Spring training 2025: Why it is a decisive season for Cubs

Mesa, Arizona – Three and a half years after the decision to implement her major and Minor League service plans for trading 2021 MLB, the Chicago Cubs believe that this is the season that she should pay out with a playoff appearance.

The Cubs have not hidden their feeling of urgency that has separated from the new winter this winter. From the movements that the front office made, to what the team in Camp reported, Chicago has one thing in mind: play baseball for the first time for half a decade.

“I think we are in a competitive window,” said Jed Hoyer, President of the Baseball operations when the Cubs reported this week. “I think we got better every year. I think.”

If you enter the heart of the fact that you believe that you are your next conflict window, the Cubs do not spend the Los Angeles Dodgers and New York Mets (hence a slower reconstruction after they have continued from the 2016 championship), but but They are not the Pittsburgh Pirates or Milwaukee Brewers. The Cubs were one of nine teams with a salary statement that exceeded the luxury tax limit of last season, and six of these teams reached the post -season. The Cubs did not belong to them, and while the property wants that to change in 2025, they were outbided by the Boston Red Sox for the remaining Free Agent Alex Bregman.

The team is still littered with players of $ 20 million, even without Bregman, like the newly acquired outfield Kyle Tucker, whose arrival signaled the shift in the strategy this winter. The CUBs exchanged three players, including a design selection opposite in the first round, against the early Free Agent Tucker.

“You do not trade for Kyle Tucker if you don’t feel like you have a really strong team this year,” said General Manager Carter Hawkins. “And so I would surely say that we have improved the year about the year in relation to the talent level that is on the field-and in the over three years in which I was here, this is certainly the most talented team that we have. ” I had. “

The projection systems agree with predictions of up to 87 (ESPN-Bet) to 90 victories (Pecota) and a national league-stock 84.9 victories, which according to Bradford Doolittle von ESPN give them a chance of 39.3% to win. Regardless of whether you can achieve the highest projections, the team is prepared to make a leap forward in Craig Consell’s second year as a manager after two seasons.

“It should feel that time all the time,” said Cotunell to ESPN at the beginning of this week. “From this perspective, I am pleased that we have high expectations.

“If you act against a great player and he has another year in his contract, it says a lot.”

Consell admitted that the team had “rebuilt a few things” after acting the former stars Anthony Rizzo, Kris Bryant and Javier Baez in 2021. The process has taken up a large part of the five -year contract Hoyer after Theo Epstein resigned in November 2020. With this season, Hoyer is aware of the consequences of his future this year.

“I’ve been here for 14 years and generally didn’t have much uncertainty in my career,” he said last weekend. “And so I think that there is a measure of fear with uncertainty. I think that would be a lie to say that this is not the case.”

This feeling was not lost in his handpicked manager. It was not long ago that Hoyer shocked the baseball world when he plucked the respected country of the division competitor Milwaukee and made him the richest manager. Now Hoyer’s fate – at least partially – depends on the fact that Consell will get the best out of the team that the front office built.

“In my opinion, it is fun,” said Punsell. “It offers a lot of clarity. And I said that. It’s like ‘let’s go.’ I think it sees you a lot of clarity how you do things.

As the position players of the Cubs report in Camp on Friday, this could do a playoff caliber season in Chicago.

The stars have to play like stars

Despite the talent that affects Triple-A and a new group of deep players on the Major League duty roster, Consell cleared that his best players had to wear the day. Perhaps this is the case with every squad, but with a team that is projected in the mid-1980s, which is often located near the bar for the playoff entry, there is little space for the lower service.

“Everything is important if you try to achieve additional victories,” said Counell. “You get it from wherever you can. Any decision to add … We will rely on our regular guests. We need the production of our regular guests offensive and defensive.”

That wasn’t always the case last season. The high -priced Shortstop Dansby Swanson may have lost the Gold Glove Award with his game in April and then dropped the plate together in the middle of the season. Swanson fought against a sports hernia injury that he only disclosed after the season, so that his increase is getting a little slower this spring. The same applies to the second Baseman Nico Hoerner, who operates on the flexion shield on his litter arm. He was able to miss a few days at the beginning of the season. Both are counted, especially when Rookie Matt Shaw is the starting baseman.

In the outer field, Ian Happ has enlarged reliable 115 to 120 ops+ season, while the dynamic midfielder Pete Crow -Armstrong can only find out how dangerous his skills can be. And if this is the year in which Seiya Suzuki – now the designated Schlagmann – can put together a solid six months, the Cubs could explode.

But the key to the line -up will undoubtedly be Tucker. He has the ability to influence a game in a way that no other Cub can – and it comes in his free agent season.

Before they exchanged Tucker, Hoyer raised the eyebrows when he said that his players had to “exceed” the expectations and the fans had to ask themselves to ask why the team not only acquired players with higher blankets. Now that the club has one, it needs the best version of him, others fulfill their roles. It is a good crime that could be great when it clicks.

Who is in third place?

Bregman was not one of the main goals of the Cubs that entered the low season, so they may not be excessively disappointed or surprised that he is not in their team. But the fans played his potential fit in the third basis when playing the winter. At least until Wednesday evening, when Bregman signed a three-year contract with $ 120 million with the Red Sox.

Adding Bregman would have pushed these projection models over 90 wins and gave the Cubs a clear path to the post -season. The road to October remains with Shaw, the likely opening day, third Baseman, but the Cubs believe that it could open some eyes in the league.

According to Kiley McDaniel from ESPN, Shaw is the view of number 23 in the entire baseball, which enters the season, but a little under sizes for the hot corner. With 5-foot-9 he has power, which would certainly play on the second basis, but he will rely on ensuring that he will take pop games on a corner.

Michael Busch (who scored 21 Homer in 152 games last season) is also on the smaller side for his position in the other Infield corner as a 6-foot 1-first basis.

“It’s not the largest group in the corners,” said a scout. “But that doesn’t mean they couldn’t beat. Busch exceeded some expectations last year.”

If you do not have traditional slugers in the corners, this also means that the real power hits in the team – Tucker, Swanson, Suzuki and Happ – will be left even more.

The bullpen must deliver

The Cubs blown six games that they entered the ninth inning last season – the third in the baseball. Six is ​​also exactly the number of games that Chicago ended behind the third NL Wild Card team. When overhauling her Bullpen for 2025, the urgency to reduce this number came by adding experience.

The Cubs acquired five pitchers – Ryan Pressly, Eli Morgan, Ryan Brasier, Matthew Boyd and Caleb Thielbar – who took over the hill in the playoffs in the last two seasons, and four of them set up last October.

“When I looked at the squad in spring training this year compared to last year, I think that was number 1,” said Pitching coach Tommy Hottovy. “It is not just the number of bodies, but the number of jugs of the Major League caliber that were there and did.”

Pressly, who was acquired from the Houston Astros at the end of the last month, is the biggest name and could play a crucial role for a bullpen who, after a failure after another, looked for a competent one after the other. This winter there were many options of the ninth inn on the Free Agent market, but budget restrictions together with Chicago’s general feelings for many of them outside of Tanner Scott (who decided the Dodgers about the Cubs last month) led to a trade for Press.

“I want to be someone that all of these boys can rely on,” said Pressly in his introductory press conference. “I would like to be this type for you all the questions you have on or outside the field.”

Consell added: “If you set up in these situations, your team is 10 minutes away from a win. It feels right for boys who fit in this situation, rightly assign boys with experience.”

With a revised line-up and a bullpen that enters a decisive season, the Cubs hope that they are only a smooth ninth ininning of enough victories to be one of the last teams in October.