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By Jackson Roberts
Contributing Sports Writer
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Billy Hamilton returning to Major League Baseball for the playoffs after a two-year hiatus would be a heck of a story.
Hamilton signed a minor-league deal with the Chicago Cubs on Sunday, making him eligible for postseason play if the team wants him on the roster. But the 34-year-old, who was one of the signature speedsters of the mid-2010s, was out of affiliated baseball for a reason.
Hamilton played just three major league games in 2023, then only played professionally in Mexico for the last two seasons. His last major league season with 100 plate appearances was 2021, when he batted .220 with a .242 on-base percentage.
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If he were to crack the Cubs' playoff roster, it would be to do one thing only: steal bases. He racked up 326 thefts in 951 games as a big-leaguer, and 87 of them in 142 games in Mexico.
However, on Thursday, manager Craig Counsell was asked about Hamilton joining the organization, and he seemed to indicate that the odds of the veteran making the playoff roster were somewhat low.
"At this point, if players signed to go to (Triple-A) Iowa, those are the kind of scenarios where something you don't really plan on happening, happens," Counsell said, per Thomas Harrigan of MLB.com. "And you just want to make sure that you have players that could fill in. So it's 'worst-case scenario' planning, but you still have to do it, and still have to plan for it. It's just in case stuff."
If no one on the current Cubs roster gets injured, it would figure to take a spectacular effort from Hamilton in a short amount of time in the minors to have any shot at the playoff roster.
According to the Major League Baseball transactions log, Hamilton was assigned to the Cubs' rookie-level affiliate in the Arizona Complex League, where he had yet to appear in a game as of Friday afternoon.
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