The core of the Chicago Cubs could look very different after the Major League Baseball Trade Deadline at the end of the month, and likely not in the way that many fans anticipated at the start of the season.
The Cubs' poor play over the past two months has dictated that the team should be sellers at the deadline. Considering the stretch of games the North Siders play before then, it seems inevitable that they will be sellers.
Where it becomes difficult for the Cubs is while they should be sellers at the deadline, the regressing play from nearly every player on their roster combined with the contract statuses of the players they would most likely want to trade has put the front office in a spot where selling isn't easy.
Perhaps that is why Nico Hoerner's name has been mentioned in the early days of the conversation about the Cubs being sellers at the deadline. To that end, Jon Morosi hopped on MLB Network on Monday morning to continue the idea of the Cubs potentially moving Hoerner at the deadline.
Now, as is the case during the month of trade deadline, social media as caught wind of Morosi's segment and they already think Hoerner is en route to Seattle and will be in the Mariners' starting lineup when they play the Baltimore Orioles on Tuesday night.
What Morosi was doing is what every Cubs fan should be doing in looking at the Cubs' roster and finding out the players from the core that need to be moved. No, the Cubs aren't going to find any takers for Dansby Swanson's contract and the player options on Cody Bellinger's contract make it a risk for any acquiring team considering the power regression this season.
The Cubs have reached a point where the realization has been made that their believed core is not going to be the core when the team is good again. The issue is that of the core, Hoerner is the only one who has a contract that could be moved at the deadline, considering he is a free agent after next season.
In an ideal world, the Cubs should desperately find a taker for Ian Happ or Seiya Suzuki rather than move Hoerner, but each outfielder's no-trade clause makes it likely they will stay with the team beyond the deadline. This leads to Hoerner being among the Cubs' most valuable trade chips this month.
