Chicago Cubs Free Agents

Now that the World Series is over and baseball season is officially over it is time to think about next season. Players have until 15 days after the season (World Series) ends to file for free agency. During those 15 days the clubs can exclusively talk to their free agents to be. The Cubs free agents are Reed Johnson, John Grabow, Rich Harden, Kevin Gregg, and the often injured Chad Fox.

Out of the Cubs five free agents Reed Johnson, Rich Harden, and Kevin Gregg seem to be gone. The Cubs don’t have any interest in Reed Johnson because of his bad back and even though he seems to be healthy now, they just don’t seem to like him. Even when he was healthy, Lou seemed to not play him much. Rich Harden was injured way too much and bad towards the end of the season. The Cubs have many other options internally and want to move on from an injury prone pitcher who barley can go 5 innings in every start. They want to find a more durable pitcher who can go deeper into games. Kevin Gregg was terrible and they have better internal options at closer.

That leaves John Grabow and Chad Fox. John Grabow they seem to like even though he walks a lot of batters. Even though many left handed pitchers walks a lot of batters, so it is hard to find someone who doesn’t. They need a dependable left handed pitcher and Grabow was that guy while he was in Chicago since being traded from the Pirates before the trade deadline. I am not a big John Grabow fan and would like them see go after other players for the money they would have to sign him for. Chad Fox they keep singing to minor league deals. So even though his career seems to be done, they have signed him to minor league deals after I said that before so who knows. I like Reed Johnson and he is the only free agent the Cubs have I would like to see them re-sing.

Why did BJ Ryan get released?

I heard that Ryan asked for his release because his velocity was down and the sharpness of his slider was completely gone. Looking up his minor league stats, Ryan pitched 5.2 hitless innings in the minors. He did walk 5 and struck out 4, but he had hitless stuff. I think he asked for his release based on the Cubs acquiring two loogies, John Grabow and Tom Gorzelanny, as opposed to thinking he's done. At least he's thrown a baseball in the past 3 year, unlike one Mark Prior