In which we learn a bit more about the free agency of Alex Cobb

No, the free agency of Alex Cobb, Jake Arrieta and Yu Darvish won’t last until 2023.

Probably.

But today we received two more pieces of information over the great wide internet regarding Cobb and the Cubs:

The sum reported there is about $1 million more in AAV than the Cubs gave to Tyler Chatwood (depending on how both deals would be structured). It would appear to me that’s a bit under market, and it appears that offer was made quite some time ago, and there wasn’t any back-and-forth negotiation, leading to the current... standoff, for lack of a better term.

Also out there today is this brief interview with new Cubs lefty Drew Smyly:

If you listen to the interview, you’ll see the tweet is mostly a tease. Smyly says he loved having Cobb as a teammate and they’re friends, but he’s pretty noncommittal about “recruiting,” saying basically the quote that’s in the tweet.

It’s not much, I grant you. But pitchers and catchers report to Mesa in less than six weeks (don’t have the exact date, but it should be about Feb. 13 or 14), and the closer we get to that date, the more pressure there will be on Cobb (and Arrieta and Darvish) to take some offer, somewhere, so they have a team to report to.

As always, we await developments.