It’s April 21, and I wasn’t really expecting the Chicago Cubs to call up Matt Mervis until at least May, but after reading the latest in The Athletic, it sure does sound like the team has no plans to call up the first baseman anytime soon.
If you missed it by the way, Mervis hit his fourth home run during the first game of the Iowa Cubs doubleheader in Buffalo on Thursday. He came pretty close to breaking a car window with this monster home run.
In 15 games at Triple-A this season, Mervis has posted a .961 OPS, and he now has 14 walks to only 12 strikeouts to go along with his four home runs, 15 RBI and 18 runs scored. By the way, Mervis is doing this while pitchers are throwing him strikes less than half the time.
Meanwhile, Trey Mancini and Eric Hosmer have produced the third lowest offensive production at first base for a team in MLB. And I’ve mentioned it before, it is bad look to the other players to sign veteran guys like the Cubs did and then almost immediately dump them. I get it, Hosmer, even at a league minimum salary, wasn’t going to be DFA’d after three bad weeks and Mancini isn’t going anywhere with his guaranteed $7 million salary this year and another $7 million waiting for him in 2024.
But reading the latest from Patrick Mooney makes it sound like Jed Hoyer is going to give these guys a lot more time at first base before thinking about calling up Mervis.
Via The Athletic.
Promoting Mervis from Triple-A Iowa is simply not under consideration while the Cubs are riding the momentum from their strong start to the season (11-7). Giving some level of assurance to Eric Hosmer and Trey Mancini before signing those free agents — and then turning on them in April — is not a good way of doing business. Mervis is not on the 40-man roster, another factor as the Cubs try to manage their talent across a 162-game schedule.
“At some point, Matt’s going to impact the Cubs,” Hoyer said. “There’s no question. When that is, I don’t know. But we’re aware that certainly he can have an impact here.”
The Cubs are off to a better start than the majority of fans around baseball thought they were capable of and they’ve been carried by solid pitching, good defense and after sweeping the Oakland A’s, the top scoring offense in the National League. But they’ve been getting by through this point of the season because the Cubs are getting incredible stretches from Nico Hoerner, Dansby Swanson, Ian Happ, Patrick Wisdom and Cody Bellinger.
I’m sure those guys will have great streaks throughout the season, but in the long run every team is going to need some thump in the lineup to get through rough times. I’m sorry, but Eric Hosmer just isn’t a guy who can provide that and the Cubs have a 25-year-old dominating Triple-A pitching.
But who knows, maybe that quote from Hoyer was simply him not trying to tip his hand and show support for the two veteran players that are currently off to a bad start in 2023. Nothing wrong with that either. However, in a season where the Cubs are trying to compete and get back to the postseason, you would certainly like to see moves that would increase the chances of that happening.
Just this week I was already thinking about Mervis making his MLB debut on May 1, against the Washington Nationals. I guess I’ll have to rethink that timeline and hopefully the Cubs don’t miss out on the playoffs because they waited a few weeks too long to call up their MLB-ready slugger from Triple-A.
