I’ll begin this article by stating that I don’t think the Cubs really have any chance to sign Robbie Ray, who might very well be the American League Cy Young Award winner for 2021.
Nevertheless, he’ll be out there in free agency and who knows? Maybe Jed Hoyer and his baseball ops team will surprise us.
Ray had the best year of his career in 2021, posting a 2.84 ERA, 1.045 WHIP and 6.7 bWAR. The bWAR figure led all AL pitchers by a significant margin (Gerrit Cole was second at 5.6) and was tied for second with Walker Buehler among all MLB pitchers.