Spring Training Game Thread

[Rcal10]

Just now, Rob said:

Busch with a HR. Not a cheapie, either.

He has looked good so far this spring.

[Bertz]

Brett Taylor brought up a really good point this AM that the amount of Ivan Brethowr we're seeing is probably meaningful.  You expect to see the Iowa guys all over these games, you don't expect to see a Myrtle Beach guy, especially in like the 5th/6th inning.  Given that he's not a Top 30 guy it's a soft sign that the org likes him a lot better than the public.

[Rcal10]

How hard is Keller throwing? He looked good again today. 

[Bertz]

11 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

How hard is Keller throwing? He looked good again today. 

95.9.  Down a little bit from Thursday, where everyone's velo was up and you wonder if the gun was hot, but still very high for him.

Interesting thing to me is that Sharma indicated Keller was being viewed as a SP, but pitched today on 3 days rest.  I wonder if he's making enough of an impression to have a real chance at the MLB bullpen as a 2-3 inning guy instead of having to bide his time at Iowa?

[Jason Ross]

24 minutes ago, Bertz said:

Brett Taylor brought up a really good point this AM that the amount of Ivan Brethowr we're seeing is probably meaningful.  You expect to see the Iowa guys all over these games, you don't expect to see a Myrtle Beach guy, especially in like the 5th/6th inning.  Given that he's not a Top 30 guy it's a soft sign that the org likes him a lot better than the public.

There's been a big swing change. Big. Swing. Change. 

Give it a few days and there will be something about it on the home page. 

[Stratos]

1 hour ago, Rob said:

Busch with a HR. Not a cheapie, either.

Busch said he hit the weights in the offseason and has come in bigger this spring

[Bertz]

I had stopped paying attention by the time Scalzo was in the game, but his average velo was up 3 full MPH today it looks like.

Some of that might be classification, in that he maybe had some AAA cutters get classified FBs and drag down his average.  But the top end velo doesn't lie.  The fastest pitch he threw in AAA last year was 95.6, today 10 of his 11 fastballs today were harder than that. Including topping 97 twice!

Looks like he might be adding a sweeper too, but I'm gonna leave parsing that to the experts.

[JD94]

Count me in as very very intrigued by Brethowr. 
 

Love seeing Jaguar hit the ground running. Very excited to see what he does this year 

 

Good seeing Busch, PCA, & Amaya looking strong early 

 

Some intriguing arms also. Many of which have already been mentioned 

 

[JD94]

Also this is the most excited I’ve been for Cubs baseball in a few years now. 

[Stratos]

6 minutes ago, JD94 said:

Count me in as very very intrigued by Brethowr. 

Interesting that they invited this 7th rounder to ST.

Speaking of giants, anyone see McGeary round 3rd base trying to get home and fall on his face because the wheels fell off?  Got in a run-down between 3rd and home and the legs wobbled a couple of times again throughout.  Boog or JD called it an SUV trying to take tight corners as opposed to a VW Beetle haha.  Anyways that guy better hit because he can't run anywhere but a straight line.

[Stratos]

1 hour ago, TomtheBombadil said:

I’m also interested in the Alcantara/4th OF/CF situation. I’ve been a big skeptic of the bat, too many groundballs, but am also very very high on the defense and character. Getting him with Dustin Kelly while Counsell works matchups and utilizes the defense maybe has 2.0 appeal, similarities to early Baez but without the earning potential. Really my knocks on Alcantara aren’t so different from Garrett Mitchell, he seems to be doing fine esp so cheap, and the Astros have had a good amount of success with RHH CFs who can play defense next to Tucker

Cubs have eluded that Caissie and Alcantara aren't going to be on the bench, they want to give them full-time AB's in Iowa.  Alcantara only has 35 career games in AAA.  He'll be out of options after this season so I assume he'll be up at some point again if/when injuries happen, especially in the 2nd half.  I also assume they want to give him as many Iowa PA's as possible while he's still able to play there this season.

There's plenty of time to change their launch angles once they come up.  I'm not overly concerned, and they wouldn't count on them as middle-of-the-order mashers right away anyways.  Would rather this path than the Ian Happ path of hitting development.

In his cup of coffee last Sept according to Bball Savant, Alcantara showed well-above average bat speed and 92nd percentile sprint speed.  That would make him easily the 2nd fastest player on the team.  And those metrics could go up with more data.  The raw power is there.

 

[gflore34]

Question regarding Spring Training - Which type of success is most likely to translate to regular season success hitting or pitching?  Arguments could be made for both, think I would choose pitching as the most likely to translate.

Keller, Scalzo looked good and, despite giving up a HR, I liked some of what I saw from Neely.

Edited February 25, 2025 by gflore34

[CubinNY]

9 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

Question regarding Spring Training - Which type of success is most likely to translate to regular season success hitting or pitching?  Arguments could be made for both, think I would choose pitching as the most likely to translate.

Keller, Scalzo looked good and, despite giving up a HR, I liked some of what I saw from Neely.

It's hard to say that anything translates especially for cold weather teams. Jamo's first year with the Cubs I think he walked one guy in ST and had an ERA under 3. Then regular season hit and he was not good, not awful, but not good. 

 

[mul21]

5 hours ago, Stratos said:

Cubs have eluded that Caissie and Alcantara aren't going to be on the bench, they want to give them full-time AB's in Iowa.  Alcantara only has 35 career games in AAA.  He'll be out of options after this season so I assume he'll be up at some point again if/when injuries happen, especially in the 2nd half.  I also assume they want to give him as many Iowa PA's as possible while he's still able to play there this season.

Did we ever hear definitively if Alcantara is getting another option year?

[Bertz]

18 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

Question regarding Spring Training - Which type of success is most likely to translate to regular season success hitting or pitching?  Arguments could be made for both, think I would choose pitching as the most likely to translate.

Keller, Scalzo looked good and, despite giving up a HR, I liked some of what I saw from Neely.

As far as traditional numbers there's been research that say it's pretty strictly strikeouts and walks.  So like with Michael Busch don't look at him hitting .500, but do notice the fact that he has gone 10 at bats without a strikeout and all his contact numbers are up as well.

The pitch arsenals are harder to say.  I would tend to pay a lot of attention to velo increases, especially if a guy's not getting hit around (i.e. he's not artificially throwing hard to try and make the team).  New pitches I try to pump the brakes on.  I bit hard on the "Jameson Taillon’s got a great new sweeper and he's going to level up now" narrative.  I think even if a new pitch has great spin/movement you need to know that a guy's comfortable locating it and using it in games that matter.

[Bertz]

7 minutes ago, mul21 said:

Did we ever hear definitively if Alcantara is getting another option year?

No, but Arizona Phil gets the benefit of the doubt on these things IMO.  And we did get confirmation about Kilian, which is news Phil broke at the same time as the Alcantara extra option.

[Jason Ross]

58 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

Question regarding Spring Training - Which type of success is most likely to translate to regular season success hitting or pitching?  Arguments could be made for both, think I would choose pitching as the most likely to translate.

Keller, Scalzo looked good and, despite giving up a HR, I liked some of what I saw from Neely.

I tend to look at ST as a glorified practice. I'm rarely interested in results - for example, a player hitting well or not does little for me. I'll expand that belief a little if we're looking at a veteran player (IDC at all about their results) versus a young player and give a bit of a look to a younger player, but overall, results don't matter so much. 

What I do think matters are differences. Does someone show up with a new swing? New mechanics? Is their velocity jumping? Are they flashing a new pitch? These are things that I kind of...jot down and keep an eye on as we move forward. I wouldn't bank on that new skill that they're flashing in a small sample, but it's a noteworthy change and could mean something. 

For example - Brethowr is showing a far improved swing. That might matter. Mathew Boyd flashed a new slider. That might matter. Many of them may not matter eventually, but it's worth taking note and keeping it in the back of your head.

[gflore34]

1 minute ago, 1908_Cubs said:

I tend to look at ST as a glorified practice. I'm rarely interested in results - for example, a player hitting well or not does little for me. I'll expand that belief a little if we're looking at a veteran player (IDC at all about their results) versus a young player and give a bit of a look to a younger player, but overall, results don't matter so much. 

What I do think matters are differences. Does someone show up with a new swing? New mechanics? Is their velocity jumping? Are they flashing a new pitch? These are things that I kind of...jot down and keep an eye on as we move forward. I wouldn't bank on that new skill that they're flashing in a small sample, but it's a noteworthy change and could mean something. 

For example - Brethowr is showing a far improved swing. That might matter. Mathew Boyd flashed a new slider. That might better. Many of them may not matter eventually, but it's worth taking note and keeping it in the back of your head.

Much like the answer from Bertz above, both make perfect sense, look at aspects of player' game that have changed.  And, are those changes effective?  If so, they may appear when the lights are turned on.

[Bertz]

Really good piece on Brown.  Some things I thought interesting 

- Assad's injury, though minor, does probably already rule him out from the opening day rotation

- Colin Rea still needs to fight off Brown and Wicks for that spot

- Whether Chicago or Iowa, Brown is very likely to be a SP to open the year

- Brown's neck injury wasn't a stress fracture, but instead an Osteoma (bone growth).  So now that it's dealt with it should not be a chronic/recurring issue

Edited February 25, 2025 by Bertz
Yikes!

[Jason Ross]

20 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

Much like the answer from Bertz above, both make perfect sense, look at aspects of player' game that have changed.  And, are those changes effective?  If so, they may appear when the lights are turned on.

Exactly. I use ST as a point of curiosity. "Oh the Cubs are working on this with Player X? Interesting". It's a good window into how the Cubs are looking at a player developmentally, I feel. These changes or fixes aren't things that just happened, they have likely been working on these things for months. Some make big differences, some don't work...but I always find it interesting. 

[squally1313]

12 minutes ago, Bertz said:

- Brown's neck injury wasn't a stress fracture, but instead an Osteoma (bone growth).  So now that it's dealt with it should be a chronic/recurring issue

typo, hopefully?

[Bertz]

3 minutes ago, squally1313 said:

typo, hopefully?

Oh gosh, yes!  Lemme fix that.  SHOULD NOT be chronic

[Bertz]

Happ/Tucker/Suzuki/Swanson at the top of the batting order for the 2nd time in 3 days.  I wonder if that's the real deal.  Presumably would put Busch #5 and Hoerner #6 from there?

[CubinNY]

4 hours ago, Bertz said:

Oh gosh, yes!  Lemme fix that.  SHOULD NOT be chronic

Yes the way Sharma explained that injury it almost sounded like cancer or something. It is such a weird injury. 

[CubinNY]

Sammy in the house!!!!