Cubs BCB After Dark: Who gets the next extension?

It’s Wednesday night here at BCB After Dark: the coolest club for night owls, early risers, new parents and Cubs fans abroad. Come on in and sit with us. We’re all in a good mood this evening. Glad you could join us. There’s no cover charge. The dress code is casual. Bring your own beverage.

BCB After Dark is the place for you to talk baseball, music, movies, or anything else you need to get off your chest, as long as it is within the rules of the site. The late-nighters are encouraged to get the party started, but everyone else is invited to join in as you wake up the next morning and into the afternoon.

The Cubs beat the Angels today 6-2. The Cubs got a terrific pitching performance from Matthew Boyd. Nico Hoerner had three hits, including two doubles. Matt Shaw had two hits. I think we all hoped that the Cubs would be better than 3-3 at this point, but early season results are alway janky.

Speaking of Matt Shaw, yesterday evening I asked you when (or if) the team should trade Matt Shaw now that Nico Hoerner has signed an extension. The vote was pretty contentious, with 48 percent saying that Shaw should be gone by the Trade Deadline and 40 percent voting to keep him at least into next season. The rest thought that Shaw should be dealt this upcoming winter, although a potential lockout might complicate that. I didn’t mention that factor in my article.

Here’s the part where we listen to music and talk movies. You can skip ahead if you want.

Tonight we’re featuring vocalist José James on International Jazz Day in 2022. Tonight he’s signing the Bill Withers tune “Lovely Day.” Joining James is Helio Alves on piano, Brian Blade on drums, Grégoire Maret on harmonica (nice solo!), Pedrito Martinez on percussion and Mark Whitfield on bass.

I don’t have a movie to write about tonight, so I’ll just give you a few short capsules. I’ve been meaning to write about Eve’s Bayou (1997) for a while now, but with the start of the minor league season and other personal stuff I haven’t had the time. But to tide you over on that, I’ll just say that it was excellent. I hope to give it a full essay at a later date.

I also got a month of Netflix so I could see the Opening Day game (big mistake) so I’ve seen a few movies on that service that I hadn’t seen. If you didn’t tell me that A House of Dynamite (2025) was directed by Kathryn Bigelow, I would have been able to guess it immediately anyway. Her documentary-style approach is hit-and-miss with me, but here it’s mostly a hit. The script by Noah Oppenheim is also tense and, from what I’ve read from national security experts, about 95 percent accurate. That makes it all the more terrifying. I’d recommend it.

Blue Moon (2025) is mostly a acting showcase for director Richard Linklater’s longtime collaborator Ethan Hawke. Hawke is easily up for the challenge of playing Lorenz Hart on what was probably the worst night of his life, the day Oklahoma! debuted on Broadway. It’s certainly the kind of small and intimate film that they don’t make much anymore and I wish they would. Hawke deserved his Academy Award nomination for the film.

Finally, Hi, Nellie! (1934) is a Mervyn LeRoy pre-Code newspaper drama starring Paul Muni and Glenda Farrell. It’s fairly tame for pre-Code and the gimmick is that Muni’s character gets demoted to advice columnist on his newspaper for refusing to run with a corrupt machine’s attempt to slander an innocent man. So Muni has to write advice as Nellie and try to clear a man’s name to get his job back. Honestly, this one failed to keep my interest. The whole “has to be an advice columnist” thing struck me like someone being sentenced to be Jerry Seinfeld’s butler.

Feel free to share your thoughts on these films or any other ones you’ve seen recently.

Welcome back to anyone who skips the music and movies.

It’s extension season in MLB as teams rush to lock up players before we get too far into the year. As you know, the Cubs signed both Pete Crow-Armstrong and Nico Hoerner to long-term deals that will keep them in Cubbie blue until well into the 2030s. Since those years are imaginary, they might as well be lifetime deals.

Since Jed Hoyer has inked these two young stars, the natural question is “Who’s next?” Working off of this article by Tony Andracki, I’m giving you a chance to vote for which Cubs players that you would like to see given long-term deals.

The first two choices are the corner outfielders, Ian Happ and Seiya Suzuki, both of whom can be free agents after this year. Both of them are very good players. I think if either one of them would sign a one-year deal, the Cubs should do it right now. The problem with extending either or both of them is that the Cubs are already pretty much locked in at third, second and short to the point where the Cubs have to consider trading second-year player Matt Shaw for lack of playing time. Were the Cubs to sign either Happ or Suzuki to an extension, that even more limits playing time for position players coming up through the Cubs system. It also locks the Cubs into an aging starting lineup. The Cubs have Kevin Alcántara, Kane Kepley, Ethan Conrad and Josiah Hartshorn at different levels of the system. I don’t think you can count on any of them being as good as Happ or Suzuki, but it’s certainly possible that one or more of them will be.

Michael Busch is a tough one because, as Andracki notes, he’s a Scott Boras client and Boras usually, but not always, advises players to hit the free agent market. Busch is also an unusual case in that he didn’t exhaust his rookie eligibility until he was 26 and can’t become a free agent until after the 2029 season. So while you can make a case that Busch is the best hitter on the Cubs, you can also say that the Cubs have him locked up over his best years and that there’s no current rush to extend him.

The other three candidates are pitchers with a few years of control left. One is Justin Steele. You all know that Steele missed almost all of last season with elbow surgery and probably still won’t rejoin the team until around Memorial Day. Steele’s injury might make him more eager to sign an extension. On the other hand, the Cubs might want to shy away from locking him up until they know that he has successfully bounced back from surgery. Steele can become a free agent after the 2027 season, so the Cubs will have to make a decision on him soon, but not now.

Cade Horton was a big bright spot in the Cubs rotation in his rookie season last year. He finished second in Rookie of the Year balloting and he certainly looked great in his first start this year. But Horton can’t become a free agent until after the 2031 season and he’s got an iffy injury history dating back to his college days at Oklahoma. Do the Cubs want to make a big commitment to Horton without knowing whether his arm can withstand the strain of 160 to 180 innings a year?

Finally there’s new Cub Edward Cabrera, who becomes a free agent after the 2028 season. Cabrera was simply outstanding in his Cubs debut and he’s been a popular pick to emerge into stardom this season. In such a case, it might be wise to lock up Cabrera now before his price goes way up.

On the other hand, Cabrera has a shaky injury history as well and has only been able to throw more than 100 innings once in his career. His career-high is only 137 innings, which came last year. Signing Cabrera to a long term extension is taking a big gamble that his arm holds up.

So now it’s time to vote. If we’ve done this correctly, you should be able to vote for more than one candidate.

Thank you for stopping by tonight. A special thanks goes out to everyone who voted and commented this past week. We hope you enjoyed yourself and will be back soon. Get home safely. Stay dry. Recycle any cans and bottles. Tip your waitstaff. And join us again next week for more BCB After Dark.

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