Rosternomics
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Cubs CHC

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GM: Jim Hendry (since 2003)

2004 roster — every player, value & surplus

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+2.5
WAB — wins above budget
+9.1
TAB — roster Talent above budget
89–73 (0.549)
record
-15M
surplus $M (value/$)
47.6
roster fWAR
$94.1M
payroll
PlayerAgeServiceGfWARSalary $MSurplus $M
Moises Alou 37 FA-elig 155 5.9 9.5 +0.6
Carlos Zambrano 23 arb 31 5.2 0.5 +8.4
Corey Patterson 24 arb 157 5.0 0.5 +8.1
Aramis Ramirez 26 FA-elig 145 3.7 6.0 +0.4
Kerry Wood 27 FA-elig 22 3.0 8.0 -2.9
Glendon Rusch 29 – 33 2.9 – –
Matt Clement 29 FA-elig 30 2.9 6.0 -1.0
Mark Prior 23 pre-arb 21 2.9 3.1 +1.8
Derrek Lee 28 FA-elig 161 2.8 6.2 -1.3
Greg Maddux 38 FA-elig 34 2.5 6.0 -1.7
Sammy Sosa 35 FA-elig 126 2.3 16.0 -12.0
Michael Barrett 27 FA-elig 134 2.3 1.6 +2.3
Todd Walker 31 FA-elig 129 1.7 1.8 +1.1
LaTroy Hawkins 31 FA-elig 77 1.4 3.0 -0.6
Nomar Garciaparra↔ BOS 30 FA-elig 43 1.1 6.1 -4.2
Mark Grudzielanek 34 FA-elig 81 1.0 2.5 -0.8
Todd Hollandsworth 31 FA-elig 57 0.9 1.0 +0.6
Neifi Perez↔ SFG 31 FA-elig 23 0.7 0.5 +0.7
Mike Remlinger 38 FA-elig 48 0.6 4.0 -2.9
Kent Mercker 36 FA-elig 71 0.6 1.2 -0.2
Sergio Mitre 23 pre-arb 13 0.4 0.3 +0.4
Kyle Farnsworth 28 arb 72 0.3 1.4 -0.8
Todd Wellemeyer 25 pre-arb 20 0.3 0.3 +0.1
Ryan Dempster 27 FA-elig 23 0.2 0.3 -0.0
Ben Grieve↔ MIL 28 FA-elig 15 0.1 0.1 +0.2
Jose Macias 32 arb 98 0.1 0.8 -0.5
Calvin Murray 32 – 11 0.1 – –
Michael Wuertz 25 pre-arb 31 0.0 0.3 -0.2
Jimmy Anderson↔ BOS 28 – 7 0.0 – –
Jason Dubois 25 – 20 -0.0 – –
Jon Leicester 25 – 32 -0.0 – –
David Kelton 24 – 8 -0.1 – –
Mike DiFelice↔ DET 35 – 4 -0.1 – –
Paul Bako 32 FA-elig 49 -0.1 0.9 -1.0
Brendan Harris↔ WSN 23 – 3 -0.1 – –
Joe Borowski 33 FA-elig 22 -0.2 2.0 -2.3
Andy Pratt 24 pre-arb 4 -0.2 0.3 -0.7
Damian Jackson↔ KCR 30 – 7 -0.3 – –
Francis Beltran↔ WSN 24 – 34 -0.3 – –
Ramon Martinez 31 FA-elig 102 -0.4 0.9 -1.6
Tom Goodwin 35 FA-elig 77 -0.5 0.7 -1.5
Alex Gonzalez↔ SDP 31 FA-elig 37 -0.5 2.6 -3.4
Rey Ordonez 33 – 23 -0.7 – –

43 players appeared (WAR is complete); salary & surplus are on record for 32 of them (74%). Players without a salary show "–" — no single historical salary source is fully complete (especially 2020–2022).

WAR = FanGraphs (fWAR). Green = produced more value than paid (bargain); red = paid more than produced. Service: pre-arb (<3 yr) / arb (3–6) / FA-eligible (6+). Click headers to sort.

History: front-office performance & develop-vs-buy (1985–2024)

Trade ledger (realized WAR, all-time)

Best acquisitions
PlayerYearWAR for CHC
Sammy Sosa199260.7
Ryne Sandberg198248.2
Anthony Rizzo201231.1
Aramis Ramírez200325.0
Kyle Hendricks201224.4
Derrek Lee200321.4
Jake Arrieta201319.6
Rick Sutcliffe198417.2
Ones that got away
PlayerYear tradedWAR elsewhere
Rafael Palmeiro198842.3
Dontrelle Willis200220.7
Dennis Eckersley198719.3
Ricky Nolasco200517.5
Jon Garland199817.2
Chris Archer201116.9
Gleyber Torres201615.9
Josh Donaldson200813.8
Rosternomics — quantifying front-office skill, attribution-clean. Follow @rosternomics on X. Decision-makers on record back to 1933; resource-controlled metrics (WAR & payroll) cover 1985–2026.
Data: FanGraphs (WAR), Baseball-Reference & the Chadwick Bureau register (rosters, IDs), the Lahman Database, Baseball America prospect rankings (via The Baseball Cube), and public payroll records. Transaction and trade data was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Executive birth/death data via Wikidata (CC0); bios are original. Emoji graphics by OpenMoji (CC BY-SA 4.0).
All figures are franchise-level outcomes credited to the decision-maker in the acquisition year — not solely attributable to one executive.