Cubs Called ‘Hot Stove’s Biggest Sleeper’ with Expensive Pitching, Corner OF Top Targets

When a person or team is called a “sleeper,” it means they are being dismissed to an extent. Whether the Cubs are like the United States after the attack on Pearl Harbor or just keep snoozing through the offseason is yet to be seen, but at least one writer believes Jed Hoyer is wide awake and ready to spend money on top-tier pitching and a corner outfielder. Of course, you may want to apply any and all caveats to Bob Nightengale calling the Cubs “the hot stove’s biggest sleeper” as the GM Meetings get underway at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas.

“Everyone lies at these things,” one GM told USA Today. “That’s what we do. You never know what to believe. Everyone says they don’t have money when they do. The truth comes out in spring training and you find out who lied the least.”

Hoyer doesn’t lie publicly so much as he just doesn’t say much of anything, and he’s done a tremendous job of keeping his plans from being leaked. That’s why you have to take anything you hear with a grain of salt, though there’s been enough smoke to make it seem plausible that the Cubs are indeed cooking something up. Nightengale wrote that rival execs believe lefty Framber Valdez and/or righty Dylan Cease could end up on the North Side, and the latter has been mentioned quite a bit elsewhere as well.

Lefty Ranger Suárez was not named in the piece, but he has been heavily linked to the Cubs and was even predicted to sign with them by two of four MLB Trade Rumors writers. Suárez feels like much more of a Cubs fit than either of the other two, and not only because he’s projected to earn at least $35 million. Predictions vary wildly depending on the outlet, but Cease and Valdez could each wind up getting well over $150 million for up to seven years. Suárez, on the other hand, is being pegged at anywhere from $90-115 million over five years.

Even if Hoyer “will be shopping in the expensive aisle” as Nightengale reports, he figures to be doing so with an eye for markdowns and flash sales. That’s how they ended up with Shōta Imanaga, who was expected to fetch north of $100 million before agreeing to a four-year, $53 million guarantee no one saw coming. That deal has now been reduced to just two years and $23.25 million by quasi-mutual decisions, freeing up both time and money even if Imanaga accepts the $22.025 million qualifying offer.

Hoyer operates kind of like a dog sitting under the table at dinner and picking up scraps as they fall to the floor before surveying the leftovers to see if someone forgot about a turkey leg or slice of ham. He’s proven adept at finding value when the market skews in a certain direction, forcing overlooked players to settle for less than what they might have hoped. If he’s going to pounce and overpay, it’s typically for an undervalued commodity like Matthew Boyd.

Of course, the flip side is that the Cubs rarely end up with free agents who possess the kinds of loud tools that lead to postseason success. Suárez is not such a pitcher, what with his 90-91 mph velocity, but he works low in the zone for the most part and is among the best pitchers in the game when it comes to limiting hard contact. He is also an elite strike-thrower, making him an excellent fit at a ballpark that has been much more pitcher-friendly over the last few seasons.

Valdez, on the other hand, has a much higher walk and gives up loads of hard contact despite one of the best groundball rates in baseball. His bowling-ball sinker does all the heavy lifting and allows him to keep the ball in the yard, so he might likewise play well at Wrigley. Cease is the clear leader when it comes to stuff, boasting a 97 mph fastball and a bullet slider that gets lots of whiffs. However, he’s got the highest walk and fly ball rates of this group by a wide margin.

I have to assume Hoyer isn’t in the mood to spend big on a fixer-upper and that the connection is more a matter of history, but I guess we’ll see. Of this particular trio, Suáez appears to best fit what the Cubs have looked for in the past. Unless they’ve finally rid themselves of their unhealthy obsession with starters who can’t crack 95 mph. Though he’s not prone to splurging, I could see Hoyer targeting another pitcher who might cost more than any of those mentioned so far.

That would be Japanese righty Tatsuya Imai, who will be among the top free-agent pitchers as soon as he is officially posted. We recently took a look at Imai, who has a blazing fastball and “wrong way” slider that should play well in MLB. The Cubs already have at least two lefties in the rotation and could really use more velocity with swing-and-miss stuff without the red flags of walks and homers. Imai has limited both in Japan and he’s more than two years younger than any other pitcher listed here, making him a nearly ideal target.

If Imai’s courtship ends up like many other Japanese pitchers not named Imanaga, a bidding war could push the Cubs out early. So as much as I dislike their MO, I could see them once again going with a fallback option. The same could be true of their reported interest in a corner outfielder, which isn’t a position of need on the surface. Ian Happ and Seiya Suzuki figure to get most of the playing time and both have no-trade clauses, so let’s stop with the calls to ship them off. Owen Caissie can spell either of them for one reason or another, making an expensive addition seem superfluous.

That remains true even if Caissie is traded as part of a package for a controllable starter, something that is entirely likely. Such a deal would open up at least one bench spot, along with the attendant playing time, for another outfielder. Nightengale says the Red Sox believe they need an upgrade over Jarren Duran, who posted 3.9 fWAR in left after a monster 6.8 fWAR season in 2024, but you don’t acquire a guy like that just to play sporadically. While he could perhaps handle right with Suzuki going back to DH, this doesn’t feel like something the Cubs would even consider.

A more likely move might be to kick the tires on Jo Adell, the former No. 10 overall pick who’s been a replacement-level player over parts of six seasons in Anaheim. He’s projected to earn $5.5 million via arbitration and has one more year remaining on his rookie deal, but he just hit 37 homers after bashing 20 the previous season, and being a righty hitter means he might not be as negatively impacted by Wrigley’s park factors.

My preference would be for the Cubs to splurge on Kyle Schwarber, but that is less likely for a number of reasons. Adell is comfortable in center and right, plus he’s logged over 650 innings in left in previous seasons. His defensive versatility and nominal payroll hit both check big boxes for the Cubs, who could use him at multiple outfield spots and DH.

In the end, they’ll probably target a lower-cost veteran who understands he’s just there to play a supporting role for a year. It should be a while yet before we see anything start to materialize, but the GM Meetings mark the real start of the offseason when it comes to moves both rumored and real.