As that child says in that very old meme: is this real life? So lame. But this is in my head.
It’s how shocked I am this morning to see it reported that the Cubs are signing a legitimate free agent right now for what will, presumably, be a real contract costing real dollars:
Free agent Joc Pederson’s external defender in agreement with the Cubs, pending the physical examination, sources said @TheAthletic.
– Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) January 29, 2021
Nothing about the Cubs off-season so far, from not bidding to sales and avoiding reasonable past hires to failure to bring Jon Lester back, despite his desire to return in a cheap deal, would have told you that they were in the market for a business like this. Not that it looks like a HUGE subscription, but it will cost them real money.
Pederson, 28, will remind many people of Kyle Schwarber if you just look at the strikingly similar lines of statistics so far in their careers:
And indeed, in many ways, Pederson looks like he will be a replacement for Schwarber in the left field. Powerful left-handed baton that you will have to battle at times, and with some offensive advantages not yet realized, coming out of a fall of 2020? Similar.
However, there are important differences. On the one hand, Pederson can play all over the field and, on the left, he really qualifies as a great defender. Schwarber, with all his work out there, has become merely “acceptable”. If Ian Happ should be in the middle of the field, where he is still developing, it will be much better for the general defense in the external field if he is a guy like Pederson on the left than Schwarber.
Another important difference? Since 2017, Pederson has really become something of a near-contact hitter. Surprising, given his profile, but on these more than 1,400 plate appearances, he reached 3% less often than the league average. Yes, this is a contact update.
Pederson has also been a little more consistently productive, without ever having a monster season:
Another plus here? Pederson had a drop in the regular season of 2020, but exploded during the Dodgers’ postseason for the title, hitting .382 / .432 / .559 in 37 PAs, which if you consider that with his 138 regular season PAs, it would give a very normal season for him. That’s the deal with these short season statistics.
The downside here is that Pederson has become virtually unusable against other lefties. For his career, he only hits .191 / .266 / .310 against left-handers (59 wRC +), and at this point, where you may have seen some signs of hope that Schwarber could be a full-time guy, there really isn’t those signs (that I’m aware of) with Pederson. He’s a platoon guy, all right. Pair it with Phillip Ervin or Michael Hermosillo and you will have a great general production of the place.
Early.
UPDATE: if this is the full scope of the deal, it’s cheap:
Joc Pederson is under a one-year, $ 7 million contract with the Chicago Cubs, sources told ESPN. First with the agreement was @Ken_Rosenthal.
– Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) January 29, 2021
Remember that Schwarber was designed to get more than that in arbitration when the Cubs decided not to bid on him. Then Schwarber raised $ 10 million from Nationals ($ 7 million in salary, $ 3 million in a mutual option purchase). So, at first glance, it looks like the Cubs got the most suitable player in the smallest deal. I love Schwarber at all the appropriate levels, but this seems like a good tradeoff, considering all things.