The Cubs beat
Kris Bryant on Wednesday. The question
now becomes, will they lose because they won?
Bryant filed a
grievance against the team over the question of service time. The Cubs delayed calling him up in 2015—this
despite a stellar spring—until they were assured of an extra year of
control. One day earlier and Bryant
would’ve been a free agent at the end of the upcoming season. Now, if they want to trade Bryant, the Cubs
can offer a player with two years of control before he reaches free agency.
Odds are a
player who files a grievance against his team won’t sign an extension with
them. With Scott Boras representing
Bryant, raise those odds to another power.
It’s odd how differently the Cubs and White Sox treat their young
players. The Cubs don’t make much of an
effort to wrap up them up early while the Sox swear by it.
The Sox have
done this most recently with Eloy Jimenez and Luis Robert, but they also did it
with Adam Eaton, Chris Sale and Jose Quintana.
Those deals paid dividends when it came time to rebuild. The Nationals, Red Sox and Cubs were inclined
to part with young talent—including Lucas Giolito; Yoan Moncada and Michael Kopech;
and Jimenez and Dylan Cease—because the players they got in exchange were not
only until control for a number of years but signed to affordable contracts to
boot. To the best of my knowledge, the Cubs haven’t
pursued the same strategy with players like Bryant, Javy Baez or Willson
Contreras.
Maybe if the
Ricketts had done that instead of starting a Cubs-centric cable network, they wouldn’t
be crying poor like they have since 2019.
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