Cubs Minor Leaguers Hot or Not: Jordan Wicks Looks Ready

[Jason Ross]

Last week marked the first time in 2025 all four affiliates played games. This week gave us our first full slate of games. Which players have gotten off to a good start? Who's struggling? 

Image courtesy of © MICHAEL CLUBB/SOUTH BEND TRIBUNE / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

We're on our second week of 2025, which means our second week of "Hot or Not?" If you're looking for recaps of each game in depth, we give deep dives for each team bi-weekly designed to give as more in depth view of each game. You can view the most recent recap, from @Billy Reich here. Hot or Not is not designed to be comprehensive, but to provide a quick overview of some notable performances. So, who was hot this week? Who is struggling? Who might be next up to Chicago? 

Overall Temperature of the Week: This was a good week for most of the Cubs' affiliates! Three of the four affiliates finished with winning records (uhe Low-A Pelicans were the outlier), and many of the Cubs' best players had good weeks. There were a few players who have gone down with injuries. Drew Gray has been added to the 60-day IL, and after rolling his ankle last Sunday, Owen Caissie did not play. Outside of the injuries, though, this week in general gets a hot rating. 

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Iowa Cubs, Triple-A (4-2)
Next up - vs St. Paul Saints (Minnesota Twins) 

🔥Jordan Wicks, SP: 3 IP, 5 K, 0 BB, 0 R, 0 ER - Wicks originally was slated to take a turn in the rotation mid-week, but with the Justin Steele injury news, he was pushed back into a piggyback role on Sunday (likely waiting to see if the Cubs would turn to Wicks or Colin Rea at the big-league level). Wicks looked great on the day in his three innings, arguably his best appearance since the injury last season. With Rea looking solid on Sunday, could we see Wicks come up to play the long man role and add another lefty in the pen? Or maybe he'd serve as a piggyback partner to someone? 

🔥Kevin Alcántara, OF: 168 wRC+, 30 K%, 25 BB%, 1 XBH - That's a really nice week for "The Jaguar". The strikeouts remain a little inflated, but the hope is that as he settles into Iowa, the whiffs will smooth out. We're still waiting on the power to really emerge, but as the de facto backup to all of three outfield spots, Alcántara staying hot in Iowa is good news.

🔥Christian Franklin, OF: 164 wRC+, 20.8 K%, 16.7 BB%, 1 HR. 3 XBH - I think I've slept on Franklin too much. I refuse to do that any longer, and now declare it Christian Franklin Season. Franklin has done almost everything you could want. He hits at every level; he takes his walks; he can hack it defensively across the outfield; he's played SEC baseball. There's a dude here. I'm not 100% convinced it's a starting dude, but Franklin has a good chance of carving out a Mike Tauchman-style career as a really good fourth outfielder.

🥶Ben Cowles, INF 41 wRC+, 40 K%< 8 BB%, 2 XBH - Cowles had started off really hitting the hell out of the baseball, but his contact rates and strikeout rates have climbed steeply. I'm not entirely faulting him—he missed a lot of time last year and he's at a new level. It's probably just best to temper any excitement on him until a bit later. 

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Knoxville Smokies, Double-A (4-2)
Next up - vs Chattanooga Outlooks (Cincinnati Reds) 

🔥BJ Murray, 1b/3b: 199 wRC+, 31.8 K%, 22.7 BB%, 2 HR - This was a much better week for the infielder. Murray was able to go deep twice, and really, he should make quick work of Knoxville if he wants to get back on a potential big-league path. He's got plenty of competition ahead of him with Johnathon Long in Iowa, but it wouldn't be impossible for him to become relevant again by the end of the year.

🔥Brett Bateman, OF: 220 wRC+, 21.4 K%, 42.9 BB% - I'm still a bit skeptical that Bateman has enough oomph in his profile to ever be put squarely on the majors' radar, but walking this much and having enough speed and defensive value can you get there. Bateman missed the first week of the season coming back from injury and he looks keyed-in and ready to go in Knoxville. When the Cubs begin moving Alcántara and Franklin to Chicago, Bateman will be among the wave of players to replace them in Iowa.

🥶Ed Howard, SS - 90wRC+, 40 K%, 13.3 BB%, 1 XBH: The good news is that Ed Howard has been promoted to Knoxville and has started his season with what would be his career-best offensive numbers. The bad news is that an 83 wRC+ would be a high-water mark. Howard isn't so old that he's entirely beyond hope to ever get back to being on a path to MLB, but he's off the radar currently. I know many fans like to dunk on the former top pick, but I keep checking in on him during his games, hoping for it to click. 

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South Bend Cubs, High-A (4-2)
Next up - @ West Michigan Whitecaps (Detroit) 

🔥Cristian Hernandez, INF - 261 wRC+, 12,9 K%, 11.5 BB%, 1 HR, 5 XBH - There isn't a Cub prospect who's gotten off to a better start than Hernandez. Many were left with a sour taste in their mouths after his first season in Myrtle Beach, but the former international free-agent gem has been crushing the baseball. He only turned 21 a few months ago, so while it feels like he's been around for a while, he's very young. He's controlling the barrel really well and is finally showing off some of the power that was promised. There's a good chance he's a quick riser this year.

🔥Ivan Brethowr, OF - 259 wRC+, 15 K%, 20 BB%, 1 HR, 2 XBH: As a former college player, you could probably expect Brethowr to play well at High A. What stands out, however, is his lack of strikeouts so far. He's only 22 years old, so while he's a former collegiate bat, he's someone who's still got plenty of youth on his side. I wrote about the huge outfielder earlier this offseason when I spoke about some mechanical changes in his game, and it's great to think that the mechanical changes may be part of why he's started so well.

🥶Edgar Alvarez, 1b/DH - 0 wRC+, 30.8 K%, 30.8 BB%: Alvarez, like the aforementioned Brethowr, is someone who is a recent draftee from the 2024 class. Alvarez came out of school with dazzling batted-ball data, but so far, he's struggled to turn that into pro success. It's super early, so there's no writing him off, but it'd be nice to see him make some more contact and have some positive outcomes. 

🥶Burl Carroway, RP - 1.1 IP, 1 K, 5 BB, 1 R, 1` ER: I probably won't mention him very often, but former second-round selection Burl Carroway reappeared in South Bend this year and the results are... basically the same. Carroway just cannot throw strikes, and at age 25, it doesn't feel like he'll randomly learn it. A small, faint, glimmer of hope was there for the lefty with the addition of Tyler Zombro and a new pitching infrastructure being implemented, but as of now, it doesn't look like it's fixed anything for him. 

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Myrtle Beach Pelicans, Low-A (1-5)
Next up - Augusta Green Jackets (Atlanta Braves)

🥶Cole Mathis, 1b/3b/DH - 25 wRC+, 33.3 K%, 4.2 BB%, 2 XBH: Not a great week for the Cubs' 2025 second-round pick. Mathis is struggling to get his feet under him. No cause for panic, just normal early-season struggles, especially for a player coming back from injury. Hopefully, he'll have a big week and put this one behind him.

🥶Alexey Lumpuy, OF - 33 wRC+, 38.5 K%, 11.5 BB%: O, how fickle prospects can be. After getting off to a nice start (and being featured as "hot" last week), Lumpuy struggled in his second week. He's very young, and Myrtle Beach is hardly a fun place to hit, so we should expect those weeks to happen. Hopefully, the tools show out a bit more next week.

🔥Evan Aschenbeck, P - 5 IP, 6 K, 3 BB, 0 R, 0 ER: Based on the record, you may have guessed the Pelicans' pitching staff struggled, but that would be a bit of an understatement; the team surrendered eight or more runs four times this week. In a sea of struggles, Aschenback, the Cubs' 14th-round pick out of Texas A&M was a gem, however, as he came on in relief and pitched really well. Keep an eye on him as we move forward, to see if it's more of a blip or a trend. 

🥶JP Wheat, SP - 4.1 IP, 4 K, 5 BB, 3 R, 3 ER: Command was not on point for JP Wheat this week. That's okay, he's likely to struggle in this category at times. With a live arm and a lanky build, mechanical consistency can come and go at times. Stuff was still there, so it's hopefully more "hiccup" than anything. 

🔥Nazier Mule, SP - 5 IP, 5K, 2 BB, 0 R, 0 ER: Nazier Mule looked great, and turned in his best performance as a prospect. Making it five innings was great and helps to show he's over the arm surgery from the start of his Cub career. Even better was the control, as Mule had command over his pitches. On draft day there was some thought he could pull a Tink Hence - both in terms of stature and stuff - where he could really come on quick and this kind of start makes you see that as a possibility. Long way to go, but awesome start.

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That concludes our Hot or Not this week. Who did I miss? Was there a player you think had a good week? Maybe someone who struggled? Let us know in the comment section below!

 

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[Bertz]

Understandably overshadowed by Hernandez, Brethowr's seeming breakout has been really fun to see as well.  The contact numbers are worse than the strikeout rate, so there's probably some regression coming there (and for as much as I'm cheerleading for Cristian, ditto), but he's looking like he's validating the spring training hype.

[Jason Ross]

8 minutes ago, Bertz said:

Understandably overshadowed by Hernandez, Brethowr's seeming breakout has been really fun to see as well.  The contact numbers are worse than the strikeout rate, so there's probably some regression coming there (and for as much as I'm cheerleading for Cristian, ditto), but he's looking like he's validating the spring training hype.

Yeah the contact rates on both aren't super sparkling, though I'm kind of chalking those up to kind of SSS stuff as it usually takes more than ~a week of PAs to get to a stabilized version of the numbers. There are different opinions on when it stabilizes, but ~100 PA's is usually around the number that people point to. Both are well shy of that, so I'm hoping that the K-rate is the closer-to-truth-number (while recognizing it can be the other way around, but I like to live a glass-half-full-life, so I'm going with the fun one)