In case you missed the early morning news, the Arizona Diamondbacks have pulled off the rare “trade away your player and re-sign him in the offseason” move with Merrill Kelly.
Let’s start there today.
When the Diamondbacks traded Kelly to the Rangers this July, they landed Kohl Drake (#6 prospect in the D-Backs system), Mitch Bratt (#9), and David Hagaman (#15), a tidy sum for a 36-year-old rental starter. And now they get him back, albeit at a very substantial $20M per year for two years. Kelly didn’t finish the year all that well with the Rangers, but has pretty much always been solid for the Diamondbacks, so this is a nice win-win for that organization — a very nicely executed series of transactions. Everyone always wants their team to pull off this combo move, but it requires some trust, some luck, and all the right circumstances to achieve. Again, good for them … especially, as Don Vito Corleone says in The Godfather, as your interests (Diamondbacks) don’t conflict with mine (the Cubs). I say they don’t conflict, by the way, with only the slightest bit of optimism. Because for however good Merrill Kelly looked as a trade target for half a season in July, he is not at all the type of pitcher the Cubs should be looking to acquire this winter. Be it by trade (MacKenzie Gore, Edward Cabrera, etc.) or free agency (Tatsuya Imai, Michael King), they should be aiming higher. And I believe they still are. In fact, Sahadev Sharma (The Athletic) reiterated as much this morning, with some quotes from Craig Counsell:“You can always say there’s never enough pitching,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said. “If you look at what happened to us in the playoffs, if we would have had to keep going, that’s where I think it would have got daunting.”
That’s why the Cubs are so focused on adding another quality starting pitcher, even after Shota Imanaga’s decision to accept the one-year, $22.025 million qualifying offer.
And for his part, Cubs GM Carter Hawkins sounds unfazed by the early sticker prices of the biggest free agents (Dylan Cease, Kyle Schwarber, and Pete Alonso): “Those always happen,” Hawkins said. “Typically, there’s not many players that are going off the board early that didn’t get a deal that they really liked, so you always kind of withstand that first rally.” Would we generally prefer the Cubs to be participating in those first rallies as opposed to simply withstanding them? Lol. Uh. Yeah. But that’s our front office for ya. Also in that article, Hawkins discusses the plan for the Cubs’ top pitching prospect, Jaxon Wiggins. In an ideal world, Hawkins hopes Wiggins can follow Cade Horton’s 2025 path, contributing meaningful innings for the big league team in 2026: “That’s obviously a high bar,” Hawkins said. “If he could do half of what Cade Horton did, that would be awesome. But I think he’s shown that he can get upper-level hitters out. It’s really just getting over the health and the command hurdle. If he does that, he’s got a chance to help us out.” The new Knives Out movie released on Netflix this Friday, and it featured a Cubs game in the background. Before I tell you, can you figure out which game this is from on your own?A Cubs game at Wrigley Field is featured in the new "Knives Out" movie ? pic.twitter.com/DSEz2VVpmO
— MLB (@MLB) December 13, 2025 The Reddit sleuths did the work for us, identifying this as the 13-11 win over the Diamondbacks at Wrigley Field on Friday, April 18. In case you haven’t been following along, we partnered up with one of my favorite accounts on X, Daily Random Cub, to do the same work over on our BN Facebook page (follow us!). Yesterday’s iteration was Kosuke Fukudome, a guy I always look back on fondly, perhaps because his particular (on-base forward) approach was a little ahead of his time. After leaving the Cubs via trade in 2011, Fukudome spent 59 games with the Indians. Then, he signed a 1-year, $1M big league contract with the White Sox, who DFA’d and released him in June. A month later, Fukudome signed a minor contract with the Yankees, but never again returned to The Show. But his career wasn’t over there. After the 2012 season, Fukudome returned to Japan and continued playing until 2022, when he was 45(!) years old. From my half-a** internet research, I have learned that Kosuke Fukudome was the last active NPB player to have played in the 20th century (he debuted for the Chunichi Dragons on April 2, 1999). Oh, what the heck … let’s re-live that amazing debut home run:How about Kosuke Fukudome homering off Eric Gagné on Opening Day in 2008?! pic.twitter.com/lC8qvzBsO6
— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) January 26, 2025MORE CUBS FROM BLEACHER NATION: Go Ad Free | Subscribe to the BN Newsletter
The Chicago Bears are playing today at noon, and because of some writer conflicts here at Bleacher Nation, I (Michael) will be doing the postgame wrap-up. Good luck to me. I am a gigantic Bears fan, but my knowledge does not match up to our Bears writers. You’ve been warned. In case you missed the news, Connor Bedard was injured in the literal last second of Friday night’s game, and didn’t play last night against the Red Wings. Unfortunately, there is no update yet:The update on Connor Bedard from #Blackhawks HC Jeff Blashill is: there is no update pic.twitter.com/YHqy1wQJfo
— Bleacher Nation Blackhawks (@BN_Blackhawks) December 13, 2025 The Hawks have since recalled Nick Lardis from Rockford. And lastly, I’ll have a more formal announcement tomorrow, but we have finally replaced Eli with two new writers joining the fray tomorrow! Keep an eye out for that, as our Bulls coverage ramps back up. For those of you who’ve had to look elsewhere in the meantime, apologies! But we’re back.Hence then, the article about the trade and sign fukudome wiggins knives out easter egg and other cubs bullets was published today ( ) and is available on Bleacher Nation ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
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