2008 Rule 5 Draft

[JeffH]

Please forgive me if there already exists a thread dealing with this.

 

Any predictions on who we might add to our 40-man roster, if anyone?

[Little Slide Rooter]

Veal

Papelbon

Kroeger if not too late(minor league FA)

[Guest]

I'll go with:

 

Mitch Atkins

Donnie Veal

Nate Spears

 

Maybe Justin Berg. Jeremy Papelbon won't be added, he isn't eligible for the Rule 5 draft this year.

[wvcbxl]

I shouldn't think Veal is much of a risk - certainly not to stick for a whole season.

 

I agree on Atkins.

[Guest]

I shouldn't think Veal is much of a risk - certainly not to stick for a whole season.

 

He's been at AA for two seasons, he would easily be able to stick on a big league roster for a full season as a reliever. And given his stuff, he could easily find a way to succeed in the bigs as a reliever.

[JeffH]

Caridad?

 

Roquet?

[SouthSideRyan]

Caridad?

 

Roquet?

 

Caridad doesn't need to be protected does he?

[Guest]

Neither of them need to be protected this offseason and they aren't performing so well that they'd be a no-brainer to protected otherwise (imo).

[vance_the_cubs_fan]

Ryan Harvey?

 

I kid, I kid.

[BigbadB]

I shouldn't think Veal is much of a risk - certainly not to stick for a whole season.

 

Think Andy Sisco.

[nilodnayr]

I shouldn't think Veal is much of a risk - certainly not to stick for a whole season.

 

Think Andy Sisco.

 

And look at how he turned out (although things may have been different had he been able to stay in the minors for 3 more years).

[biittner77]

I shouldn't think Veal is much of a risk - certainly not to stick for a whole season.

 

Think Andy Sisco.

 

And look at how he turned out (although things may have been different had he been able to stay in the minors for 3 more years).

 

Didn't do the Cubs any good though.

 

Depending on how things shake out, I wouldn't be shocked to see Veal make the 25 man roster. If the Cubs traded Marshall they'd likely want another LH in the pen and would be willing to take a look at Veal in that capacity given their other options. After all, isn't that where his future lies anyway? It's a long shot but certainly possible.

[Guest]

Atkins

Berg

Marcos Mateo

 

Wow. I thought Spears was a lock given his AFL and the side of home plate he swings from. I think Veal gets taken in the rule 5.

[Rob]

Atkins

Berg

Marcos Mateo

 

Wow. I thought Spears was a lock given his AFL and the side of home plate he swings from. I think Veal gets taken in the rule 5.

 

Almost certainly. He needs more minor league time if you want him to start, but he can be a quality LOOGY today.

[Wrigley Rat]

I looked at Spears vs. Fontenot and Fontenot is significantly better IMO. Since Fontenot has little value to other clubs, I'm guessing that Hendry doesn't feel Spears deserves a roster spot. Of course if the Cubs decided to trade Fontenot in some package, I would think we would need a Spears-type player to replace him.

 

I am surprised about Veal. I don't care if other clubs don't value Veal in trade discussions with Hendry - I'm sure that someone will take a flyer on him. I just hope he doesn't stick with anyone. I picture him as a guy who just needs more time than most to develop.

[SouthSideRyan]

Nobody's really touched on Mateo yet, just throwing out there that his rosterring is probably dumber than Berg's.

[Guest]

Baseball America[/url]"]Chicago Cubs

 

Added RHPs Mitch Atkins, Justin Berg and Marcos Mateo.

 

Atkins was their minor league pitcher of the year after he was 17-7, 4.00 with 132 strikeouts combined at Double-A Tennessee and Triple-A Iowa. His 17 wins were good for second in the minors. Mateo, 24, spent most of the year with Daytona, where he was 4-3, 3.57 in 25 appearances, 16 of them starts.

[TruffleShuffle]

 

Almost certainly. He needs more minor league time if you want him to start, but he can be a quality LOOGY today.

 

unless he has figured out how to throw strikes consistently, i don't know how you can be so sure about that.

[TruffleShuffle]

I looked at Spears vs. Fontenot and Fontenot is significantly better IMO. Since Fontenot has little value to other clubs, I'm guessing that Hendry doesn't feel Spears deserves a roster spot. Of course if the Cubs decided to trade Fontenot in some package, I would think we would need a Spears-type player to replace him.

 

I am surprised about Veal. I don't care if other clubs don't value Veal in trade discussions with Hendry - I'm sure that someone will take a flyer on him. I just hope he doesn't stick with anyone. I picture him as a guy who just needs more time than most to develop.

 

i'm not saying that fontenot is extremely valuable or anything, but almost any team in baseball would have a place on their roster for mike fontenot. even if his numbers this year were a fluke, he's still a utility guy who can put up an obp around .350 and an ops around .800. that's pretty good.

[Wrigley Rat]

I looked at Spears vs. Fontenot and Fontenot is significantly better IMO. Since Fontenot has little value to other clubs, I'm guessing that Hendry doesn't feel Spears deserves a roster spot. Of course if the Cubs decided to trade Fontenot in some package, I would think we would need a Spears-type player to replace him.

 

I am surprised about Veal. I don't care if other clubs don't value Veal in trade discussions with Hendry - I'm sure that someone will take a flyer on him. I just hope he doesn't stick with anyone. I picture him as a guy who just needs more time than most to develop.

 

i'm not saying that fontenot is extremely valuable or anything, but almost any team in baseball would have a place on their roster for mike fontenot. even if his numbers this year were a fluke, he's still a utility guy who can put up an obp around .350 and an ops around .800. that's pretty good.

I would agree, but I think Fontenot is only valuable until his last arbitration year when his cost to the team becomes prohibitive (for what he gives us). I think we need to have another "Fontenot" ready in the minors to replace him with at that time. Since that is not until 2012, I figure Spears is relatively expendable. I just worry about including Fontenot in a trade and not having a decent replacement. Neifi Perez redux?

[Rob]

 

Almost certainly. He needs more minor league time if you want him to start, but he can be a quality LOOGY today.

 

unless he has figured out how to throw strikes consistently, i don't know how you can be so sure about that.

 

You don't need control to be a LOOGY... just a slider.

[craig]

 

Almost certainly. He needs more minor league time if you want him to start, but he can be a quality LOOGY today.

 

unless he has figured out how to throw strikes consistently, i don't know how you can be so sure about that.

 

You don't need control to be a LOOGY... just a slider.

 

Heh, I'm not sure I understand what's being said or implied here. Just a good slider? Does the slider need to have any control, or not? Is the thinking that Veal has a slider? A good one? A semi-controlled one? I don't really know. I know at one point he was said to have a curveball that moved, although he couldn't control it. More recently he's been said to throw a slider, that sometimes had good movement and sometimes showed brief flashes of consistency, but did not show good movement and good control both with any consistency. there have been times when it's been said that Veal throws a good fastball, but rarely with control and again the velocity was inconsistent.

 

I'm a bit surprised that Veal didn't get rostered, and that dudes like Mateo and Berg got rostered ahead of him. That's especially interesting, in that we have absolutely zero roster pressure. Even with those three added guys, none of whom are especially significant as prospects, I believe we're still only at 36 roster spots. I don't expect we'll come close to maxing out at 40 pre-Rule 5 or after we finish signing free agents. (It's not like we're going to sign four meaningful free agents, that's for sure. And if we make trades, we're likely to lose as many or more 40-man guys as we gain.)

 

That Veal didn't get rostered, when all he needed to beat was Mateo or Berg, and when it would have been no problem to add him in addition to Mateo and Berg, probably tells us something. I'm not sure what, exactly, but it isn't anything favorable about Veal. Maybe they know he's already got arm problems. Maybe they know he's already got substance problems. Maybe they simply know that whatever he was once projected to become or was scouted to have past, that his stuff just hasn't grown into what they hoped it would; that his control is awful; and that his actual stuff is less than it used to be.

 

At one point Fleita viewed his curve as the best breaking pitch in the farm. Since then, they've decided his curve is so wild that they scrapped it, and tried to replace it with a slider. Is that slider any good, and does he have any control over it? Based on his 10.00 ERA in AFL, and his >1.5 WHIP in back-to-back AA summers, it would appear not.

 

At one point his fastball was viewed as excellent, with a chance to be a plus-plus pitch. More recent reports are that while it touches low 90's on occasion, it's mostly upper 80's. So it would appear that perhaps he currently profiles as a soft-tossing wildman:

*Fastball: minus velocity, minus control

*Breaking ball: decent movement, minus control.

 

He's been a really, really bad pitcher, and he's gotten worse each year, and got further worse in front of the AFL scouts.

 

Sometimes a wildman figures something out, and sometimes a guy who has occasionally thrown hard recovers velocity. So maybe he'll put things together sooner or later, I hope so. Maybe that will happen abruptly in somebody else's camp this spring, and he'll not only get drafted but stick, and not only stick in spring but stick all year, and not only stick all year but actually be somewhat good.

 

But most likely Veal is just a really bad pitcher with bad control of mediocre stuff.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Veal 2008

 

v. RHP: 492 BF(119.1 IP), 6.94 K/9, 4.22 BB/9, 19 HR, .290 BAA, 41.9% GB%

v. LHP: 142 BF(32.1 IP), 8.63 K/9, 6.96 BB/9, 0 HR, .221 BAA, 54.0% GB%

[badnews]

The Cubs' lovefest with Justin Berg is obnoxious. He sucks. One of the better equivalents to Berg is Scott Munter. Munter was a groundball machine. He also had a suck K/BB ratio and gave up a ton of hits. What's Berg's absolute upside? The crappier version of Jamey Wright? Ugh.

 

I think Veal can stay on a major league roster. Look at Wesley Wright this past season.

[Guest]

Baseball America[/url]"]The list of intriguing lefties includes several rarities—lefty power arms. The best-known name, Cubs lefthander Donald Veal, ranked as high as second in Chicago's Top 10 prospects, after the 2006 season. Since then, he has fallen in stature in much the same way the player he's most often compared to—Dontrelle Willis—has fallen. Veal posted a 10.00 ERA in the Arizona Fall League despite continuing to show a fastball that reaches 94 mph and a curve that at times is a plus pitch. He lacks consistent command of his heater, curve or changeup, and the Cubs plan on moving him to the bullpen to see if he can develop along the lines of an Arthur Rhodes, throwing more strikes in shorter stints.

 

...

 

The Twins didn't protect several players of interest, including last year's No. 1 overall pick, righthander Tim Lahey, whom the Rays selected and traded to the Cubs; he was later returned to the Twins