Chicago Cubs: Why the Cubs should trade for Matt Harvey

It’s a low-risk, high-reward move.

Since Harvey has been rather atrocious the past two seasons, his trade value is as low as it has ever been.  Last year seemed to be a fluke for Harvey when he pitched to a 4.86 ERA in just 17 starts.

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This year, however, seems to be more of the same, if not worse.  According to Baseball Reference, Harvey has career-lows in strikeouts per nine (6.8), strikeouts per walk (1.44) and ERA+ (76) just to name a few.  He also has career highs in WHIP (1.484), home runs per nine (1.9), walks per nine (4.7) and many other categories.

With these numbers, the Mets’ asking price is presumably something along the lines of a ham sandwich.  So if you’re the Cubs, you only have to give up one or maybe two top-25 prospects to land him.

Money isn’t really an issue either.  He is currently making $5.125 million, is arbitration-eligible next year, then becomes a free agent in 2019.

This means that the Cubs would give up basically nothing for him and get him for relatively cheap. If he doesn’t work out, no problem.  If he works out, though, the Cubs hit the lottery.