The Cubs need to stop wasting money on bad relievers

The Cubs have done OK with some of their trades and free-agent acquisitions in recent seasons, but they have been really bad at how they are spending money on relief pitchers. They’ve been fortunate to find a few diamonds in the rough, but the chickens have come home to roost in 2026, with the bullpen becoming a major liability late in the season.

Here are some of the results from the last few seasons:

Top 5 Cubs Reliever Salaries for 2026

Player	Season Salary	RA9-WAR	Cost/WAR
Phil Maton	$5.5M	-0.5	N/A
Hunter Harvey	$5M	-0.1	N/A
Caleb Thielbar	$4.125M	-0.4	N/A
Hoby Milner	$3.75M	0.5	$7.5M
Jacob Webb	$1.875M	0.7	$2.68M
Total	$20.25M	0.2	$101.25M

Note: I used RA9-WAR, because I think fWAR puts way too much emphasis on strikeouts. RA9-WAR emphasizes runs allowed, which credits the pitcher with using the defense behind them, while fWAR is defense independent. For example, Javier Assad has a -0.2 fWAR this season and a 1.6 RA9-WAR.

So for $20 million, they got 0.2 wins. Meanwhile, Ryan Rolison, Javier Assad, Aaron Civale and Trent Thornton have combined for 3.9 RA9-WAR, which is not even that great, but much better than the more expensive guys..

But if you look at some of the relievers who are getting over $10M, very few are having a great season. Here are the top 10 for 2026 (excluding players who were expected to be starters):

Player	Season Salary	RA9-WAR	Cost/WAR
Josh Hader	$19M	2.6	$7.31M
Edwin Diaz	$18.5M	-1.3	N/A
Raisel Iglasias	$16M	1.2	$13.33M
Devin Williams	$16M	-0.6	N/A
Ryan Helsley	$14M	-0.2	N/A
Pete Fairbanks	$13.3M	-0.8	N/A
Aroldis Chapman	$13M	2.1	$6.19M
Robert Suarez	$13M	1.8	$7.22M
Tyler Rogers	$12M	1.6	$7.5M
Brad Keller	$11M	0.3	$36.67
Total	$145.8	6.7	$21.76M

So, spending a lot of money is a very risky proposition, with 4 of these 10 pitchers having a negative RA9-WAR. But players like Hader, Iglasias, Chapman and Suarez appear to be worth the cost. A couple of players with the highest RA9-WAR are Mason Miller and Jhoan Duran, who were acquired in expensive trades (from a prosect perspective. Louis Varland, another player acquired via trade was not free. And Bryan Baker, Jacob Latz, Didier Fuentes, Brent Headrick, Paul Blackburn and Spencer Miles were all surprises compared to expectations.

Top 5 Cubs Reliever Salaries for 2025

Player	Season Salary	RA9-WAR	Cost/WAR
Ryan Pressly	$9.2M	-0.3	N/A
Ryan Brasier	$3M	0.0	N/A
Andrew Kittredge	$2.8M	0.3	$9.33M
Caleb Thielbar	$2.75M	1.6	$1.72M
Taylor Rogers	$1.87M	-0.1	N/A
Total	$19.62M	1.5	$13.08M

So, Thielbar was the only decent signing before 2025, but it is interesting that 2 of the most expensive pitchers were acquired at the trade deadline. Pressly, who they traded for to be thier closer, was released after the trade deadline. Players just out of the top 5 included Brad Keller and Drew Pomeranz, who were very positive surprises.

Top 5 Cubs Reliever Salaries for 2024

Player	Season Salary	RA9-WAR	Cost/WAR
Hector Neris	$9M	0.5	$18M
Adbert Alzolay	$3M	-0.5	N/A
Yency Almonte	$2.8M	0.1	$28M
Julian Merryweather	$2.75M	-0.3	NA
Mark Leiter	$1M	-0.1	N/A
Total	$18.75M	-0.4	NA

Neris was the big acquisition, and while not horrible, ended up getting released. Alzolay, who had looked so good the season before, was terrible and then blew out his arm.

Shockingly, despite spending almost no money on the bullpen in 2024 (and getting very little from the guys they did spend money on), the Cubs were 12th in ERA and 9th in RA9-WAR. The main contributions came from Tyson Miller, Porter Hodge, Jorge Lopez, Nate Pearson, Keegan Thompson and Hayden Wesneski.

Top 5 Cubs Reliever Salaries for 2023

Player	AAV	RA9-WAR	Cost/WAR
Michael Fulmer	$4M	0.2	$20M
Brad Boxberger	$2M	0.0	N/A
Rowan Wick	$1.55M	N/A	N/A
Mark Leiter	$0.85M	1.0	$0.85M
Cody Heuer	$0.785M	N/A	N/A
Total	$9.185M	1.2	$7.65M

Looking at this group, two of the most expensive relievers in 2023 did not even play in the majors.

But the Cubs bullpen was still very good for the money in 2023, with a rank of 13th for ERA and a RA9-WAR at 9th in MLB.

So what are the lessons

1. Stop signing veteran pitchers from the Astros
   
   The biggest acquisitions in the bullpen the last three years were veteran relievers who had pitched for the Astros: Hector Neris, Ryan Pressly and Phil Maton. Neris and Pressly were released and Maton was ineffective and injured the whole year. Maton has another year on his deal, and maybe if he’s healthy he might contribute something. But so far, all have been disasters.
   
2. Invest more in drafting pitchers and development.
   
   The Cubs have been decent with hitting on waiver pickups (Rolison, Pomeranz, Civale, Tyson iller)) and minor league free agents (Keller, Thornton). But they have not done a great job of developing some of their own pitchers. They have let go players like Tyler Megill, Jason Adam and Jeremiah Estrada, who hit it big elsewhere. And players they have developed in the minors, like Alzolay, Hodge and Palencia, have been hot and cold. They did spend lot more draft capital on pitchers this year, so maybe we’ll see some fruit from that investment in 3 or 4 years.
   
3. Take all the money they have invested in relievers and put it somewhere else?
   
   Fans will hate this, as I was pleased at the time when the spent money on some of these guys. Would that money would have been better spent on a top-tier starter? Here are the top 7 starters who were free agents (the final 3 were all qualifying offers)
   

Player	AAV	RA9-WAR	Cost/WAR
Framber Valdez	$38.33M	1.7	$22.55M
Dylan Cease	$30M	5.4	$5.55M
Ranger Suarez	$26M	3.2	$8.125M
Michael King	$25M	4.8	$5.21M
Brandon Woodruff	$22.025M	1.3	$16.94M
Shota Imanaga	$22.025M	2.7	$8.16M
Zac Gallen	$22.025M	-1.0	NA
Total	$185.405M	18.1	$11.30M

So, King and Cease were good signings. Suarez and Imanaga (huh?) were pretty good. And Valdez, Woodruff and Gallen were all pretty bad signings. The problem here, is that the risk of signing a starter who turns out to be bad is much, much worse than getting a reliever who turns out to be bad, due to the money involved. But then again, the Cubs might be a different team if they had Dylan Cease the whole year.

And if you wait until the trade deadline to add guys who have looked good, there will be a big price in prospects. Getting Kittredge really helped the team in 2025. Unfortunately, Zeferjahn has not been as good for the Cubs in 2026.

Ultimately, the biggest lesson is that being a General Manger is not easy. There can be a huge variance between expectations and actual performance among pitchers, and the GMs who choose well are going to be the bug winners. Or, if you are the Dodgers, you just load up on lots of expensive players, and even if some are huge disappointments, you can still win.

It’s easy to point out the failures of the Cubs in regards to spending on relievers here, as I’ve done here. But much more difficult to actually make the right moves, and sign the right guys, assuming they even want to play for your team.