We’re still two months away from the start of spring training and the Cubs have a lot of work remaining, but it’s never too early to look at what the computer models say about their potential production. Dan Szymborski recently released his ZiPS projections for the squad Jed Hoyer is in the process of assembling and, folks, I like what I’m seeing here. Though there aren’t any 6-WAR players in the mix, the Cubs have six positions at 3.5 or greater.
As a quick primer before we get into this a little further, ZiPS factors growth and decline trends against players’ past performance to determine what they may do in the future.