What was expected?

After finishing 2023 with a record of 83-79 and narrowly missing out on a Wild Card berth by just one game, the Cubs largely decided to just run it back with the squad that brought them there – including re-signing Cody Bellinger to a 3-year, $80-million dollar contract after he seemed to rejuvenate his career in his first year in a Cubs uniform.

The only other significant on-field addition came with the offseason signing of international free agent pitcher Shota Imanaga, though the initial thoughts were that he’d probably perform at more of a 3rd- or 4th-starter level. There was also a trade for the Dodgers’ Michael Busch that we’ll touch on below.

The most major shift in expectations came on the managerial side of things instead, with Chicago successfully prying Craig Counsell away from the NL Central rival Brewers after he had spent the last eight years as the bench boss in Milwaukee.

With some youth pieces starting to come into their own and a new, steady hand to guide them, contention for a Wild Card spot was well within reach.

How did it go?

When I said the Cubs decided to just run it back, it turns out I meant it almost literally. Despite a borderline Cy Young-caliber season from Imanaga, the Cubs ended up with an identical record of 83-79 – but this time finishing six games back of a Wild Card playoff spot.

A regression in Bellinger’s bat played a significant part, plus presumptive ace Justin Steele pitched only 134.2 innings after reaching 173.1 the year prior.

Outside of that, the status quo mostly stayed in place with each player that experienced a breakout offsetting a player who was struggling.

The bullpen proved to be a thorn in their side all season too. After reliably tallying 22 saves with a 2.67 ERA in 2023, Adbert Alzolay managed only 17.1 innings before blowing out his elbow and requiring Tommy John surgery, finishing his season with a 4.67 ERA and only four saves. That caused a ripple effect throughout the bullpen and the team never quite got things sorted, as shown by their 26 blown saves – which would rank just two blown chances off of 2nd worst in the league.

(But at least they weren’t the South Siders, who were the “proud” owners of a league-leading 36 blown saves!)

Fantasy Stud?

How could it be anyone other than Shota Imanaga?

Largely overshadowed during the free agent signing period by fellow Japanese starter Yoshinobu Yamamoto and his massive contract with the Dodgers, Imanaga was a bit of an afterthought heading into the season but immediately started turning heads by firing zeroes across his first three starts, pitching 15.1 straight scoreless innings. What was expected to be just a hot start didn’t end up fading either, as it took until his 10th start to give up more than two earned runs in an outing.

In fact, over the entire season, Imanaga only allowed more than three earned runs in a start on three separate occasions – one which was a seven run blow up and the other being an even worse 10-spot – to end his rookie year with a shiny 2.91 ERA over 173.1 IP.

Though I’m usually loathe to cherrypick outings and statistics like this normally, let’s have some fun and see what Shota’s line would have been had those two blemishes on his record not counted.

Pretty impressive! But is it sustainable? We’ll dive deeper into Shota’s standout debut in the Player Breakdowns below…

Fantasy Dud?

… Chrisaac Moredes? … Isaapher Parel?

Whatever portmanteau you choose, it’s probably a little bit unfair to solely stick Isaac Paredes with the label of Fantasy Dud as he only spent two months of the season as a Cub. But considering he was traded 1-for-1 from the Rays for Christopher Morel – the true heir to the throne – and continued to carry the mantle of being the team’s most disappointing hitter by slashing .223/.325/.307 across 212 PAs post-trade, he gets the “honor” of taking home this infamous award.

While still with Tampa Bay prior to the trade, Paredes was in the midst of a relatively strong season overall, posting a wRC+ that was 32-percent better than league average, on the strength of a robust walk rate (12.1%) and reasonable strikeout rate only a few points higher (15.9%). That pushed his OPS to .792, which would have almost exactly split the difference between his OPS marks of .840 and .740 in 2022 and 2023. His ISO tumbled to .190 after sitting above .230 the prior two years, but he still managed to launch 16 longballs, putting him on pace for roughly 25 over the course of the full season.

But Paredes’ pull-happy ways did not find the confines of Wrigley Field to be friendly upon his arrival, with the park dimensions doing no favors to his batting line. As mentioned above, he put forth an OPS of just .632 the rest of the way – and it looked even worse under the hood, as his ISO cratered to a paltry .084, to pair with just three home runs. His Barrel% also dropped exactly in half, from 5.4% to 2.7%, but his Hard-Hit% weirdly jumped from 25.9% prior to the trade, to 29.5% afterwards. However, that coincided with a 4.6% increase in his groundball rate, so it seems he was getting on top of the ball for hard groundouts more than before.

This wasn’t an entirely unexpected downturn either – at least for those who dug deep into Paredes’ Statcast numbers around expected home runs as the Wrigley Field aspect loomed large immediately.

The takeaway from this is Paredes’ will likely continue to struggle to tally home runs while donning a Cubs uniform. Had last year’s 31-home run season been played exclusively at his home park of Tropicana Field, Paredes’ batted ball data tells us he would be expected to hit 30 home runs. As negligible a drop as you can find.

But if that same season was played at Wrigley? Only 23 of his hits are clearing the fence in that locale. Same for 2024, where he would see six of his 19 shaved off.

In other words, I know he just arrived – but get him out of there ASAP!

Fantasy Surprise?

In order to prevent Imanaga from more-or-less sweeping the positive awards, let’s give a little love to two-time Tommy John survivor Jameson Taillon.

At his peak, Taillon was well-regarded but never quite reached the heights of a top-25 starter, in large part due to injuries. Even being generous and removing the 2019 season in which he pitched only 37.1 innings before going under the knife and having his UCL repaired, Taillon has averaged just 153 innings per year. In the modern era of MLB, that workload is only slightly below average but at the time, it stuck him with a “injury prone” label he’s had trouble shaking since.

But in his age-32 season, Taillon found a groove, posting the second-lowest ERA of his career (3.27) over his third-most innings ever (165.1). All the more impressively, he managed to do so while pitching with the lowest fastball velocity he’s experienced in the majors, averaging 92.3 MPH – a dip from 93.7 MPH last year and 94.1 MPH the year prior. That drop in velocity naturally lead to a decrease in the pitch’s put-away ability as well, as players went from whiffing on the pitch 20.6% of the time in 2023, but only 14.7% of the time in 2024.

So was Taillon just lucky? Certainly a little, but it wasn’t all smoke and mirrors… Once again, a deeper dive into Taillon awaits in the player breakdowns below.

Player Breakdowns:

Hitters

Seiya Suzuki – OF

I think it’s safe to say at this point that Suzuki has quietly become one of the more reliably solid outfielders in the game, with next to zero fanfare surrounding him. In his three seasons since coming over from Japan, Suzuki is the owner of a 129 wRC+, making him a well-above league average hitter and his 2024 was even a step above, reaching a wRC+ of 138 while launching 21 long balls and tallying 16 stolen bases.

The 16 swipes were a nice addition to Suzuki’s profile, as he otherwise profiles as an upper-tier power hitter archetype. He ranks in the 91st percentile for Hard-Hit%, in the 87th for Average Exit Velocity and he follows those power metrics with strong plate discipline, evidenced by a 94th percentile chase rate and 80th percentile BB%. He also exhibits above-average bat control, with a Sweet-Spot% of 38.8%, good for the top 10 percent of the league.

That said, Suzuki does have a potential glaring red flag in his profile. I’m going to post a portion of it. See if you can spot it.

If you guessed I was referring to his BABIP, congratulations – you win $5 FAAB!

A lot of people will immediately revert to their initial introduction to “Advanced Stats 101” and assume that an elevated BABIP is simply a byproduct of good fortune and nothing else – but as we’ve slowly learned over the years, there’s still a major component of skill at play and it should be considered as repeatable (within reason). Still, his .341 mark in 2023 would have been above league-average – so what caused him to jump all the way up to .370 this year?

The most obvious profile change I can find is a drop in contact outside the zone (O-Contact%) from 64.1% last season to 56.3% in 2024. That leads me to thinking Suzuki may have made a distinct choice to avoid chasing bad pitches outside the zone that can lead to soft contact – and inherently, a lower batting average on balls put in play.

However, Suzuki’s overall Chase% actually went up a couple decimal points this year and he also continued to swing at pitches outside the zone at a similar rate (40.9% in 2023, 39.6% in 2024).

So what does all that tell us? It seems Suzuki did get a bit fortunate in his results this season and Statcast feels the same, with his actual stats (.283 AVG / .482 SLG / .365 wOBA) trailing a bit of distance behind his expected rates (.258/.463/.348) after they sat nearly in line with each other last season.

Still, even with a slight regression likely to come, Suzuki has solidified himself as an All-Star caliber bat – even if the general public has yet to recognize him as one.

Ian Happ – OF

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