Evaluating 3 fringe teams in the Cody Bellinger trade sweepstakes

Do we NEED more Cody Bellinger content? Yes. It's a slow baseball news week, plus you could use some conversation topics to bring up during Thanksgiving with your half-drunk uncle who still claims Kevin Orie could be the Cubs' next great third baseman.

It's been widely reported that teams that miss out on Juan Soto will be potential suitors for Cody Bellinger, including the Yankees, Mets, Dodgers and Blue Jays.

Let's bypass those teams and pull together some more creative deals for the versatile former MVP. Jed Hoyer doesn't need to move Bellinger, so these packages are going to have to be pretty significant to make something happen. The gaping need in the Cubs 'entire organization is starting pitching with either elite velocity or a swing-and-miss repertoire, so we'll focus on organizations' big league-ready pitching.

1. Dave Dombrowski and the Phillies keep swinging

I love Dave Dombrowski. Almost as much as he loves spending MLB owners' money. He lives for deal-making and isn't afraid to commit serious dollars and extra years to reel in elite players, particularly when his teams are in win-now mode.

The Phillies are definitively in win-now mode after falling short the last couple of seasons and they have a glaring gap in center field. Johann Rojas is penciled in as the starter for 2025, but his 68 wRC+ in '24 was a glaring black hole in the postseason admist a lineup otherwise filled with established hitters. Inserting Bellinger into the Phil's lineup admittedly would make them extremely lefty-heavy, but there are murmurs they are open to trading Bryson Stott. Replacing Stott with a righty option would help the Bellinger fit.

However, Dombrowski will have a hard time pulling from a top-heavy farm system to pull a package together to entice the Cubs. Andrew Painter would 100 percent get the job done but, even coming off Tommy John surgery, seems like too much of a can't-miss prospect for even Dombrowski to flip for a non-elite player.

Mick Abel is another highly touted pitching prospect in the upper levels of the Philadelphia minor league system, but his hype has so far outweighed actual production on the bump. His strikeout rates are outstanding, but he got hammered to a tune of a 6.46 ERA at Triple-A in 2024. It wasn't just a few bad, outlier outings driving up those numbers either. He's not someone the Cubs would want a package built around.

The rest of the Phils system is position player-heavy, and there's not a lot of potential for Dombrowski to subtract from the Major League club with their win-now aspirations.

Chances of a Phillies trade: 15%

The Phillies would be motivated, but the pieces just don't line up unless they get convinced Bellinger is the missing piece and are willing to move Painter.