Minor League Discussion & Boxes, 7-2-25

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Scheduled Games (Central Time):

Iowa vs. Omaha, 12:08 pm
Knoxville at Rocket City, 6:35 pm
South Bend at Peoria, 6:35 pm
Myrtle Beach at Charleston, 6:05 pm

The ACL and DSL Cubs teams have the day off

Probable Starting Pitchers:

Iowa: TBD
Knoxville: RHP Nick Dean (23.2 IP, 4.18 ERA, 2.20 FIP, 25 K, 5 BB)
South Bend: LHP Drew Gray (at ACL: 6.1 IP, 0.00 ERA, 2.87 FIP, 11 K, 4 BB)
Myrtle Beach: LHP Ethan Flanagan (10 IP, 0.90 ERA, 2.49 FIP, 10 K, 3 BB)

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Will Sanders is off the developmental list and starting for Iowa.

[Bertz]

Jaguar dong!

[CaliforniaRaisin]

8 minutes ago, Bertz said:

Jaguar dong!

 

[Bertz]

At this point Alcantara's probably rocking a 110 or so wRC+.  

When you consider speed + defense, if we had WAR available for AAA he'd probably have the team lead at this point (among the prospect-y guys at least).

[mul21]

51 minutes ago, CaliforniaRaisin said:

Will Sanders is off the developmental list and starting for Iowa.

I wonder if that had anything to do with Woodford exercising his out clause.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

 

[CaliforniaRaisin]

30 minutes ago, mul21 said:

I wonder if that had anything to do with Woodford exercising his out clause.

I don't think so. He was out all last week and it feels like that's about how long pitchers go on the development list.

[JD94]

I’ll just put this here, but I really hate to lose Bally in a trade. Love his pure hit tool. I know he doesn’t really have a position, but he’s a favorite of mine. I’m not a prospect hugger and I’m not saying he’s untouchable, just that I would be sad to see him go this deadline if it happens. Only other player that would disappoint me to trade would be Wiggins because of the upside. I’d be fine moving anybody else. 

[Jason Ross]

6 minutes ago, JD94 said:

I’ll just put this here, but I really hate to lose Bally in a trade. Love his pure hit tool. I know he doesn’t really have a position, but he’s a favorite of mine. I’m not a prospect hugger and I’m not saying he’s untouchable, just that I would be sad to see him go this deadline if it happens. Only other player that would disappoint me to trade would be Wiggins because of the upside. I’d be fine moving anybody else. 

My answer to this (as someone is a big Owen Caissie fan and he feels fairly likely to go) is always that I suspect in any trade in which we lose a Ballesteros or Wiggins that the return will be good enough to hopefully ignore the loss. 

I also think if Ballesteros goes, it lets you know how the Cubs feel about the defense. Just a hunch, but if they really are sold on the defense, he's probably the least likely to be traded in the hitter group. If they are pretty iffy on it, as a DH, he's just much less exciting. 

[Bertz]

Savvy move to end Sanders' day after 5.  Based on pitch count it was iffy, but doing it this way let's him feel good about that outing.  His first really good one with Iowa.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

[Jason Ross]

Ballesteros got a knock sliding into home and was lifted. 

Hopefully a minor thing. But something to monitor. 

[JD94]

27 minutes ago, Jason Ross said:

My answer to this (as someone is a big Owen Caissie fan and he feels fairly likely to go) is always that I suspect in any trade in which we lose a Ballesteros or Wiggins that the return will be good enough to hopefully ignore the loss. 

I also think if Ballesteros goes, it lets you know how the Cubs feel about the defense. Just a hunch, but if they really are sold on the defense, he's probably the least likely to be traded in the hitter group. If they are pretty iffy on it, as a DH, he's just much less exciting. 

Yeah I get that. I just hope that with the lack of high end arms available that we don’t have to get into a prospect bidding war for a middle of the pack SP because he’s the best of a lot of mediocre options. I agree with what you’re saying about if they do move Bally, it’s likely because they see him as nothing more than a DH which really hurts his value. 
 

We will see what happens. I try not to get too attached to prospects. I’m excited for the TDL. Should be fun for us. Cubs will be really active. 

[Jason Ross]

9 minutes ago, JD94 said:

Yeah I get that. I just hope that with the lack of high end arms available that we don’t have to get into a prospect bidding war for a middle of the pack SP because he’s the best of a lot of mediocre options. I agree with what you’re saying about if they do move Bally, it’s likely because they see him as nothing more than a DH which really hurts his value. 
 

We will see what happens. I try not to get too attached to prospects. I’m excited for the TDL. Should be fun for us. Cubs will be really active. 

I think we'll end up with a better arm than the rentals appear to be and one with control. No info, just hunch. My guess is that the Cubs will pick up:

1. A SP with more than just half a season of control
2. A RP 
3. One bench bat who hits LHP. 

So I'd guess a loss of:

• (1-2) from the Caissie, Alcantara, Ballesteros, Rojas, Wiggins camp. Outside chance of Ben Brown being in this group depending on the SP
• some from the Long, Franklin, Triantos, Sanders tier of prospect. Just spitballing, but James Triantos feels like a great bench piece for this team down the stretch. Can run, multiple positions defensively...so I think we try to hold on to him.
• some random smattering of upsiders, think like Naz Mule, JP Wheat or any of the recent IFA's

It'll depend on how good the SP is with how many from the top group is we lose.

[Donzo]

Best AAA start for Sanders.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Best case scenario 

[Bertz]

It certainly wouldn't rise to the level of being considered a hot streak, but Southisene is showing a bit of a pulse at the plate lately

Like he's graduated from frozen to refrigerated 

[CaliforniaRaisin]

Cristian Hernández HR (#5)

[CaliforniaRaisin]

4 walks and a HBP for Drew Gray through 3…

[craig]

Flanagan.  Nice game!  He's been good in his couple of starts.  Would be so fun to have a guy like that work out.  

[Bertz]

Low bar, but maybe the best day of the year for Myrtle.

Ethan Flanagan is interesting.  I assume this is just a case of a guy who, even with some post injury rust, is too advanced for the kids in Low A.  I hope I'm wrong though and there's some fun raw material to work with there.

[Bertz]

Oof, looks like Cristian Hernandez had three errors tonight.  Dampers the strong game at the plate.

[CaliforniaRaisin]

13 hours ago, Bertz said:

Oof, looks like Cristian Hernandez had three errors tonight.  Dampers the strong game at the plate.

It's weird because he had two different 20-game error-less streaks at shortstop this year.