I don’t think teams will be concerned with him being injury prone. Maybe if they were similar type injuries, but not a whole lot of commonality between finger/hand and shin injuries. Injuries happen. And not sure what you mean by the set up in Houston aiding his play. The previous 4 seasons when Tucker made a name for himself in majors, at home he batted .283 with 156 runs, 52 HRs, 174 RBI and 39 steals. He hit .309 away from Houston in same time frame with 151 runs, 58 HRs, 186 RBI and 41 steals. And those away counting stats were accomplished in 95 fewer ABs.
It will be interesting to see where and for how much he signs. Certainly this season isn’t helping his cause, but I don’t think your #2 and #3 will have any impact. Hopefully he can turn it around last month and playoffs and give interested GMs more to think about.
If you were Hoyer, how much is too much at this point?
Playing RF in Wrigley is not easy. When the wind is blowing in, it's damn near impossible to fence one. Conversely, when the wind is blowing out, not much stays in the ballpark.
Last year, how many games did he play? This season, his numbers are average and that's because he will take a walk. He's currently being benched. He's not running out ground balls. He's being boo'd by the most loyal fans in the planet.
If you were the Cubs, would you break the $250M barrier over 8 years to keep him? That's more than $30M per year and let's face it, given the expectations, he's been a bust. There's just no argument against that at this point. Like you said, he can have just an outstanding September, which changes the outlook.
Maybe the expectations were too high, but they were that of a $500M player. That type of money is paid to guys who can carry a team.
To be clear, he's not the only one that's wet the bed the second half of the year. Their ability to score runs, especially late in games, is abysmal. He's a huge part of that.
Edit: In Houston, he had FAR more protection in the order.
