The Cubs Should Trade or Non-Tender Mike Tauchman and Sign One of These Minor-League Free Agents Instead

[Matthew Trueblood]

The Chicago Cubs are a team in need of ceiling, flexibility, and a bit of extra room at the margins. It could be the perfect time to pounce on an opportunity to upgrade in a bench spot, clear playing time for prospects if needed, and save a small amount of scratch for spending elsewhere.

Image courtesy of © Mark J. Rebilas-Imagn Images

Just after the end of the MLB season, players who ended the season off the 40-man roster and who have been in pro baseball for at least six years can elect free agency. We saw the Cubs go through this process on Monday, when they allowed several players to become free agents, although they subsequently re-signed a handful of them, too. This happens every November, and almost every November, a couple of players who reach free agency through these means end up surfacing with big-league clubs and having solid seasons or careers. The Brewers got Blake Perkins this way late in 2022, for instance.

Based on process-oriented and batted-ball data from Triple-A, I see two players who might be especially worthy of targeting for teams this fall. Each is a left-handed batter and outfielder in the second half of his 20s, and each was briefly considered to have genuine upside very early in their pro careers. None of that has materialized for them yet, but the signs they each showed at Triple-A this year should have the Cubs considering them as alternatives to Mike Tauchman, whom they got off the scrapheap in Jan. 2023 but who is now in line to make over $2 million via arbitration and (at 35 years old) almost certainly has his best baseball behind him.

Carlos Cortes, Released by Mets
Marginally famous when first drafted because he would play the infield as a right-handed thrower and the outfield as a left-handed one, Cortes quickly faded into relative obscurity. It's probably a bit too generous to blame the lost minor-league season in 2020 for his inability to turn the corner as a prospect, but in examining his progress through the system, that does feel like the moment when he had an opportunity to take a leap forward. Instead, he's plodded up the ladder, showing insufficient hands to stick on the field (so long, right-handed throwing) and insufficient speed to play center field. At just 5-foot-7, he cuts a very unlikely figure for the big leagues, especially for someone who won't have speed in their game, so he's dropped below the radar.

Over the past two seasons, though, he's shown real promise with the Mets' Triple-A affiliate in Syracuse. In 2024, he batted a seemingly forgettable .246/.330/.456, but that came with 16 home runs in just 321 plate appearances. More telling than those numbers, anyway, are some of the ones under the hood for the 27-year-old.

PA	Swing%	Chase%	ZSw-Chase	InZoneWhiff%	PHiA/SW	100+/Sw	LandAng	LaunchAng	LowHit%	MedHit%	HighHit%
321	44.0%	23.9%	43.1%	16.8%	4.8%	9.6%	8.4	15.8	29.0%	33.5%	36.6%
ExitVel	10thExitVel	90thExitVel	Hit95+%	Well Hit LA	Sweet Spot EV	BABIP	Barrel%	FBDst	xWOBA	wOBA	SAEV
90.9	76.6	104.7	39.2%	15.7	93.9	.255	17.6%	319.4	.317	.338	91.5

You need not know what each and every one of these numbers means to get a sense of the player they're describing. Cortes makes good swing decisions; hits the ball fairly hard; elevates and pulls it often enough to get to his power; and doesn't get beaten in the strike zone much. It's unlikely he'd hit for the same type of over-the-fence power in the majors, but both his average launch angle on well-hit balls and his average exit velocity on balls in the launch-angle sweet spot top the MLB average. His inability to play center field would hurt his utility to many organizations, but the Cubs have Pete Crow-Armstrong, Cody Bellinger, and Kevin Alcántara around. They can afford to swap out Tauchman for a player like Cortes, if they believe in his bat. The data says they should, and he's more substantial than his vitals might suggest.

Cal Mitchell, Releaed by Padres
It's a shame this second stop for the former top Pirates prospect didn't work out. Mitchell is a San DIego native, and he hit very well in El Paso. The Padres just happened to get a shocking rookie breakout from Jackson Merrill and an unexpected star turn from Jurickson Profar, obviating any long-term experiments or even injury stopgaps that might have allowed the local kid to make good.

Mitchell is still just 25, though he'll turn 26 during spring training. On the way up the Pittsburgh chain, the knock on him was a lack of power, which came partially from the very thing that drew so many scouts to him when he was still a teenager: his sweet swing. As good as Mitchell looked up there, he too often hit his best balls on low trajectories, and he couldn't cover the top third of the strike zone. His strikeout rates got gory, and he never got the ball off the ground enough to tap into the power suggested by his 220-pound frame.

After he crashed out of the Pirates system last fall and signed a minor-league deal with San Diego, though, he made some adjustments. Here, rather than give all the numbers I conveyed for Cortes in a single table, we're going to look at each of the two lines as distinct tables, with second rows, so we can compare his 2023 and 2024 showings.

Seasons	PA	Swing%	Chase%	ZSw-Chase	InZoneWhiff%	PHiA/SW	100+/Sw	LandAng	LaunchAng	LowHit%	MedHit%	HighHit%
2023	316	45.1%	27.8%	35.4%	19.3%	4.7%	9.8%	11.3	10.5	33.0%	37.2%	29.3%
2024	469	44.6%	21.8%	45.8%	18.6%	5.3%	7.4%	7.7	13.4	27.0%	40.8%	32.0%

Seasons	PA	ExitVel	10thExitVel	90thExitVel	Hit95+%	Well Hit LA	Sweet Spot EV	BABIP	Barrel%	FBDst	xWOBA	wOBA	SAEV
2023	316	90.6	73.6	104.2	44.7%	12	93.8	.354	22.6%	314	.303	.326	89
2024	469	89.6	70.6	102.9	42.5%	17.4	94.3	.307	24.8%	332.9	.352	.371	93.6

Mitchell made a crucial change just by deciding not to chase above the zone in 2024, and it paid off in spades. His strikeout rate plunged from nearly 30% to barely over 20%, and his walk rate rose from 9.2% to 11.7%. 

That tweak made a world of difference and unlocked some relatively low-friction improvements in his contact profile. As you can see, he actually lost a bit of raw exit velocity, but he hit his line drives and fly balls harder and got more lift. Generating more air balls allowed him to stroke 22 home runs in under 500 plate appearances. It is, again, unlikely he would carry that home-run rate into the bigger parks and less thin air of MLB, but he profiles like a higher-upside version of Rafael Ortega, whom the Cubs got a bunch of good work from in 2021 and 2022, as they plunged into this rebuild.

Whereas Cortes handles lefties fairly well, Mitchell probably shouldn't ever see one, but if the Cubs are as aggressive as they should be in the market for one more big right-handed bat, that won't be a problem. Mitchell could slot into the roster spot currently reserved for Tauchman at a lower price, with six years of team control left and still very much in his prime. He can also be optioned to the minors for one more season. If the Cubs can sell either of these players—but especially Mitchell—on coming aboard, it could pay off handsomely for them in 2025 and beyond.

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