One word: Schwarber.
Of all the Cubs who may improve or flounder in their sophomore season, Kyle Schwarber is the one player that fills the entire spectrum of fan ecstasy to doubt. He is the key to the Cubs season.
He has the compact swing to make contact on any count and on any pitch. However, he only hit .246 last season. He is projected to have 294 AB, 16 HR, 47 RBI which is similar to his 2015 numbers. That may be fine for a bench player, but not a starter.
Schwarber appears to be Jason Hammel's personal catcher, by default. The Cubs are going to give Schwarber the opportunity to play the position he wants to play, catcher. So Schwarber will get 30 games behind the plate, or 40 AB.
Schwarber appears to be set for a platoon in LF with Jorge Soler. An even split would be 66 games or 264 AB.
Schwarber will DH in AL games so that may be another dozen or 48 AB.
That gets him up to 352 AB, or 19.7 % more AB than projected at Baseball Reference.
But it also shows that Schwarber, at best, will start in 98 games this season. Is that enough to get him into a steady rhythm and habit where he can maintain his batting concentration for a full season like he did in the minors?
And what happens when he gets into his first slump? Will Joe Maddon continue to play him, or with all the other options he has, does Maddon go with the "hot" hand. And in close games when defense is a premium, will Maddon defer to better defenders such as Ross, Montero or Szczur?
We hope that Schwarber has a break out year like Kris Bryant did in 2015 (.275 BA, 26 HR, 99 RBI).
The public knows the Cubs can be good, very good because they surprised the world last year. Most of the young Cubs still have not hit their professional ceiling (such as Addison Russell, who writers believe will have the break-out season). The Cubs have a lot of moving parts, and sometimes just one gear can gum up the entire machine.
Schwarber will still be the fan favorite because his hustle and his monster HRs. But there is going to be added pressure this year because the Cubs have made it clear that the catcher of the future is not Schwarber but Wilson Contreras, who will start in AAA Iowa.
