The Cubs haven’t made any major signings to date this offseason.
This, you know. Not bringing you any new information here.
Jed Hoyer and Co., however, have signed a flurry of new relief pitchers to the staff. As of the time of this post, one of those signings has not yet been officially announced by the team; I’d expect that to happen in the next day or two.
I would expect more movement bullpen-wise, whether it’s another 40-man signing or two or just guys given NRI’s.
If the season opened today — and
as you surely know, that day is still 87 days away — here are the eight relievers who will stand on the third-base line at Wrigley Field and be introduced along with the rest of the 2026 Cubs.
In alphabetical order:
Ben Brown
Hunter Harvey
Porter Hodge
Phil Maton
Hoby Milner
Daniel Palencia
Caleb Thielbar
Jacob Webb
That list includes four pitchers (Harvey, Maton, Milner and Webb) who were not in the Cubs organization this past season.
A bullpen consisting of the pitchers above would leave these men on the 40-man roster out, for the time being:
Javier Assad
Luke Little
Riley Martin
Jack Neely
Ethan Roberts
Jordan Wicks
The Cubs also signed Collin Snider, a right-hander who spent the last two years with the Mariners, to a minor-league deal with a NRI to Spring Training.
Now, regarding a couple of the names on the “out” list: Assad is likely going to wind up at Triple-A Iowa stretched out to start in case of emergency. If the Cubs sign a starting pitcher (I’m hoping, still, for Tatsuya Imai), that would mean Colin Rea would be dropped from the rotation to the bullpen, which would mean someone would have to go from that top eight list. Of those eight, Brown, Hodge and Palencia have options remaining, though I can’t see Palencia on the Iowa Shuttle. Hodge and Brown almost certainly would be the next guy(s) out.
So that’s the way I see it right now. How about you?
