(670 The Score) Major League Baseball’s Aug. 1 trade deadline is fast approaching, and Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer will soon have key decisions to make.
The Cubs are 45-50 and eight games back of first place in the National League Central entering action Thursday, when they begin a four-game series with the Cardinals at Wrigley Field. Hoyer must soon decide whether the Cubs will be buying, selling or standing pat at the trade deadline.
Hoyer sees this stretch of ballgames leading up to the trade deadline as a pivotal evaluation period for his decision on the Cubs’ season, as he shared with the Parkins & Spiegel Show on Thursday afternoon.
“Saying one record is a hold or a buy and one is a sell is probably a little bit misleading, but like obviously the better we play, if we have a great record, we’re going to increase our playoff odds,” Hoyer said. “If we do that enough, then we’ve put ourselves in position where we feel like we have a good chance to potentially add and get to a place where we can make some noise in the playoffs. We’ve looked at historically what do teams do, we’ve looked at where we are with our personnel and our schedule, and I think we have a feel for where we need to be in order to make those decisions.
“Ultimately, as boring as it sounds, we have to increase our playoff odds, we have to get closer to .500 and get closer to the other teams in our division. Candidly, a team like the Brewers is not making it easy right now. They’re not losing many games.”
The Cubs have some intriguing potential trade chips in right-hander Marcus Stroman and outfielder Cody Bellinger, who have each received interest from contending teams across the league. Both players are slated to become free agents after this season.
The Cubs and Cardinals begin their four-game series at 7:05 p.m. Thursday night in Chicago.
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