6 Cubs who failed to live up to expectations in 2024

Hitting the preseason projections on the nose, the Chicago Cubs went 83-79 for the second consecutive season which was good for a distant second-place finish in the NL Central and yet another October watching from home.

Poor offensive conditions at Wrigley Field, some misses on key free agent signings and injuries all contributed to the team's downfall - but a two-plus month offensive cold spell doomed them regardless. If this team is going to change the narrative in 2025, they will, as Jed Hoyer made very clear, have to outperform expectations.

Unfortunately, these 6 players failed to do just that this year - and it proved costly.

1: Dansby Swanson got better as the year went on, but Cubs need more

Dansby Swanson followed up a 4.9 fWAR in his first year on the North Side with a 4.3 fWAR effort in 2024, which, at first glance, might leave you wondering why he's on this list.

The problem with Swanson this year came at the plate. Fangraphs' Offense (Off) metric had him at 6.9 in 2023 and just 3.4 this season. As the team's highest-paid player (and the recipient of the second-largest contract in Cubs history), the expectation is that Swanson could be the team's stopper. By that, I mean he could be the veteran presence who helps pull the offense out of cold spells.

That wasn't the case this season.

As Chicago's offense evaporated in May and June, Swanson batted just .205/.286/.364 and was just as big a part of the problem as anyone on the roster. Sure, he turned it on in the second half and looked much better down the stretch, but the Cubs needed more from him when the bats were in a tailspin during the first half and he didn't deliver.

2: This wasn't the swan song Kyle Hendricks or the Cubs hoped for

Kyle Hendricks fought off Father Time in 2023, coming back from offseason shoulder surgery and turning in a rejuvenated campaign. He made 24 starts, working to a 3.74 ERA and 3.81 FIP in more than 130 innings of work. That prompted Jed Hoyer to pick up a $16.5 million club option for 2024 - a decision that soon proved ill-fated.

The fact he even survived to the end of the season is nothing short of a miracle when you consider how it started for the veteran right-hander. In the first half, he worked to a 6.78 ERA - and that's after a bounceback month of June. Through the end of May, he had a 10.16 ERA and opponents had torched him for a 1.010 OPS, which led to him getting bounced from the starting rotation.

Through sheer will and determination, Hendricks became, more or less, serviceable as injuries left Craig Counsell short-handed in the rotation. Over the final two months, he managed an ERA in the low-4.00s and turned back the clock one final time in what may be his last start in a Cubs uniform during the season's final weekend. But that isn't enough to make us look past the rest of the year.

3: Hector Neris failed to be the stabilizing veteran in the bullpen

The warning signs were there, but the baseball card numbers (1.71 ERA, 10.3 K/9 in 2023) were enough to convince Hoyer to bring Hector Neris in on a one-year, $9 million deal.

Forced into the closer's role early in the year after Adbert Alzolay was ineffective and then shelved due to injury, Neris did the job but never did it without raising fans' blood pressure. Control issues had him constantly working in and out of trouble and he was anything but reliable.

Chicago knew it needed some young arms to step up and throw meaningful innings heading into the year. But the hope was Neris could be a calming, reliable arm in the mix out in the bullpen - and he didn't deliver. The Cubs avoided the looming specter of that vesting option by releasing him before he could hit the appearance total, which is the only 'win' that came out of this relationship.

4: Cody Bellinger couldn't replicate his bounceback 2023 numbers

The Chicago Cubs waited out the market, eventually bringing back Cody Bellinger in the final hours of the offseason via a three-year, $80 million deal with opt-outs after the first and second seasons.

En route to NL Comeback Player of the Year honors in 2023, the former Rookie of the Year and MVP put up a 139 OPS+ and narrowly missed out on a 30-100 campaign while also playing elite defense at multiple positions. This year, although still an above-average player, he was hardly the offensive force from the year prior.

Bellinger finished the year at 2.2 fWAR, making him Chicago's seventh-most valuable position player. That's not what the Cubs envisioned when they paid him $27.5 million. Maybe the conditions at Wrigley cooled his end-of-year numbers (.700 OPS at home, .797 on the road) - but regardless, the team needed more from him offensively and the power just never came to be.

6: Adbert Alzolay now looks like a sure-fire non-tender candidate

In just 18 appearances, Adbert Alzolay blew five saves. That tells you all you need to know about how the 2024 season went for the right-hander. After turning in what felt like a breakout performance last year, the wheels totally fell off for him - to the extent his time with the Cubs may be at an end.

He allowed more than one hit per inning and nearly one-third of those hits left the yard (3.1 HR/9). His walks were up, strikeouts down - and there were few bright spots for Alzolay, who, as I mentioned, was coming off a brilliant 2023 campaign where he worked to a 2.67 ERA in 58 appearances.

Alzolay hit the IL after his rocky start to the year. In August, the team announced he would undergo Tommy John surgery after he unsuccessfully tried to rehab his injury - meaning he'll miss the entire 2025 season, as well. The Cubs expected him to be the ninth-inning guy this year and his downfall led to a first-half bullpen meltdown the team took too long to recover from.