Craig Counsell has some thoughts

Craig Counsell met the media on Sunday to kick off his second spring training with the Cubs. It's comforting listening to him talk because he's a whole lot smarter than Jed and Carter. I'm not sure if he's smarter than them individually or combined, but 0+0 is 0, so I guess it doesn't matter.

Craig is just a lot cooler in these situations, too. It could be that way because the manager meets the media every day, most of the time twice a day, and the president of baseball shenanigans only does it once a homestand. But you get both well thought out answers from him, and he's much better at giving you some kind of an answer when he gets asked a question that he can't, or knows he shouldn't answer.

Take for example this bizarre sequence in the Jed and Carter press conference, also held on Sunday in Mesa.

Patrick Mooney asked Jed whether the budget Tom Ricketts has given him for player payroll is sufficient to add Alex Bregman and if so what it will take to get "the deal over the line."

"Yeah, obviously can't comment on individual players."

Then another reporter said, "You could on him, he's a free agent."

And Jed did a strange Joe Biden-esque whisper thing and said, "I can't talk about free agents."

But can he?

General managers have been hiding behind the, "I can't talk about another team's players" for generations, because that would be tampering.

But more and more they claim now that they can't talk about free agents, and they claim that it's in the collective bargaining agreement.

Is it?

Sort of. But not the way they want us to think it is.

There's a little known codicil to the Faber College constitution...I mean, the MLB CBA, which gives the dean...I mean, the commissioner unlimited power to preserve order in time of baseball emergency.

Wait, no that's Animal House. Shit. Here, watch this while I look it up.

A-ha! It's right here in the CBA. In attachment 49 (not making this up), starting on page 329 and going for three pages, there are rules that spell out what people who work for teams (like, say, Jed Hoyer) are allowed to say and not say when it comes to free agency.

It's not to protect the player. Of course not. It's to protect the teams from being charged with collusion. And for good reason, because those fuckers are colluding left and right all the live long day.

In a nutshell, here's what Jedward isn't allowed to say about someone like Alex Bregman. Bregman, mind you, is not employed by any team right now, which is why he's a free agent.

Jed can't talk about, "the value of an unsigned free agent, or about possible or contemplated terms for an unsigned free agent, regardless of whether discussions have occurred."

So, Jed could not have answered Mooney's question, "He wants $30 million a year for six years, if he'd come down to say, $25 for this year with a mutual option for next year, I'd sign that little sumbitch in a heartbeat!"

And that doesn't matter if Jed has talked to Scott Boras about Bregman or not. Basically, all Jed can't do is talk about the salary demands of a free agent, how much he'd be willing to pay, what he's heard other teams are offering or how long a potential deal might be. He can't say he has no interest in signing a specific free agent or that a specific free agent might be injured. Otherwise? Go nuts.

Could he say, "We'd really like to sign Alex Bregman"? Yes. He could say that.

He could say, "Bregman's a good player and right now if Matt Shaw bombs at third we're going to have to go with Gage Workman or Jon Berti and I'm going to blow my brains out." That would be fine. It might earn Jed a trip to a social worker for his own safety, but he could say it and not get in trouble.

This all came up last offseason when Shohei's agents were threatening teams that if they divulged how his free agent process was going (i.e. if they had met or going to meet with him) that Shohei would scratch them off his list. His list only had one name on it, which was apparent when the only team that violated it was the Dodgers, when Dave Roberts let it slip that they'd met with him, and he signed with them anyway.

Teams were trying to stay on Shohei's good side by claiming the CBA prohibited them from talking about it. So sportswriters fired up a PDF version of the CBA and did some ctrl-F'ing to figure out the GMs were full of shit.

Attachment 49 even gives specific examples of what you can't say.

The following is a non-exhaustive list of prohibited comments:
1. “Player X won’t receive anything longer than a one-year deal.”
2. “Player X is seeking more than Player Y received.”
3. “We are out on Player X.”
4. “Player X is worth at least $Y million.”
5. “Player X has contract offers from multiple Clubs.”
6. “We are unwilling to forfeit a draft selection to sign Player X.”
7. “We have concerns about Player X’s physical condition.”
8. “Player X is not worth more than $Y million, nor should he receive a contract greater than Z years.”

They even give some suggested answers (all lame) for a GM to give to a media member who has learned that an agreement has been reached (from the agent, most likely) and wants comment before the contract is actually signed.

Jed could easily have a conversation about Bregman with the media. He could talk about a potential fit, about how he's always admired that a stubby legged guy like him could turn into such a good player, etc.

Hiding behind, "I can't talk about a free agent" is just a lie. But I guess it's better than, "I don't want to talk about because I'm afraid I'm too dumb to not say something I'm not supposed to." It also becomes a handy way to avoid admitting that prohibited comments 1, 3, 6, and 8 are all true.

Counsell's Q and A was more interesting. Because he actually said things.

He reiterated that Seiya is going to DH whether he likes it or not. (Seiya does not.) And said that Seiya's had "a lot of success as a DH." That's not wrong, but Craig is clearly intimating that Seiya hits better when he DHs so this is for his own good.

But the truth is Seiya hits the same no matter if he plays the field or not.

He's slashed .266/.347/.478 as a right fielder and .298/.386/.461 as a DH. Well, see that is better. That's an .846 OPS as a DH and .825 in right. Sure, but those RF numbers include him playing through the after effects of his various oblique injuries while he was completely healthy for the vast majority of his DH at bats.

What Craig didn't tell you is that Seiya is best when he plays left. He slashed .400/.400/1.000 out there...in one career game. OK, never mind.

The fact that Seiya's production doesn't drop when he DHs is good enough for me. And Counsell said the obvious that when the other three outfielders are healthy or not slumping Seiya will DH, but guys will get hurt and guys will struggle so there will be more than enough outfield time to go around for all four.

Craig probably wants his phrasing back for one answer. He was asked about what it will take for the non-Matt Shaw prospects to earn spots during the season on the big league roster.

"Look, our young position player prospects are all finished at AAA."

Huh?

He clearly didn't mean to drop the "are" in there. He meant that last year Owen Caissie, Moises Ballesteros, Kevin Alcantara and Shaw finished the season at Iowa, so they're all close. Alcantara even got his first big league hit out of the way last September.

Craig didn't mean they're all "finished" with AAA.

Or did he?

No. He didn't.

He said the goal with the pitchers is to get all of them ready to pitch in Japan, but realistically because the games are March 18 and 19 none will be stretched out long enough to go very deep in the games. He even said that most of the pitchers came to camp early to get a head start. I'm sure that won't become an issue in September. I hope it doesn't imperil the pursuit of fifth best record in the NL in the second half for a fourth straight year.

Bruce Levine kind of pissed Craig off by asking how the Cubs could avoid being terrible on defense early in the year this year like they were last year. I give Craig credit for not saying, "Well, we're not going to have Christopher Morel at third and Yan Gomes behind the plate and Petecrow in Iowa this time."

But the Cubs were shaky in April last year. Dansby made five errors last season. Four of them came before April 30.

Nico Hoerner committed nine errors last year. Six of them came before May 4.

Morel committed three errors in the first four games of the season.

Craig thinks the Cubs should be a very good defensive team this year. He's right.

Just don't expect much from the overrated left fielder.

I joked that Seiya had arrived in camp just in time to do his annual pulling of the first oblique of the spring. But somebody beat him to it.

Maybe that's a good omen?

And the Bregman pursuit has officially reached the, "Let's really dampen expectations" phase.

Ken Rosenthal is reporting that if (when) the Cubs don't get Bregman they will pivot to 40-year-old Justin Turner, who played all of 36 games at third last year between Toronto and Seattke.

Turner did some horrible things to the Cubs in the 2017 NLCS (.333/.478/.667, 2 homers, seven RBI, walk-off homer off of John Lackey in game two).

But, he hasn't been an effective defensive player since 2019. He slugged just .383 last year in 139 games.

If the Cubs signed him I'm not sure what his role would be. He couldn't play third more than a handful of times. He's right handed so you'd be taking DH at bats away from Seiya for no good reason and not even getting a platoon advantage. I guess he'd be the righthanded guy Craig plays at first to hide Michael Busch from most lefties?

Great?

If they sign him it'll be because he's relatively cheap now (he's 40 and has no market) not because they need him for anything.

You can't warn us all that you're up against the luxury tax and then piss away money on Justin Turner.

So, I'm sure they will.