Presenting the 2025 Chicago Cubs as National League contenders
By Bill Felber
What would a Chicago Cubs contender look like in 2025?
When he unloaded the heart of the team at last July’s trade deadline, Chicago Cubs president Jed Hoyer famously declared that the club did not intend to give up on this season.
Given the team’s 11-19 start, that was obviously wishful thinking. Thirty games into the season, the Cubs are being outscored by an average of nearly a half run per game with team OPS and ERAs both in the lower third of the National League.
Still, it might be fun to look forward a couple of seasons and imagine what the next Chicago Cubs championship contender may look like.
After all, plenty of recently successful teams have turned their fortunes around in three or four years.
Any list of such teams would begin with the Atlanta Braves, who went from 72-90 in 2017 to World Series winners in 2021. The San Francisco Giants were eight games under .500 in 2019; in 2021 they won 107 games.
If the Braves and Giants can do it, there’s no reason why the Cubs could not also turn their fortunes around in a span of a few seasons. What’s needed is a productive farm system, some sagacious work at the free agent market, and maybe a winning trade or two.
One thing’s for certain; a contending Cubs team in 2025 won’t look much like the current Cubs team. There likely aren’t more than four or five regulars on the current roster who will be a part of that next great Cubs team.
But since projecting future success logically begins with the existing core, that’s the place to begin. Which current Cubs could plausibly be regulars on a contending club in 2025?