Talkin’ Cubs Live – Cubs vs. Rangers – 03/19/13

I definitely agree. The injuries to Lake, Jackson (minor), and Almora have already caused issues in depth, because it creates a trickle-down effect.

And this just further illustrates the lack of quality depth position-talent wise that the Cubs are facing. I agree that pitching depth is also an issue, but with the likes of Garza (if he ever returns healthy), Samardzija, Jackson, Vizcaino, T. Wood, and then you have fringe guys like Feldman, Baker, and Villanueva as fillers, but the former 5 guys are the base of the rotation, and likely will be for a few years to come. If something happens to them (already did to Garza), then the Cubs better hope guys like Paniagua, Whitenack, P. Johnson, Jensen, etc. really pick up pace this year. The pen and position talent are real weaknesses for the Cubs this year.

Think about what happens if Soriano, DeJesus, Rizzo, or Castro go down. How about Fujikawa, Russell, and Marmol?

The Cubs really don’t have much to choose from in either of those areas.

The way I see it, starting pitching should be the least of their worries, and that’s precisely how they designed it this year taking chances on Villanueva, Baker, and Feldman, and then at the end of last year acquiring an injured Vizcaino.

The one thing they didn’t do was fix the lineup. While Hairston has power and versatility in the OF, he is NOT the answer….not even close. He’s basically a .240′s and under type hitter. In fact, if you consider how well Bogusevic and Chavez have played this spring, you can see how the presence of Hairston really screwed the Cubs. He’s also well past his prime while the other two are not. I’m not saying they’d set the league on fire, but I’m just saying they’d be more exciting.

And let’s not even get into the decision to essentially give 3B to a guy like Valbuena who struggles to hit his own weight, but is the perennial king of winter ball stats it seems.

I agree that there weren’t really any options on the market for 3B (and supposedly they went hard after Keppinger), but they stood pat with Stewart and Valbuena, and rest assured, this will hurt them during the season.

I know it won’t happen, but my hope for the Cubs lineup by the time the season is over would look like this:

Jackson-CF
Castro-SS
Rizzo-1B
Lake-LF
Schierholtz-RF
Vitters-3B (yeah, I know….but hopefully he takes off this yr)
Watkins-2B
Castillo-C

I envision the Cubs trading Barney, Soriano, DeJesus, and cutting their losses with Stewart. .

I doubt it will happen, but that lineup is what I’d hope would come to fruition by September. It’d be tough to trade Barney, but the fact is, he’s a negative on offense, and has limited speed. That’s where Watkins could really help, and plus, he’s not too shabby on defense himself.