If you hadn’t heard yet, the love-him-or-hate-him actor/comedian, Will Ferrell, is going to play some baseball on Thursday:
As was announced today, actor Will Ferrell will be visiting five Cactus League locations in Arizona Thursday, playing in Spring Training games for 10 different teams. (This is for a new HBO special from Funny or Die, but he’s also raising money for organizations that help fight cancer, including Cancer for College, a charity that “helps individuals who have been adversely affected by cancer to realize their dream of a college education.”) He will be playing every position on the field in the games, but what’s truly amazing is that he’s playing any position at all.
Carrie Muskat has some details of Ferrell’s itinerary:
Ferrell will be playing in the following games:
12:05 p.m. MT: Mariners at Athletics
1:10 p.m. MT: Cubs at Angels
2:10 p.m. MT: Reds at Diamondbacks
4:05 p.m. MT: Giants at White Sox
6:15 p.m. MT: Dodgers at Padres
It sounds like the Cubs game will be televised, and I’m sure there will be tons of video and scouting reports like this:
@Ryan_Davis17 Tall, lanky could add about 100 lbs to that frame. Excellent deliver (but only off the mound). Great sink on the cannonball..
— John Arguello (@CubsDen) March 12, 2015
I can’t wait! I know some folks are flipping their lids because they either hate Will Ferrell or think of it as a publicity stunt, but I think it’s great that this is happening, and at least it’s not just a run-of-the-mill gimmick because Ferrell will be raising money for a good cause. Also it’s spring training, we’re supposed to be having FUN, people! I don’t always like Ferrell’s characters or movies, but I thought he was great in the original Anchorman, Old School, Elf, and Stranger Than Fiction.
Anyway, to distract me from the fact that Jackie Robinson West is likely to undergo some drastic changes (sigh), Ferrell’s random act of charity/showmanship made me realize that if not for his celebrity status, he would just be another random white guy (RWG) on a spring invite. Granted, most folks who get spring invites or are currently on a minor league roster comprise the upper 1% of the best baseball players on the planet, and I doubt Ferrell can claim he belongs in that 1%. But I am reminded that not very long ago, the Cubs had quite a few RWGs make the roster because frankly, either by design or by pure stupid luck, the team just hasn’t been very good.
This is just an observation on my part, but every single year, there seems to be at least one or two RWGs that get more attention than they deserve based on their true talent level. Many of them are useful and serviceable, but they are hardly superstars and their feats of legend are merely byproducts of confirmation bias for the most part.
If we look at the last Cubs playoff team, we can see a few names like future Japanese superstars Micah Hoffpauir and Matt Murton. Casey McGehee was eventually traded and then became more than serviceable in Milwaukee and Miami before he signed with the Giants this offseason. Then you have Cubs legend Koyie Hill, who we’ll get back to. RWGs like Reed Johnson and Mike Fontenot were very useful, of course, but they were ultimately expendable.
Moving on to 2009, we see that Cubs legend-in-the-making Hoffpauir turned into a pumpkin, and despite a stretch of nearly a month where he played catcher every single game while Geovany Soto was fat and stoned and hurt, that was pretty much the extent of Hill’s usefulness. Then you see RWGs like Jake Fox, Aaron Miles, Ryan Freel, and the actually-not-too-bad Sam Fuld getting playing time out of necessity, and also because (correct me if I’m wrong) fans were actually clamoring for them to play more over the actual stars, especially Fox and Fuld.
2010 brought us the great Tyler Colvin before he got stabbed by a bat. He hasn’t actually been that good since, but that’s probably not because of the accidental impaling.
2011 introduced us to fan favorite Tony Campana, who is pretty much just fast (but that probably won’t help him much now), as well as superstar-in-the-making Bryan LaHair.
The first year of Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer’s tenure, LaHair got a random All-Star bid (huh…) and we also had Super Joe Mather, who got a few timely hits but was otherwise less-than-mediocre.
2013 had a smorgasbord of RWGs, including:
- Ryan Sweeney
- Cody Ransom
- Donnie Murphy
- Brian Bogusevic
- Scott Hairston
- Brent Lillibridge
- Steve Clevenger
And 2014 had its share of RWGs, including:
That was the mark of a team on the mend…throwing a bunch of crap at the wall to see what would stick. Very little of it actually did, but you have to give the RWGs credit for showing enough to the fans that some could be shipped off for lottery tickets, or even perform very well in their days as a Cub like Ruggiano and Reed Johnson did. But that grew tiresome in a hurry, because we kept longing for something more permanent and solid that could contribute in a more impactful way.
Well now look no further than the 2015 Cubs, who are so loaded with prospects and depth at every position that RWGs probably won’t be able to sniff the roster anymore.
If we check out the active roster (which contains one “Will Ferrell” as a utility guy), even without counting on Kris Bryant (who will likely not be called up until later on in April or May), we see that there are no true RWGs that can crack the band of 25 that will head to Wrigley in April.
Guys like Dallas Beeler and Eric Jokisch are legitimate fifth starter options that aren’t random enough to be RWGs.
Miguel Montero‘s backup, David Ross, is a veteran and a solid defensive catcher who is certainly not random.
In the infield, Mike Olt and Tommy La Stella have skills identified as valuable by the front office that makes them much better than random.
The left field platoon of Chris Coghlan and Chris Denorfia have enough clout to not be considered random. Matt Szczur is a former top prospect in the Cubs system who has enough tools to not be random, even as the fifth outfielder/pinch runner. He’s probably going to squeeze out Ryan Sweeney, who has shown when he is healthy that he’s far from the generic RWG.
In fact, the only RWG that I foresee will actually play for the Cubs is Will Ferrell, and he’s just playing one or two outs as a utility guy in spring training.
The savvy signings and trades plus the remarkably effective plan to acquire talent from multiple avenues has helped the Cubs get us away from the era when we had to cheer for RWGs. The Cubs turned the corner this offseason, and not having to rely substantially on RWGs is definitely another sign of improvement. Not that RWGs are bad, but I’d rather not have this reaction when reading rosters…
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