The 2022 MLB trade deadline didn’t deliver the fireworks some expected from the Cubs, who had two of the market’s biggest bats in Willson Contreras and Ian Happ. Instead, three relievers saw their way out of town in smaller deals, the sort that happen every year as teams try to bolster their bullpens for the stretch run.
The returns from those deals don’t constitute the grand haul that general manager Jed Hoyer secured last summer, when several veterans turned into a group of prospects, including Pete Crow-Armstrong and Kevin Alcantara — now two of the best talents in the organization. But the farm system still needed arms, and it added at least two good ones.
