John Mozeliak has helmed the Cardinals since 2007 and was their No. Brian Sabean has run the Giants since 1996. Brian Cashman has been the Yankees general manager since 1998. If you look at the consistently successful franchises across baseball, you’ll see unfailing continuity in the front office.
#Cubs shortstop 2016 series
Or maybe even World Series MVP Ben Zobrist’s four-year $56 million agreement.įinding a group of young stars is easier said than done, of course, but investing in scouting and player development can pay off with big free-agent signings down the road. Or Jason Heyward’s (thus-far disappointing) eight-year $184 million deal. If the Cubs hadn’t built a young, cheap core, they couldn’t have afforded Lester’s six-year $155 million contract. For a big-market team like the Cubs, those bargains allow you to over-spend elsewhere on the roster. Rizzo, an MVP candidate, made $5.3 million.įor a small-market team, those kinds of low-cost assets keep you afloat. Hendricks, a Cy Young candidate, made $541,000. In a year in which he’ll likely win NL MVP, Bryant made $652,000, according to. Young players are the most valuable assets in baseball for one prevailing reason: They’re cheap.
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Use free agents to supplement homegrown talent Epstein’s strategy of collecting young position players and adding pitchers later (which his former team, the Red Sox, has also found success with lately) worked to a tee. So the Cubs stocked up on early-20s position players and decided they’d figure out the pitching later.Īs it turned out, Arrieta and Hendricks emerged as stars and Jon Lester and John Lackey agreed to sign in free agency. No young player is totally projectable, but while young pitchers blow out their arms all the time, hitters tend to be a safer bet. The Cubs were banking on the dependability of position-player prospects relative to their pitching counterparts. Meanwhile, they had no can’t-miss hurlers anywhere in the organization. Most analysts figured it was time for Epstein to find an ace starting pitcher.īut not only did the Cubs draft Schwarber that June, they traded for Russell the following month, giving them another shortstop in an organization loaded with them. At that point, the Cubs already had a stockpile of young position-player studs: Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, Starlin Castro, Javier Baez, Jorge Soler, Albert Almora. When the Cubs drafted Schwarber in 2014, most observers were confused. Build with hitters, figure out pitching later No one likes to lose in the short term, but Epstein showed that sometimes the quickest way to the top is to visit the bottom.
Unlike many bad teams with a handful of established players, the Cubs were entirely unafraid to dismantle their roster with an eye toward the future. and Justin Grimm, all acquired during the first three years of the Epstein Administration in the types of veteran-for-prospect trades rebuilding teams sometimes balk at. In 20, the Cubs also got major contributions from Jake Arrieta, Addison Russell, Kyle Hendricks, Pedro Strop, Carl Edwards Jr.
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