Cubs Dodged Major Bullet by Not Trading for This Pitcher

For a few weeks the Chicago Cubs were rumored to be interested in Kansas City Royals starting pitcher Kris Bubic. The 27-year-old was having an elite season, ranking fourth in the American League with a 2.38 ERA through July 20, but sometimes the best trades are the ones you never make.

We’re not really sure how serious, if at all, talks got between the Cubs and Royals for Bubic, but they seemingly dodged a bullet because he’s now going to miss the rest of the season with an injury.

After being placed on the 15-day injured list the Royals announced on Monday that Bubic’s recovery from a shoulder issue will sideline him through the end of the 2025 season.

This isn’t the first time Bubic has dealt with a serious arm injury. The lefty underwent Tommy John surgery earlier in his career, which wiped out pretty much all of his 2023 season and limited him to bullpen duty once he returned in 2024. Yet, Bubic’s resurgence that did begin with work as a reliever made him an attractive trade target this summer, especially because he could have come with another year of control in 2026 via arbitration.

But that’s all a moot point now as the Royals lost their ace and after their series win at Wrigley Field last week they haven’t been acting like a team who was looking to sell at the trade deadline anyway. They added some help on offense, trading for right-handed hitter Randal Grichuk from the Arizona Diamondbacks and then signed their other workhorse in the rotation Seth Lugo to a contract extension.

Lugo, 35, had a $15 million player option for the 2026 season and was rumored to be on the Cubs’ wishlist at the trade deadline. So, in a two-day span two pitchers who might have been available on the trade block suddenly became unavailable. It shows you that in today’s three Wild Card playoff structure a lot more teams are unwilling to sell early in July and want to hang around as long as possible before making any major decisions at the trade deadline.

Even with a sub-.500 record at 52-54, the Royals are only four games back of the third Wild Card in the American League. Despite needing to chase down four teams for a postseason berth the Royals won’t be waiving the white flag at the end of July and in a roundabout way that helped the Cubs not make a mistake by making an aggressive play for Bubic, who got injured in his last start on July 26.