With each passing day, the Cubs’ need for at least one more starting pitcher to round out the rotation becomes more clear. Recently, there have been multiple bullpen games, or games started by the likes of Chris Flexen. Monday will see Ryan Brasier serve as the opener for the return (gulp) of Ben Brown. While you must do what you must mid-season, the Cubs are now dead level with the Milwaukee Brewers at the start of a 63-game sprint to the finish. Going with this type of a hole in the rotation feels unsustainable.

The problem the Cubs (and every other contending team) face is that, with expanded playoffs, more and more teams feel as though they are “in it” and can make magic happen over the final two months. This means that in the days prior to the deadline, they can conceivably charge a higher price to buy them out of this slim chance to sneak into the postseason. Put another way: fewer teams are defined sellers, which leaves fewer obvious places for the Cubs to go buying without having to pay a premium. This makes a team like the Washington Nationals (whom FanGraphs currently gives a 0.0% chance to make the playoffs) all the more attractive. 

Much of the discourse around the Nationals and trades will obviously revolve around their ace starting pitcher, MacKenzie Gore. Gore has transformed himself into one of the premier left-handed hurlers in the game, and with multiple years of control, he would cost a ton of prospect capital if they are swayed to move him. The Cubs could probably field their price, but it could create a problem: would they have enough to solve their other issues? Beyond Gore, there would appear to be no obvious candidates on the roster whom the team would be willing to move (Bradley Lord looks the part, but is 25 and under control for six years) and who are productive (outside of Lord and Gore, the best ERA of any starter on the Nationals sits over 4.50). But, what if I told you that despite the bad production in traditional statistics, the team did have a pitcher I would run out in a playoff game?

Enter: Michael Soroka. A former farmhand of the Atlanta Braves, Soroka was viewed as a top-five organizational prospect half a decade ago, but since then, he has struggled to find footing in the highest level of competition baseball has to offer. (Perhaps that’s unfortunate phrasing, since an Achilles injury was a major reason for his struggles to become a consistent presence.) Since his sensational, 4-fWAR season back in 2019, injuries have derailed him.

Eventually, Atlanta essentially gave up on Soroka, who was moved to the Chicago White Sox for reliever Aaron Bummer, and then was released from the Chicago-based organization just one year later. In his one year on the South Side, he showed poor chase rates, high walk rates, surrendered lots of barrels and provided little to get one excited about his future. On top of that, the optics of getting released from the team who set an MLB record for incompetence are, frankly, pretty bad. Soroka’s career was on the ropes.

However, Soroka found refuge with another bottom-dweller for the 2025 season, signing a one-year “prove-it” deal with the Washington Nationals—likely his last real chance to show that he’s a pitcher worthy of an MLB roster spot. How’s it going? Well, if you relied on his ERA for the season, you’d probably come to the conclusion that not much has changed, and that he was likely even closer to being finished. On the season, Soroka’s ERA currently sits above 5.00, but I don’t think that’s a fair reflection of how he’s pitched. After all, ERA takes more into account than just Michael Soroka. It can take into account the entire team—a team tied for the second-worst record in the National League. 

Usually, bad teams are bad for a reason. Maybe they hit poorly, or they have bad pitching. In the Nationals’ case, they can’t field anything. Currently, the team sits 27th in baseball with -27 Defensive Runs Saved (DRS). Being just “bad” would be an improvement; this is a team who has seemingly forsaken the idea of defense in general. This likely factors into Soroka’s inflated ERA, as his strand rate is comically low, sitting as the 12th worst in baseball. This isn’t the pitcher’s fault, if the defense cannot and will not help him out on balls in play or even make routine plays. Soroka’s expected ERA is 3.22, and his xFIP is 3.90. It’s pretty clear that Soroka is far better than his ERA would suggest, and pointing the finger at the eight players who share a field with him at any given time is probably fair. 

But even going beyond just playing the blame game on his defensive counterparts, Soroka has made significant changes under the hood that point to his improvement as a pitcher, including ones that I suspect the Cubs would find interesting. His velocity has been rebounding, getting better than even it was in 2019, when it averaged 92.9 mph on the gun. Last year, the righty’s velocity jumped half a mph to 93.5, and this season he’s jumped to 94 mph. 

It’s not just velocity, though; he’s changed his mechanics. From 2024 to 2025, Soroka has dropped his arm slot around 5°. This has helped him, specifically with his slider and getting extra sweep on the pitch, away from right-handed hitters. Statcast even classifies the pitch as a “slurve” now, instead of a slider, due to the movement. Regardless of the classification, the results speak for themselves. The pitch has an expected opponent weighted on base average (xwOBA) of .206 and a whiff rate of 37.4%. Below is Soroka getting one of the most dangerous pitchers in baseball to swing over the top of the pitch. He gets significant movement and depth on it, and Shohei Ohtani swings over it helplessly. On the day, Soroka got 16 swings and misses, an impressive number against (arguably) the best lineup in baseball.

Soroka’s new arm slot, and his increased usage of his four-seam heater (up to 44.4% from 32.3% last season) would likely interest the Cubs. The Cubs have tinkered with pitchers this season in both regards—most notably, Colin Rea. Rea has seen a massive uptick in fastball usage, while also lowering his own arm slot; the hard work on that front with Soroka is done for the Cubs. With his lower angle, Soroka may be capable of cutting the baseball more, playing with seams (such as Cade Horton) or could develop a better changeup (say, the kick-change Jameson Taillon uses?), all of which are things the Cubs have history with as well. 

While I wouldn’t advocate Soroka be the only pitcher the Cubs acquire in the upcoming time prior to the trade deadline, I think a smart organization will see the ERA Soroka is sporting is a mirage and hiding the true improvement. He should also be relatively cheap. The surface-level numbers do influence asking price. The Nationals have no reason to even pretend they can still make a playoff run, and Soroka is a free agent at year’s end, making him a true rental. With his changes and a better defense, Soroka is miles better than Chris Flexen and the bullpen, and very well may be more trustworthy than even Jameson Taillon in a playoff series.

So I’m begging anyone to save Michael Soroka from Washington’s pitiful defense, but I would also hope that the “someone” in this scenario is the Cubs. He’s a tailor-made pitcher for the Cubs, and fits a need. There’s upside, and probably some juice left to squeeze if the Cubs feel like they wanted to tinker a bit. But even as it is, he’s made improvements that Washington just isn’t capable of using effectively, and would improve most teams’ rotations. Imagine if Soroka played in front of Matt Shaw, Dansby Swanson, Nico Hoerner, Pete Crow-Armstrong and had the benefit of the wind blowing in at Wrigley Field.

What do you think of Michael Soroka as a Cubs trade target? Do you think he would fit a need? Let us know in the comment section below!