At Cubs Convention there were a few questions that came up repeatedly: Will Kris Bryant be traded? (Apparently, no). Who will bat lead off? (Apparently, Kris Bryant). One of the things fans speculated about the most was who would fill the fifth spot in the starting rotation vacated by Cole Hamels and who would wind up in Iowa or the bullpen.
Well, we don’t have an answer to that final question, but per ESPN’s Jesse Rogers, it looks like the Cubs aren’t wasting any time gathering data to figure out an answer:
The three most likely pitchers to compete for the fifth spot in the rotation will start the Cubs first spring training games, so I wanted to take a quick look at their body of work from 2019.