{"id":41553,"date":"2025-05-20T15:39:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-20T15:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/41553\/"},"modified":"2025-05-20T15:39:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-20T15:39:09","slug":"cubs-to-activate-ian-happ-option-moises-ballesteros","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/41553\/","title":{"rendered":"Cubs To Activate Ian Happ, Option Moises Ballesteros"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Cubs are welcoming Ian Happ<\/a> back from the injured list for tonight\u2019s game in Miami, president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer tells the Mully & Haugh Show<\/a> on 670 The Score. Rookie Mois\u00e9s Ballesteros<\/a> will be optioned to Triple-A Iowa.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not the only forthcoming roster move. Manager Craig Counsell told Maddie Lee<\/a> of The Chicago Sun-Times last night that Porter Hodge<\/a> is heading to the 15-day IL with a left oblique injury. They could recall someone from Triple-A this afternoon to take Hodge\u2019s bullpen spot, though it\u2019s possible they\u2019ll activate Ryan Brasier<\/a> from his own IL stint instead.<\/p>\n

The Happ\/Ballesteros swap is a reversal of last week\u2019s roster move. Chicago placed the veteran outfielder on the 10-day IL, retroactive to May 10, with a left oblique strain. That was evidently very mild, as he\u2019s back after a minimal stint despite the tendency for many oblique strains to linger for weeks. Ballesteros was called up for the first time. Hoyer said this morning that Ballesteros was aware at the time that it\u2019d be a brief promotion no matter how well he played, as the Cubs always intended to send him back down once Happ returned from what they expected to be a minimal IL stint.<\/p>\n

Ballesteros, 21, was raking at .368\/.420\/.522 clip over 34 games in Iowa. He\u2019s a career .288\/.371\/.459 minor league hitter despite consistently being one of the youngest players at each level at which he\u2019s appeared. He didn\u2019t produce much in his first look at MLB pitching, going 3-16 with a pair of walks over five games. He hit a run-scoring single off the White Sox\u2019s\u00a0Yoendrys G\u00f3mez<\/a> for his first big league hit<\/a> on Friday and had his first multi-hit effort in last night\u2019s loss to the Marlins.<\/p>\n

The Cubs used Ballesteros strictly as a designated hitter over the past week. He\u2019s a polished offensive player but needs to continue developing as a catcher in Iowa. Happ\u2019s return to the lineup will push Seiya Suzuki<\/a> back to DH from left field. Happ will presumably slot back at the top of the batting order. He\u2019s hitting .269\/.364\/.381 through 187 plate appearances.<\/p>\n

Hodge, 24, has been Counsell\u2019s most frequent choice in high-leverage situations. He has allowed a 5.12 ERA through 19 1\/3 innings. His 22.6% strikeout rate is way down from last year\u2019s excellent 31.7% mark. It\u2019s not especially strong production overall, though the lackluster ERA is mostly attributable to one six-run blowup at the hands of the Diamondbacks a month ago. He has allowed three earned runs in 9 2\/3 frames since that appearance, albeit with six strikeouts and walks apiece.<\/p>\n

Ryan Pressly<\/a> entered the season as the Cubs closer. He has not pitched well and has not recorded a save since April 13. Hodge had been leading something of a committee approach to the ninth inning.\u00a0Daniel Palencia<\/a> has stepped up as one of Counsell\u2019s more trusted late-game arms. The Cubs called on him for what would\u2019ve been his first save of the season last night. He entered the ninth inning with a 7-6 lead and quickly recorded the first two outs before allowing a double, a walk, and a two-run walk-off triple to Jes\u00fas S\u00e1nchez<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cubs are welcoming Ian Happ back from the injured list for tonight\u2019s game in Miami, president of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41554,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5,36,4,1896,889],"class_list":{"0":"post-41553","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-ian-happ","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-moises-ballesteros","12":"tag-porter-hodge"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114540915307706796","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41553","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41553\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}