NL contender gets suckered into signing Michael Conforto after abysmal Dodgers season

Over the last week or so, former Dodgers outfielder Michael Conforto's market has picked up a little after a dead offseason, but that's not saying much. After a couple of stray rumors about the White Sox that never came to fruition early on, Brian McTaggart of MLB.com broke the silence to report that the Astros had expressed some degree of interest in him.

But early on Monday morning, Jon Heyman reported that Conforto would be headed to Chicago — but, shockingly, not to the bottom feeders on the south side. The Cubs are bringing him in on a deal, which Ken Rosenthal seemed to confirm was a minor league agreement.

The Cubs are slow-playing outfielder Moisés Ballesteros, who was excellent in 20 games in Chicago, though they kept sending him up and down, to and from Triple-A Iowa (.298 average, .868 OPS in the majors). Ballesteros reported to spring training late due to visa issues.

As a minor league deal, it looks like the same kind of low-cost move that the Dodgers seemed to be making by signing Andy Ibáñez — but with even less risk. There was no world in which Conforto was going to make anywhere near the $17 million the Dodgers (foolishly) gave him last year; he'd be lucky if possible incentives would get him even half of that.

Dodgers flop Michael Conforto signs deal with Cubs to remain in NL

None of this is really surprising to anyone, is it?

We can only speculate on how much money the Cubs are giving him in incentives, but we know for certain that it's not enough to make the Cubs feel bad if/when they need to cut him.

Chicago is certainly hoping they're taking a calculated risk that has a better chance of paying off than signing, say, a journeyman bench bat, but Conforto hasn't been good since 2019. They're banking on a short peak and an All-Star appearance with the Mets while hoping that his career-worst season in LA was just an off-year.

Dodgers fans know that it's not going to pay off. If the Dodgers, with their vaunted coaching and development staff, couldn't get Conforto to hit over .200 in a full season, making him one of the worst qualified hitters in the game (the worst, by some metrics), you'll forgive us if we don't believe that the Cubs can do any better.