Why Should Kris Bryant Be On The Opening Day Roster?

Everyone knows Kris Bryant's story. Simply put, the kid is a freak. With a college player of the year award and minor league player of the year award under his belt, the power hitting third baseman is more than ready to take the field against the highest level of competition. But the talk around the league is whether or not Bryant will start the season at Wrigley. Of course if Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer keep him hanging around the minors until about April 17th, that gives them another year of control. That means they will trade out 9 days of his rookie season for one full year of service in his prime. According to Hoyer and Epstein, any decision to keep Bryant in the minors will be strictly baseball related. Obviously he is ready for the bigs so why not bring him up? But do not worry, I'm here to tell you why none of this matters.

The newest fad in the Major Leagues is signing players to extensions before their service time on their team is up. Look at the Miami Marlins this past offseason. They signed two of their best players to extensions: Giancarlo Stanton and Christian Yelich. Both of those players had yet to reach their 6 years of team control before they were eligible to become free agents, but yet here they were getting megadeals instead of the meesley few million dollars they would have been receiving. The Cubs are no stranger to this tactic as their two cornerstones of the team both signed deals like this. Starlin Castro signed an 8 year deal just 2 years after he exceeded his rookie limits and 4 years before he was due to become a free agent. Anthony Rizzo signed a 7 year deal barely a year after the start of his rookie season.

So what is the point of doing this? No, it sure does not save the team any money, in fact clubs actually take a significant hit to the wallet by doing this. But by signing these players early, it lets the players know that the organization is in on them for the long haul and they believe that they will be elite players for years to come. So if the Cubs follow the plan they have been using I would expect Bryant to not even reach the point where that extra year of free agency comes into play. So why not bring the kid up? Heck, those extra 9 days may be an extra 5 home runs and 3 wins at the pace that Bryant is playing this spring.