To many people’s surprises, the Chicago Cubs did not trade Willson Contreras at the trade deadline this year.
Many teams were said to be in on the Contreras sweepstakes, but it appears that each of the suitors found the Cubs asking price to be too high.
Even those closely associated with the Cubs organization seemed to think that Contreras, an impending free agent, was on his way out.
The team store had even taken down the Contreras jerseys.
Cubs insider Paul Sullivan tweeted a picture of the jerseys hanging in the team store, with Contreras’ jersey being noticeably absent from the rest of the pack.
Even the Cubs Store took down the Willson Contreras jerseys. pic.twitter.com/S6Y5Aj7hWe
— Paul Sullivan (@PWSullivan) August 4, 2022
Cubs Store Takes Down Contreras Jerseys
It’s quite shocking that the Cubs didn’t trade the catcher, given that he’s a free-agent-to-be and that they could’ve gotten some top prospects for him.
But the Cubs chose to hold on to one of the last holdovers from the 2016 World Series team.
To see that the Contreras jerseys were noticeably absent in the team store shows that everybody in Chicago was expecting the Cubs to ultimately deal him away.
That has to be somewhat awkward for those working in the team store and for Contreras.
Even he expected to be traded.
Now, after those working in the team store took his jersey down, they’re going to have to put it back up on the shelves, at least for now.
The jerseys for Marcus Stroman, Nick Madrigal, Seiya Suzuki, Christopher Morel, Ian Happ, and Patrick Wisdom were all still there.
Now, Contreras’ jersey will join them for at least the next few months.
Speculation will certainly return at the end of the season when Contreras hits the open market.
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