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Our annual feature of the Cubs’ 40-man roster #Cubs #MLB

Last year:

After averaging everything according to various projections, the Cubs’ season record came out to approximately 87-75 after a little consideration of our trusty napkins and some minor mental gymnastics. Reality was kinder to our Cubs and their final record was 92-70, good enough to get the Cubs into the postseason, where they dismissed the San Diego Padres and were outshined by the Milwaukee Brewers in the NLDS.

Gone are Kyle Tucker and many others. The Cubs signed Alex Bregman to a spendy deal and traded for Edward Cabrera, steps toward assembling a deeper and higher-floor squad.

This particular edition of the annual profiles isn’t results-driven, as last year’s was. I just wanted to see if the predictive ‘data’ would hold up. Some people’s stats were ‘in the ballpark’ but most of them weren’t even in the neighborhood.

I will provide predicted stats for everyone if you want to compile for your own reasons.

The Chicago Cubs are a team that is built around ‘chemistry’, more so than most squads. A lo of them have bonded over their religion and have been quite open about that. A good few have their own social media presences. Ian Happ has a popular podcast — we feature it here often, as it’s very good. Dansby Swanson and Justin Steele have YouTube channels. PCA is seen about town — he and Caleb Williams were seen to be having a great time at the Blackhawks game Monday night. Alex Bregman looks to be an up-front kind of leader, which should aid in that chemical experiment.

Something didn’t click with Tucker. I never had the feeling he wanted to be back. I suspect he told the Cubs early that he wanted to test the market, and I also think that his personality didn’t mesh, for whatever reason.

The 26-man roster hasn’t been set yet, so there’s considerable liquidity, and so we’ll present players by position rather than batting order, as presented in Al’s last article on the subject, just to make things tidy (with the same restrictions/qualifications). This list will be updated with links when those pages are published, as we did last year, and we’ll add the players from the 40-man roster after the 26-man roster has solidified. Profiles are planned to be daily, but that is of course subject to change.