Chicago Cubs invite two former Blue Jays to Spring Training

The Cubs invited reliever Trevor Richards and catcher Reese McGuire to spring training after signing both to minor league deals on Tuesday, per WSCR-AM's Bruce Levine.

The 31-year-old Richards has spent the bulk of the past four seasons with the Blue Jays but was traded to the Twins just prior to the 2024 trade deadline.

He posted a 4.55 ERA with a 22.4% strikeout rate and a career-high 12.6% walk rate between Toronto and Minnesota this past season and carries a 4.60 earned run average over the past four seasons.

Richards has posted a combined 29.1% strikeout rate in 266 1/3 innings dating back to 2021, showing a clear ability to miss bats.

He's battled command troubles along the way, however, both in terms of finding the strike zone at all (11.3% walk rate, 29 wild pitches) and in terms of precision when he does put the ball over the plate (1.39 HR/9).

Although Richards is right-handed, he's been far more effective against lefties than against righties, due in large part to his top secondary offering being a plus changeup.

Lefty batters have hit just .220/.315/.371 against Richards in his career, while righties have a more productive .248/.320/.433 slash.

McGuire, 30, has appeared in the past seven big league seasons as a part-time catcher.

Spending time with the Blue Jays, White Sox and Red Sox, he has appeared in 355 games and stepped to the plate 1,038 times.

He has a .252/.300/.364 batting line in that time, which translates to a wRC+ of 80.

Though that puts him 20% below the league average hitter, it's actually not terrible production for his position, since catchers usually produce about 10% less than par.

Unfortunately, the last two years have seen him slide down a bit. With the Red Sox over 2023 and 2024, he slashed .242/.297/.331 for a wRC+ of 70.

Defensively, he's generally gotten good marks. Outlets like Baseball Prospectus and Statcast consider him to have been a strong framer, while his blocking and work with the running game have been close to average.

When the offense was a bit stronger, McGuire was a useful player.

FanGraphs considered him to have been worth least 1.2 wins above replacement in each full season from 2019 to 2022.

But as his bat dropped off over the past two years, his value slid along with it. Boston outrighted him off their roster in August and McGuire became a free agent at season's end.

The Blue Jays traded McGuire to the Chicago White Sox ahead of the 2022 season.

Richards and McGuire will report to spring training on Feb. 9 with the rest of the Cubs' pitchers and catchers.

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