Chicago Cubs: Evaluating the Jose Quintana trade

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As is often the case with contenders, the Chicago Cubs shored up for a postseason run with a big acquisition last summer. Was it all worth it?

Good starting pitchers can be difficult to come by. In 2016, the Chicago Cubs starting rotation led all of Major League Baseball with a 3.15 ERA. Last season, after a middling start, the team felt it necessary to bring in Jose Quintana from the Chicago White Sox.

In exchange, the Cubs shipped off top prospects Eloy Jimenez and Dylan Cease, as well as Matt Rose and Bryant Flete.

The Cubs have been known to make flashy trades in the past. Before the 2016 trade deadline, they sent their top prospect at the time, Gleyber Torres, to the New York Yankees in exchange for fireballer Aroldis Chapman. Obviously, we all know the rest of the story.

At the helm, Theo Epstein is not afraid to make the heavy-handed decisions – ones that could ultimately bring a huge return. In the case of the Torres-Chapman deal, the latter wound up being a key cog in the Cubs’ historic World Series championship season.

Which circles us back to Jose Quintana as we dive into this blockbuster trade almost a year in.

Prospects make the world go ’round.

Deals such as the Quintana trade will almost always involve at least one, if not multiple, top prospects. In the Cubs case, it involved two top prospects, Jimenez and Cease, as well as two other guys, Rose and Flete, who have been relatively unknown.

The decision to part with Eloy Jimenez was undoubtedly a difficult one. Just 21 years old, Jimenez enjoyed immense amounts of success in professional baseball thus far. After beginning his 2017 campaign at High-A ball for the Cubs, he found himself in Double-A as a member of the White Sox. In 18 games, Jimenez slashed .353/.397/.559 with 3 home runs, 7 RBI, a 176 wRC+ and a .429 wOBA.

This season has started off relatively slow for Jimenez as he is slashing just .216/.262/.486, however he has already hit three home runs in just ten games while driving in eleven runs. Before we know it, Eloy Jimenez will be the talk of the South Side, as he continues to impressively make the climb to the bigs.

(Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images) /

Backup plans for the South Siders

The second major piece of this prospect puzzle is Dylan Cease. The young right-hander has also found great success to this point in his career. This season for the White Sox High-A club, Cease is 2-1, in four starts, with a respectable 2.79 ERA.

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Cease was strong as a Cub. His strengths include a high strikeout rate and the ability to keep the ball in the yard. As he is just 22, it should be awhile before Cease sees time at the Major League level, however like Jimenez, he is on a strong path.

The other two prospects, Matt Rose and Bryant Flete, are nothing special. In 65 games for the Cubs High-A last season, Rose slashed just .227/.281/.481. In 2018, Rose is hitting .247/.293/.364, while striking out at a whopping 34.1 percent clip.

Flete, seemingly based off his production so far, seems like a better bet to become a better player in the long run than Rose, but still nothing too exceptional.

The former, in his last year with the Cubs High-A, slashed .305/.355/.425 with a 120 wRC+. He is not a big power guy, as he is just 5’10”, 146 pounds and has hit only fifteen career home runs in six years in the minors.

Prospects can be strange, regarding value. As Cubs fans and Major League Baseball saw, Jose Quintana found himself dealt in a one-for-four trade. Realistically, however, it can be boiled down to Jose Quintana for Eloy Jimenez and Dylan Cease.

Are the Cubs better off than they were a year ago?

Swinging back to the present, and where the Cubs sit, the trade for Jose Quintana was worth it.

Sure, Eloy Jimenez, and maybe Dylan Cease for that matter should be productive if not great at the next level, once they develop. However, much of the time prospects are far from a sure thing.

The excellent thing about the Cubs and the talent level on the roster currently is that the entire roster is in their prime. The average age of the active roster is just above 28 years old, mainly due to the outlier that is Ben Zobrist. Despite this fact, the backbone of this team isn’t yet 25 or are just passed that point.

A long-term answer

The team has a bevy of depth, and similar to how it would have been difficult at the time for the Cubs in finding a place for Gleyber Torres, the Cubs did not have a spot for Jimenez, which made the decision an easy one to ship him out.

Jose Quintana is also under team control for the next three years for the Cubs. At $8,850,000 this season, as well as $10,500,000 over the subsequent two seasons, the team has set itself up nicely.

Next: Cubs sweep Brewers behind another quality start

The left-hander isn’t flashy. He doesn’t draw the accolades of someone like Yu Darvish or former Cub Jake Arrieta. But he’s one of the more underrated quality arms in the game. Further more, he’s a stable anchor for this rotation. The best part? He’ll keep getting better. His last time out against Milwaukee, he tossed seven scoreless.

In other words, Cubs fans won’t lose faith in Jose Quintana anytime soon.

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Chicago Cubs: Revisiting the Jose Quintana deal with some perspective