 Four to the cubbies bullpen get a big boost tonight. Welcome in everybody to MLB whip around on Amber Theo Harris alongside our MLB insider JP Marosi and a man who caught over 1800 major league games AJ Przenski. That's good for six all the all time by the way. So congratulations Yeah, that's really tough on the knees. I could imagine not knees are good. It's tougher on the brain Yeah, we can vouch for that. All right tonight's headlines one of the best closers in baseball is no longer A free agent agreeing to a deal with the Cubs the Dodgers going for their eighth straight win But a disturbing trend continued against the diamondbacks and through all the injuries the resilient Astros go for their sixth straight When in a perfect six and a record against the Mariners But the big story of the day as Ken Rosenthal first reported the Cubs are in agreement with free agent closer Craig Kimberle on a three year 43 million dollar deal the 31-year-old will likely spend a few weeks making Minor league appearances before he is ready for the bigs now This is clearly a need for the Cubs right now whose bullpen ranks dead last in the NL It walks for nine and strikeouts to walk ratio They also are near the bottom of the league and saves and blown saves So JP I know other teams were involved lots of rumors, but the cubbies got them Well the twins amber I was told tonight they were comfortable to go with two years for Kimberle, but not to three That's why the Cubs end up winning out the Phillies of course that's of interest as well They've got some bullpen concerns with a number of injured relievers, too But the reason why this made sense for the Cubs is not just for this year as you mentioned the three-year deal Getting that additional security for them for the future because Pedro Schroep who just got back from the injured list He's a free agent after this year as is Steve Seasheck. This is a multi-year play for a team AJ that right now they don't have a single picture on their active roster Originally drafted and developed by the Cubs. They've had to pull guys from all over the major leagues This is only the latest addition to their roster So does this make the final piece of the puzzle for the Cubs complete to pull away in the division? We keep saying the Cubs are the best team in this division We keep saying they're better than the Brewers we keep saying they're better than the Cardinals the Pirates the Reds But they're missing something with us. Is this the final piece? I think so But we keep waiting for them to have that 10 out of 12 winning streak to pull away 17 out of 20 like the Dodgers have done the Astros have done and the Cubs haven't done it now Why people will say the pitching? Well, the pitching hasn't been that bad The starters have been actually pretty good the bullpen other than the walks been pretty good the offense pretty good The only thing that they have is they can't hit with runners in scoring position and that comes and goes But for a veteran laden team like the Cubs you would expect it to be better They've had all these streaks of 0 for 25 0 for 26 and as a veteran team you expect them to do that And if they start hitting with runners in scoring position with the rest of their team I think they are gonna run away with this division a little bit because of the questions with the other teams But is this the final piece? Yeah shot in the arm though, right? You know what it does It gives the team that's sitting there the players are sitting there saying oh, we're kind of languishing not really pulling away Oh, we got Craig Kimball every single guy in that clubhouse had a smile on their face when they heard this Whenever it leaked through the clubhouse in the dugout I think their game was going on when Rosenthal broke this but it just gives them a smile and a jolt of adrenaline like oh Our team is going for it. We wanted a couple years ago. We're back and we're going for it Well one thing at AJ they don't have that athleticism that we usually see from a Joe Madden team Joe loves to have guys It's really defensively they can move around the diamond. Yes, but the base running on this team is lacking One of the worst teams at baseball in terms of second to home first to third They don't really do those types of things. That's what that's the point I mean Brian's not fast Contreras bias can run a little bit, but right Hayward's okay He's not really sure workers not going anywhere right They don't have the speed guys They can't run and that's the point so when you think about it if they're not hitting home runs If they're not gonna hit with men in scoring position and if they're not gonna really run the bases that well They're waiting for the homer would certainly welcome the baseball in 2019 But that's one of the reasons why AJ they haven't really been able to I think take the next step of being a really Dynamic run scoring team like you need to have in October Yeah, the Cubbies came into the night tied with the Brewers for the lead in the National League Central