When the 2021 regular season ends, few front offices will have as much flexibility – or as much expectation to confront – as Jed Hoyer’s Chicago Cubs operation.
Since the trades of the team’s core at the end of July, Hoyer has declared that the club is not undertaking a rebuild as much as it is anticipating a quick winter restructuring with an eye to success.
Financially, the Cubs are in their most flexible position in more than a decade. Hoyer will approach the 2021-22 winter with firm commitments to only three returnees: $22 million to Jayson Heyward, $14 million to Kyle Hendricks, and $2.51 million to infielder David Bote.
Hoyer will also have to make decisions regarding eight arbitration-eligible players: Rafael Ortega, Willson Contreras, Ian Happ, Rex Brothers, Adrian Sampson, Ildemaro Vargas, Brad Wieck, and Jonathan Holder.
But among those eight, Chicago Cubs fans really only care about Contreras, Happ, and Ortega.
At most, the core of the returning Cubs team is likely to cost $50 million, a relative pittance for a club that has made a habit of spending in the $200 million range. It means that if he chooses to do so, Hoyer can be a big player in the free agent market.
To do so, however, he and the other members of the team’s front office must first decide what talent they’ve already uncovered in 2021 that could be useful in 2022. At the same time, they must identify which members of the current roster have shown they’re either not up to the challenge of the Majors or have resumes that pose too many questions to rely on.
A dozen regulars and starting pitchers should draw particular scrutiny. Here’s a look at how Hoyer and his staff could – and should – assess each of the dozen.