Article: Chicago Cubs Top Prospect Rankings, 2024 Preseason: #11-15

[Josh Illes]

We’re five prospects deep into our roundtable, looking at our favorite 20 prospects in the Cubs system. We’ve already had a few surprises, but will there be a few more to come?

Image courtesy of © Darren Yamashita-USA TODAY Sports

If you haven't already, please check out the previous lists written alongside @1908_Cubs, introducing you to our honorable mentions and the prospects we ranked 16-20 by reading the first part of the series! Today, we'll continue making our way to our top 10, as we round out the prospects in the back half of our lists, looking at the players we ranked 11-15 in the Cubs system. 

Jason's 15th Ranked Prospect: Alexander Canario, OF
Canario is very boom-or-bust, to me. There’s a ton of power in the profile; that’s undeniable. Similar to Matt Mervis, however, there are serious contact rate concerns. Canario’s contact rate in Triple A last season was just over 67%. While he did damage against fastballs, he did almost nothing against sliders, changeups, and curveballs, whiffing at alarming rates. This is a serious flaw that Canario would have to fix in order to become a valuable MLB hitter. I give him an edge on Mervis due to the positional flexibility of being a decent outfielder, but I don’t have much faith in his profile of being fastball or flail right now. It’s fair to suggest that part of this may be rust: Statcast data on swing rates like this are brand new to 2023, and his 2022 may have been significantly better. But I have a hard time being confident in his overall profile, as well. 

Josh's 15th Ranked Prospect: BJ Murray, 3B
Like Haydn McGeary, Murray appears to be a bargain the Cubs found in the 15th round of a draft, this time in 2021. Also like McGeary, all he has done is hit. This past year, he hit a .199 ISO at Double-A Tennessee, while hitting a career-best 16 home runs, and there is no reason to think he won’t carry that over into 2024. The switch-hitter plays a capable third base, but will need to prove himself defensively at the hot corner to elevate his prospect status. I don’t believe he will ever have the power required to be an everyday MLB first baseman. If he can sustain his success in 2023, though, he could be a quick riser in 2024. 

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Jason's 14th Ranked Prospect: BJ Murray, 3B
Murray has a good approach at the plate and makes a lot of contact with the baseball. There seems to be a belief in the industry that his glove has progressed far enough to be a capable third baseman. Murray has posted back-to-back seasons of 127 and 128 wRC+, respectively, and has put himself on the map as a potential bat to crack the MLB roster at some point in 2024. I hesitate to put him higher right now, as I don’t know how much I believe in his power… yet. That’s not to say it’s imaginary; I want to see him show that he can carry the nearly .200 ISO into Iowa. The biggest knock was that he didn’t hit enough home runs to be exciting, at a position where his bat needed to carry him a bit more, and I want to see him repeat and build upon what he did last year. While I don’t think Murray is a star player, I think there’s probably a player who’s a capable 2.5-fWAR third baseman here.

The floor is high enough that he’s sure to make the majors at some point, and the ceiling is high enough that I wouldn’t project him simply as a second-division starter. I’m interested in seeing how he handles advanced pitching. While I’m not sure he’ll be able to leapfrog a few prospects on the list, Murray, especially with a promotion or two, could be a top-half prospect for the Cubs in just a few months. The ordinal ranking has less to do with Murray and more with how much I think of the top 13 players. 

Josh's 14th Ranked Prospect: Luke Little, RP
Little made a big jump last year in his overall development. Starting the year in High A, he made it to Chicago by season’s end, with stops in Tennessee and Iowa. That’s impressive for anyone, but especially for a hard-throwing lefty who is equally capable of striking batters out or getting them to ground out. He’s 6-foot-8 and throws his fastball in the upper 90s, which is daunting enough for hitters, but Little also has a shallow arm slot, which makes picking up that fastball even harder. Hitters have a hard time barreling the ball off of him, which is what you want to see in a high-leverage lefty reliever, something I believe Little is and will be for quite some time.

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Jason's 13th Ranked Prospect: Daniel Palencia, RP
I had a hard time deciding which of Daniel Palencia or Luke Little to rank higher, so this could be seen as “12 A and 12 B." Palencia has absolute wipeout stuff, but has struggled to maintain consistency. Despite this, he shot up a few levels last year and made a handful of appearances over two stints with the parent team. What interests me is that his walk rate went down over his last handful of appearances, and he maintained that juice, posting an impressive 3.23 xFIP over his final 17 innings. There was a blowup or two preceding that, but 17 innings isn’t a pure fluke. Some legitimate tweaks and changes may have been made. It may not be a guarantee he makes the Opening Day roster.

Still, with an injury or two and with a manager who prefers to see his arms go one inning and has no problem going with young pitchers with stuff, I expect Palencia to make an impact on the 2024 Cubs. It’s not a guarantee the control sticks, but there’s a real chance he’s an impact-level reliever, and with a good season, could take over the Héctor Neris eighth-inning role if the Cubs decline his option at season's end. The stuff is just that good. He’ll need to be the guy the Cubs saw over his last 17 innings in 2023 to do that and over a larger sample, but the upside is there. It's a pretty good get for a half-season of Andrew Chafin. 

Josh's 13th Ranked Prospect: Moisés Ballesteros, C
It seems I’m a little low on Ballesteros compared to everyone else. After all, he was recently named the Cubs' Minor League Player of the Year, so he is doing many things well. Specifically, the 20-year-old catcher can hit. He slashed .285/.374/.449 over two levels in 2023. He hit 14 home runs in 117 games while striking out less than 16 percent of the time. Those numbers, for a catcher, are elite. I haven’t jumped him into my top 10 because I’m not sure if he will be able to stick at catcher long-term. At 5-foot-7, I’m not sure that first base is the best place for him, which could leave him without a position. That said, “If you can hit, they’ll find a position for you” is a phrase that gets used often, and I think it applies to Ballesteros. I’m looking forward to his 2024 season to see if he can sustain his hitting metrics while improving defensively.

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Jason's 12th Ranked Prospect: Luke Little, RP
Why did I give Little the edge on someone like Daniel Palencia? He’s left-handed, and guys who throw 98 mph from the left side are rarer and more valuable than those who throw from the right side. With Little’s size, left-handed throwing, and fastball velocity, you can argue this pitch is a 70 to 75 grade. The two relievers have similar questions to answer, though, such as: how often will they throw strikes?

Little did begin to answer that question with a jump to Triple A and some improved walk rates, so the arrow is pointing in the right direction. On top of the strikeouts, Little gets a ton of ground balls, with an over-50% ground ball rate throughout his career, giving him ample double play opportunities, especially with the Cubs' current middle infield. Coupled with the strikeout potential, he’s likely to survive a few more walks. As of writing this, the Cubs have little competition for the tall left-handed pitcher, and unless they want Drew Smyly to be the only left-handed arm in the entire pen, he has a great chance to break camp with the team. There’s leverage reliever-type upside, and I’m excited to see him in Wrigley.

Josh's 12th Ranked Prospect: Matt Mervis, 1B
I realize it’s a bit of an unpopular opinion these days, but I still really like Mervis. Or, at least, I’m willing to give him more of the benefit of the doubt that he was ever set up for success during his short stay in Chicago last season. It sounds shocking, but I don’t believe David Ross was very good at handling young prospects making their major-league debuts. When you listen to Mervis talk about himself, the one thing that has always stood out is his belief in himself--his unfettered confidence. I think he lost some of that during his struggles last season, but I wouldn’t be surprised if an offseason (and manager change) later, he can recover some of what made him special in 2022 and return to being the Mash Mervis of old.

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Jason's 11th Ranked Prospect: James Triantos, INF
Triantos is an interesting case, because there remain a wide variety of possible outcomes for him. If you’re optimistic about him, the upside is something around Alex Bregman: an extremely low strikeout, high-contact, 15-20 home run power infielder. The downside is something like “Nick Madrigal, but he can’t field.” You could probably argue B.J. Murray in this slot over Triantos, but I’ll give a slight nod to Triantos, despite the lack of a defensive home right now. Triantos has some extra helium after impressive performances in the Arizona Fall League (though in the AFL, quality pitching is always sparse). There’s enough arm and athleticism that it wouldn’t be surprising to see him eventually figure out third, second, or somewhere in the outfield. I’d also be willing to let James trade a few strikeouts for a little more power. This season won’t see Triantos get any time with the major-league team, but his emergence could impact the team around the deadline if they feel he’s become superfluous.

Josh's 11th Ranked Prospect: Ben Brown, SP/RP
Brown was traded to the Cubs on Aug. 1, 2022. I was lucky enough to watch him pitch 20 days later with the Tennessee Smokies when they visited Birmingham, where I live. His stuff was as good as advertised--a terrific slider, good curve, electric fastball--but what I saw that day was him throwing the ball over the plate a little too often, allowing hitters to stay on balance and ready to swing. The outing wasn’t bad overall, but he gave up a couple of loud doubles and almost looked overmatched. Fast-forward a year later, and I would argue he isn’t throwing the ball over the plate *enough*. It seems that he’s still trying to find his sweet spot when it comes to location, but I think he’ll ultimately be able to figure it out, maybe as soon as this year. If he needs to start limiting his pitch mix, he may become a reliever, but either way, he has the stuff to contribute at the MLB level.

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Is there someone you think belongs in the top 10 we listed outside of it? Is Jason too high on someone? Is Josh too low? Let us know in the comments section!

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