Rosternomics
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Cubs CHC

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President of baseball ops: Jed Hoyer (since 2021) · GM: Carter Hawkins (since 2021)

2026 roster — every player, value & surplus

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-1.7 pace
WAB — wins above budget (162-game pace)
-2.7 pace
TAB — roster Talent above budget (162-game pace)
34–31 (0.523)
record
+111M
surplus $M (value/$)
35.9
roster fWAR
$208.2M
payroll
PlayerAgeServiceGfWARSalary $MSurplus $M
Pete Crow-Armstrong 24 pre-arb 65 7.5 0.9 +65.5
Ian Happ 31 FA-elig 61 4.5 19.0 +20.8
Ben Brown 26 pre-arb 18 4.4 0.8 +38.7
Michael Busch 28 pre-arb 64 3.8 0.9 +33.4
Nico Hoerner 29 FA-elig 64 3.7 12.0 +21.1
Seiya Suzuki 31 arb 51 2.8 19.0 +6.2
Alex Bregman 32 FA-elig 64 2.7 20.0 +4.1
Dansby Swanson 32 FA-elig 62 2.7 28.0 -3.9
Matthew Boyd 35 FA-elig 5 2.1 17.0 +1.6
Miguel Amaya 27 pre-arb 37 1.6 0.8 +13.3
Michael Conforto 33 FA-elig 41 1.2 2.0 +9.1
Carson Kelly 31 FA-elig 47 1.1 5.0 +4.5
Colin Rea 35 FA-elig 13 1.0 5.5 +3.2
Shota Imanaga 32 pre-arb 13 0.9 22.0 -13.9
Jacob Webb 32 arb 27 0.8 1.5 +5.3
Edward Cabrera 28 arb 11 0.5 4.5 +0.1
Riley Martin 28 – 8 0.4 0.7 +3.3
Daniel Palencia 26 pre-arb 16 0.4 0.8 +2.4
Ethan Roberts 28 pre-arb 14 0.2 0.7 +0.9
Jordan Wicks 26 pre-arb 2 0.1 0.5 +0.8
Moisés Ballesteros 22 pre-arb 51 0.1 0.8 +0.5
Ty Blach 35 arb 1 0.1 0.0 +1.0
Yacksel Ríos 33 arb 1 0.1 0.0 +0.7
Cade Horton 24 pre-arb 2 0.1 0.8 -0.2
Vince Velasquez 34 – 1 0.1 – –
Hoby Milner 35 FA-elig 29 -0.1 3.8 -4.3
Charlie Barnes↔ LAD 30 – 1 -0.1 0.0 -0.7
Matt Shaw 24 pre-arb 42 -0.1 0.8 -1.6
Luke Little 25 pre-arb 1 -0.1 0.0 -1.2
Javier Assad 28 arb 8 -0.2 1.8 -3.1
Ryan Rolison 28 pre-arb 18 -0.2 0.7 -2.2
Pedro Ramírez 22 – 9 -0.2 0.5 -2.5
Nicky Lopez↔ TEX 31 – 4 -0.3 0.2 -2.6
Gavin Hollowell 28 pre-arb 1 -0.3 0.0 -2.5
Scott Kingery 32 arb 8 -0.3 1.2 -4.1
Phil Maton 33 FA-elig 23 -0.3 5.5 -8.5
Trent Thornton 32 arb 11 -0.4 0.8 -3.9
Dylan Carlson 27 arb 3 -0.4 2.0 -5.4
Hunter Harvey 31 FA-elig 4 -0.4 5.0 -8.7
Kevin Alcántara 23 pre-arb 11 -0.5 0.5 -4.9
Corbin Martin 30 pre-arb 7 -0.6 0.1 -5.4
Caleb Thielbar 39 FA-elig 18 -0.9 4.0 -11.8
Jameson Taillon 34 FA-elig 12 -1.9 18.0 -34.5

43 players appeared (WAR is complete); salary & surplus are on record for 42 of them (98%). Players without a salary show "–" — no single historical salary source is fully complete (especially 2020–2022).

WAR = FanGraphs (fWAR), annualized to full-season pace. Green = produced more value than paid (bargain); red = paid more than produced. Service: pre-arb (<3 yr) / arb (3–6) / FA-eligible (6+). Click headers to sort.

History: front-office performance & develop-vs-buy (1985–2024)

Trade ledger (realized WAR, all-time)

Best acquisitions
PlayerYearWAR for CHC
Sammy Sosa199260.7
Ryne Sandberg198248.2
Anthony Rizzo201231.1
Aramis Ramírez200325.0
Kyle Hendricks201224.4
Derrek Lee200321.4
Jake Arrieta201319.6
Rick Sutcliffe198417.2
Ones that got away
PlayerYear tradedWAR elsewhere
Rafael Palmeiro198842.3
Dontrelle Willis200220.7
Dennis Eckersley198719.3
Ricky Nolasco200517.5
Jon Garland199817.2
Chris Archer201116.9
Gleyber Torres201615.9
Josh Donaldson200813.8
Rosternomics — quantifying front-office skill, attribution-clean. Follow @rosternomics on X. Decision-makers on record back to 1933; resource-controlled metrics (WAR & payroll) cover 1985–2026.
Data: FanGraphs (WAR), Baseball-Reference & the Chadwick Bureau register (rosters, IDs), the Lahman Database, Baseball America prospect rankings (via The Baseball Cube), and public payroll records. Transaction and trade data was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Executive birth/death data via Wikidata (CC0); bios are original. Emoji graphics by OpenMoji (CC BY-SA 4.0).
All figures are franchise-level outcomes credited to the decision-maker in the acquisition year — not solely attributable to one executive.