Cubs sign veteran Colin Rea, but still need to add a high-end starter to the mix

Per MLBTR's Steve Adams, the Chicago Cubs have signed veteran starter Colin Rea to a one-year, $5 million deal with a club option for 2026. Rea, 34, most recently pitched with the Milwaukee Brewers three of the last four seasons, spending 2022 in Japan. Last season in Milwaukee he pitched to a 4.29 ERA, 4.75 FIP and 1.3 WHIP with135 strikeouts and 43 walks in 167 2/3 innings. It is easy to forget, but in 2020 he pitched 14 innings with the Cubs.

In 2024, the right-hander got off to a solid start, pitching to a 3.77 ERA in 105 innings in the first half, before falling off in the second half posting a 5.17 ERA over his final 62 2/3 innings. He managed to eclipse his career innings pitched total last year and posted his lowest ERA in a season in which he pitched at least 100 innings. Overall he is a career 4.57 ERA, 1.3 WHIP, 4.69 FIP, 7.4 K/9 and 2.8 BB/9 pitcher across 446 2/3 innings of work.

Rea's overall numbers are pretty "meh" in terms of ERA and FIP. He is not awful but nowhere near great. His best asset is his command, sporting a career 7.2 percent walk rate. He does not miss a ton of bats and is not particularly overpowering. His fastball is in the low-90s around 92-93 MPH and he mixes in variants of fastballs (cutters, sinkers and some registered splitters) and some breaking stuff. His career ground ball (42 percent) and fly ball percentage (37.1 percent) are around the same.

So, what's his role? Rea has been primarily a starter but has come out of the bullpen. In a perfect world, the Cubs add him as a depth/swingman. He can eat some innings and won't walk a lot of guys. However, the Cubs currently have a surplus of "fringe" guys in Javier Assad, Jordan Wicks, Matthew Boyd and Ben Brown (if healthy). With a rotation that has set spots for Justin Steele, Shota Imanaga and Jameson Taillon there will be a question of who gets the other spots. Assad, Boyd and Rea are all experienced starters and options on the current roster for the bottom of the rotation, with Wicks as another potential option, but the jury is out on him. If Brown does recover, the bullpen seems like the better place to start for him.

Could there be more moves that further shuffle things around? Sure. The thing is, the hope is to add a higher-caliber arm to the rotation. Taking a chance on Jack Flaherty or making a deal for a guy like Pablo López are moves with potentially higher rewards. An obvious win would be landing the services of Roki Sasaki but who knows what happens there? While the rotation was very effective last year, you don't have much firepower outside of Steele. Imanaga uses movement and location to get whiffs but is not a power arm, neither is Taillon and he does not generate a ton of whiffs.

Even Steele who gets plenty of whiffs does not light up a gun. If Rea and Boyd are your additions to the rotation, it feels underwhelming - especially if there is some regression next year from some of the other starters. If another notable rotation arm is added to the top four rotation spots, and a guy like Rea or Boyd is the fifth starter, then the Cubs can live with it.

Time will tell how this plays out.