craig

That's really great to hear. I had Whitenack at #19 on my prospect list, I think higher than anybody else and probably the only nut to put him into their top-30 until now with Phil. I don't know how hard he throws. But I think he's got a chance to become pretty valuable and useful. He's got a chance to be excellent in two of the signatures for a good pitcher: low HR and low walks. I'm not sure how hard he threw last spring, or how hard he will throw. But my understanding is that while he's skinny at the waist, that he's got the pretty broad shoulders that suggest he might perhaps project into more velocity and power future than he had last spring. I don't know anything, but I'm ignorantly optimistic that perhaps he'll end up with a fastball that is more than just "back of rotation" fast and more than just "back of the rotation" effective. You can have an asset fastball even if the velocity is average, if the location/movement is above average. Second, my understanding was that he was largely a pitch-to-contact fastball guy for much of last season. I'm hopeful that this reflects a fastball that was already pretty effective, by whatever combo of velocity/movement/command. And may get better as he fills out and get faster as expected. The best way to be a good rotation pitcher is to have a fastball that you can throw a lot, for strikes, without needing to be tricking people all the time. If you can throw a fastball even when they're guessing fastball and still get a nice groundout, that helps. My hope is that's why he's allowed so many hits and so few walks: he was throwing an effective fastball for strikes and for non-HR contact. Some go through, many get caught, but few go over the wall and few guys get walked. Third, if he's got a fastball or projects as much, then if as Phil suggests his splitter is emerging as a killer pitch, that could change everything. He's been a very low-walk guy. So if he can throw strikes/fastballs early and get ahead in the count, and now has a putaway pitch (or the threat thereof), then suddenly the K's could jump. Perhaps even get guys scared to go to 2-strike counts, so they start fishing more even earlier. "Killer breaking pitches" can come and go, though. Phil sees a tiny sample in camp and gets buzzed. But that might not be at all consistent or sustainable. So let's wait and see. I'm hopeful, yes. But that's a whole different thing from being even remotely sure or expectant. Fourth, there were signs last year, statistically. His stuff had no problem stepping from Peoria to Daytona, where he had a 2.04 ERA and a 1.1 WHIP. It wasn't just there, either. He'd been a ERA=2 guy for his last couple of months at Peoria as well. So I believe that over his last 3-4 months, his ERA was terrific. Plus, the K-thing evolved to some degree as well. At Daytona, he was 28K/39IP. Not wow, but a 3K:1BB with low-HR guy is going to be successful. Whether that's a 6K/2BB/9IP blend or a 9K/3BB/9IP blend. As for listing in Phil's top ten, I don't think that's necessarily so crazy. After the Garza trade, of course, we don't really have ten guys with Cy Young/MVP tools. Top ten is of those in the system. Some guys who may not have ace or 5-tool MVP tools are going to be there. Anyway, fun to read some enthusiasm for a guy I've been hoping might emerge as a low-walk-low-HR effective guy.

Disappointing on Golden, although I hadn't heard any of your good character stuff. As Rammy said, I'd thought there was some prima donna talk, and Phil had suggested that he looked unreceptive to coaching in Instrux. Hopefully you're right on the good character stuff, and this will be a good prompt spring to get him on a favorable path. On Burgess, I think he'll be able to extend his minor league career if he can play some 1B, so I can see that making sense. That's probably the easiest position at which to get AB's in our farm. I guess I hadn't taken him seriously as a prospect, so that didn't surprise me that much.

Smith, Moore, Darvill, and McGehee each have some things in common and some differences. In common, of course, is playing 3B for Cubs, and none of them moving up as highly valued guys. (Well, Moore was once, but that was past by the time he got to us.). Moore vs Smith: Moore has more BP power and is much more athletic and has resultingly superior defensive tools. Smith has simply been better as a hitter. But if you hit well enough, that can overcome everything else. A commonality is that they both K a lot, reflecting holes in swing and the probably inability to hit breaking balls. McGehee is very different in that he's always been a contact hitter, and the power came late and unexpectedly. He's a nice comp in that any 3B who isn't scouted as promising enough to justify a 40-man roster spot, but still has a chance to hit his way into the majors, can use him as a model. That works for Smith, if he hits enough. But I think otherwise their actual profiles are pretty different. McGehee was always smart, motivated, and hit for contact. He never K'd or had the hitting holes like Smith, and he was never the type to come in fat. Darvill shares with Moore origins in middle infield, which might suggest he has better pure defensive tools than McGehee or Smith. But I think he shares McGehee's early nature as a good-contact hitter who has power questions. This is why I think Darvill's ceiling is high. If he's a contact hitter who doesn't have Moore-like holes; if he's got good plate disciipline; and if he's got solid defensive tools; then if he can grow into power he's got a chance to be very very good. So I think his McGehee-like pure hitting skills give him a better chance that Smith or Moore to grow into a McGehee type big-league career, with better speed and perhaps better defensive range. Tangent, Toonster, did you notice that Lemahieu hit a long HR yesterday? As I've wished before, I hope he's added enough strength so that he can now increase his range of places where he can get hits. If he's now strong enough where he can productively add both his pull field, and the over-the-wall HR area (where OFers never catch the ball!), then all of his offensive numbers could benefit accordingly. boost his average with over-the-wall hits, and so that it now makes sense for him to use the whole field, including his pull direction, and more than the whole field, including the over-the-wall balls that OFers never catch.

I don't think Smith is much of a factor. Guys who are viewed as significant starter-material tend to get 40-man rostered, especially when there was as much space and as many expendibles as we had this winter. And guys who are viewed as significant starter-material tend to get valued by at least one of the 30-teams in the majors. But not a single one picked him in Rule 5. A contact is pretty connected with a bunch of the AA people. He was told that the Cubs were going to cut Smith last spring, but he survived the cuts because somebody got hurt. Keith Law on Marquez Smith: >I've received a lot of questions about Cubs infielder Marquez Smith, who was Rule 5 eligible but went unselected despite his .314/.374/.584 line in about 300 plate appearances in Class AAA last year. It's just one game, but I can guess why he didn't garner much interest or a 40-man spot from Chicago. He took some awful hacks against breaking balls, including one on a 72 mph Little League curveball for a strikeout in his first at bat. He's a below-average runner, and struggled to make a throw from third base on a soft grounder. That's not to say he has zero value, but it's a long list of flaws to steer teams away from him.<< If a guy hits enough and with enough power, he can be below average in the other three tools and still get a career. Hopefully that will be Smith. But I suspect that he's pretty low on the Cubs internal ladder, and that there is little consideration for him as a long-term solution to the 3B situation.

I think I counted up ten teenagers who were drafted and got 6-figure bonuses. And not counting Silva and Cabeza, who are in their 20's, the eleven 6-figure Internationals means they added 21 teenage 6-figure signees. That is a load of new young prospects. I can't ever remember adding that many teenagers who were interesting. It could be a different world in Mesa/Boise over the next few years.

So $4.16 + $1.75 = $5.91. I'd think if $4.16 is already 7th, than another $1.75 would pass some more and would put us in the top four or so. Awfully nice to see. Thanks a ton for your info, links, price tabulations, and scouting capsules. Really, really encouraging. The combo of thirteen six-figure international signees, all but the two Cubans being young teenagers, in addition to how many teenage overslot guys we picked up in the draft, suddenly the Cubs farm system has a volume of young teenage talent like I can't ever remember. Often with a lot of these $150-500 guys, they don't work out. But there would seem to be a lot of kids who might have a chance.

I think Wilken's approach has been good and balanced. 1. Three of his five first rounders have been players, two pitchers, IIRC. Well, I suppose if we include Flaherty and Donaldson, the sandwich guys, then it's five of seven. 2. For each of the last four conventions, he's mentioned that he'd like/prefer to draft a hitter if there was a good enough one The mild all-else-being-equal-I'd-take-a-position-guy thing may just be a response to the Cubs imbalanced system rather than a fundamental draft philosophy, I don't know. But it seems he appreciates the value of high-draft position guys. 3. Whatever mild or context-prompted preference that may be, he hasn't at all forced it, given that two of the five first have been pitchers. 4. If I look at his picks over the first three rounds with the Cubs, it's hitters 9, pitchers 5. Again, a modest but not extreme lean towards players. I think his combination of being a good scout, of going BPA, and of leaning a little bit towards players without going to extreme has helped improve the system. I hope he doesn't make a strong shift towards pitchers.

If any of those guys are BPA, the Cubs should just select accordingly. Jackson could flame out or be used as trade bait or whatever. It's nice to have some diversity in the system (I'm going to be hammering home this HS position player thing for the foreseeable future), but I think it would be a mistake for the Cubs to pass on someone just because they have Brett Jackson. If the Cubs legitimately believe that guy could be as good as Jackson, if not better, then why not take him? Agree. If they are BPA and worth a top-10 pick, great. Given his K-contact problems, I'm not sure whether Jackson will be able to handle the movement and breaking stuff of the best pitchers in the world. But if he can hit enough to keep his average, OBP, and HR's strong, terrific. If successful, he could be a good power, good OBP, good speed, good corner defense guy, and perhaps for a while a respectable CF defender. I'll take another one of those for sure if I believe the guy's really going to be all that. Obviously a guy who profiles like Jackson, in terms of so much contact problems and so many K's, and actually not all that many HR's yet, that wouldn't seem like a real great risk at #9. Jackson seemed like a real high-risk pick when we took him, at 31(?). The fact that he's done well so far doesn't change the fact that he was a pretty high-risk pick at the time, and that to take another contact-challenged hitter would again be pretty risky. BPA of course. I think it's harder when there is no singular BPA. Every prospect has projected possibilities for good, and projected possibilities of what might prevent high success. Risk-reward on every guy. So if their is a tier of equivalent overall risk-reward guys, my preferences would be: 1. Player > pitcher. I think Wilken expressed this at the Convention. Maybe I'm cheating a bit, because the risks and rewards differ. So maybe I'm really just reasoning that the pitcher isn't really an equivalent risk-reward value but is actually more risky. But I think the injury risk and arm-deterioration factor for pitchers is so substantial. Often pitchers are viewed as lesser risks: a college pitcher is already fast and already has a good breaking pitch, there is little projection risk, you can see that he will succeed in the majors soon. The risk of slow progress, unfulfilled projection, and non-arrival seems minimal. So I think the risk-reward analysis can often miscalculate the risk. But the reward of having a long-term success is reduced, too. Five years after the draft how many of the power arms are throwing exceptionally fast? Between true injury and just wear, most pitchers don't have the stuff they had even five years into their pro careers. If you pick a player and he works out to be solid, you can have a solid player for a more extended period. It's not normal for players to just naturally and probably deteriorate five years into their careers. 2. OF > IF (in terms of projected position.) We've got some volume of infielders, and castro in hand. Else equal, I'd rather take an OFer. Obviously to be valued equally, an OFer would be expected to hit better. 3. HS > College. A college guy is closer to mlb, and requires far less projection. Those are two substantial advantages; therefore if a HS player is overall evaluated as a comparable BPA/risk-reward value, the HS player must have some other advantages to get to the same overall value level. The HS player probably has essentially no evident flaws, but there's always the risk that flaws will be exposed in time. But if you have no evident flaws now and none show up, you could have an almost perfect player. For a college player, everything is more certain, but I don't think he lasts even till 9 without having some already evident flaws.

Springer is also really old. He'll turn 22 next summer, I think.

I'd like to get some premium hitters with power. And I hope that there are some available that Wilken can grab, and that work out. Good hitters last and are hard to find. 1. I don't really have a fault with the drafting approach, though. I think that the drafting has been quite good for the last several years, extremely good. I do hope that they find some position guys, for sure. 2. I think the philosophy of taking the best prospect available, BPA, is the way to go. When Cashner, or Carpenter, or Golden, or Simpson, or Jackson, are the BPA's on your board (BPA's of those you can sign, obviously), take that guy. If your BPA happens to be a pitcher when I wish the BPA was a power hitter, take the BPA pitcher. If the BPA guy happens to be Cerda, rather than a taller more power-oriented guy, take Cerda. I think they've been pretty good about balancing pros and cons for each individual player. 3. I think they have been case-by-case perceptions of BPA. I don't see any rigid "philosophy" that defines what kind of guy they take. Vitters, Cashner, Jackson, Colvin, Simpson, etc., seems like plenty of variety to me. 4. I don't think I share the view that the draft approach has avoided corners, power, or ceiling. It's not what you played in HS or college, it's what you project to play and be in the majors that's involved in the ceiling. Projection. Colvin, Vitters, Donaldson, Flaherty, Lemahieu, Golden, I don't believe that any of these was taken with the anticipation that they'd play SS or CF in the majors, and probably not 2B either. Colvin is a corner with serious power. In retrospect I'd think he looks like a very high ceiling pick, with the true power that he has. The fact that he doesn't walk or hit breaking balls enough to support a higher BA/OBP/contact-rate is why he's shy of the ceiling. But given his power and stroke, which I think Wilken foresaw, his ceiling must have looked limitless. Vitters was totally taken as a high-ceiling hitter, contact plus power possibilities, with no speed or SS to speak of. Donaldson for his power potential, as a catcher that gave him a very high ceiling. Flaherty I'm sure they projected that he'd get a lot bigger, I don't think they had any expectation that he'd play SS in the majors. But he seemed to have quite a high ceiling, it's just turned out that despite his size and BP power, to date he just can't quite hit the ball or get the lift necessary to turn his size into HR's. When you draft for ceiling, obviously most guys don't reach their perceived ceiling. High risk-high reward, not often you're going to catch the max reward. Lemahieu, they knew he'd not be a SS, he was maybe 2B/probably corner pick. But again, they knew he was young and skinny, and had lots of strength to add which might ceiling to power. Golden a corner power guy. In the Lemahieu draft, they would have drafted some other HS outfielder if he'd indicated he'd be signable. Jackson was perceived as a high risk-reward, high-ceiling pick, plenty of power ceiling, and likely to spend most of his career in a corner. He'll likely whiff to much to ever live at his ceiling, but with his power potential I think his ceiling was plenty high. 5. I'm very desirous of some productive-power middle-lineup guys. But I do think that being a good hitter is essential to having productive power. If I think a prospect doesn't have the bat speed or the gift to make some contact, I don't care how far he hits batting practice or HS HR's. I think if a good scout sees that a Harvey just doesn't have the tools to hit, I don't care how much raw power he has. I would prioritize the "hitting" tool over the "power tool", because the latter is worthless without the former. And the number of HR's is a function of frequency of solid contact as well as of raw power when the contact is made. All that being said, I certainly agree that I wish we had more position prospects. I hope Golden is golden, but I'd sure love to see a pick (or multiple such) in which a guy has a chance to have both the hitting tool and the power tool combined.

I'm pretty enthused about Silva. I think the Cubs have some good scouts. And having been shopping around for a while, I think they've had a chance to see him play. So, I don't really think they'd shell out $1.2 if he didn't have some genuine good potential. And I don't think they'd shell out $1.2 if there wasn't realistically somebody else who might shell out $0.8-1.0. Second, these are young players. Looking at statistics from two years ago, they were teenagers then. I don't know enough about Cuban baseball, but my understanding is that there are some good players in their top league. The numbers aren't great in themselves, but if a favorably tools-scouted player put up numbers like that as a teenager in Daytona or AA, we'd be really excited. I think because we don't know the league, we can't easily contextualize how good or bad those numbers are. But I suspect they might be better than we think.

Thanks for this post, toonster. Believe it or not, I don't think I'd ever read about his history. My perception was way off: as a 6th-round senior sign lefty with average velocity, who'd been drafted in teens and 20's in previously, I'd just assumed he was your typical journeyman limited-stuff Loogy-wannabe. To find that back in HS BA viewed him as the 8th best HS prospect in the country, I totally didn't appreciate that. TJ. The car accident and head injury. Interesting I think I read the BA reports differently from you. I think 93-97 for Maine and 92-97 for smit, I don't believe they are saying those guys are resting/sitting within those brackets at 95+/- 2 mph consistently. I think the 97's are the highest gun reading any of their sources have seen, and that there are probably a lot more 92's/93's than 95's or 97's. It may mean that 93-97 is max speed depending on the day? In June, scout sees him mostly working 89-92 but touched 94 twice; other scout saw him 90-93 but touched 95 a couple of times. In August, a scout saw him working 90-94, but did see a couple of 95's and 96's and one 97. I guess I'm thinking that when I see 92-97 for Smit, fair chance that only 10-20% of his fastballs are in the 94-97 end of that range.

Jackson had a 126K/12HR ratio as a pretty physically mature college guy, one whom Hendry has projected to play left field. And according to Law, after his first weekend in AA, he hit .250's with 1/3 K's. I can understand why some people wouldn't put that in their top 60. Obviously the key is the HR's. He whiffed a ton in college, and at each pro stop. He's going to be a whiffer. But how many HR's? Scotti mentioned that he has plenty of power and always has dating back to Cal. More favorable rankers assume his power will blossom into lots of HR's, and I trust that's the case. This year would be a nice time to see that. But if he's a 10-15 HR guy, it will be a lot harder. He hit 12 this year, that's not a lot. I expect him to hit more in future, but we'll see. Scotti says he's been plenty strong for a while, so somehow he may need to make some adjustments and learn to swing for more HR's, if in fact he's not going to simply grow/physically mature into more physical power. If he's a 20+ HR guy, that goes a long ways further than when a guy is hitting 12. 12HR/126K isn't a great ratio, but 25HR/125 HR would be just fine. In Szczur's press conference, he said that Hendry told him Szczur could be the 2014 CFer, with Colvin in right and Jackson in left. Obviously Hendry is doing this in the midst of a recruiting trip and over some drinks, so perhaps he forgot that he'll still be paying Soriano $19 million in 2014. But I thought it was interesting that he projected Jackson for left field. Makes sense, since Szczur is faster and Jackson's arm is unexceptional. Obviously that was premised on Szczur progressing and earning CF spot. If Szczur never does, Jackson may have no need to be moved out of center, and may be found just fine defensively even if not gold-glovish. As an optimist on Jackson, (I ranked him 2nd in between ARcher and McNutt on my list), I think some doubters know he was a college guy and think he's older. But he'll still be only 22 until August. And by his own account, he was really drained by the end of the season (whether mentally or physically or both, I don't know.) So it may be that his August/September slide were as much a case of just being drained as that he was being overmatched by AA pitching. That being his first full season in the pros, I'm hopeful that he'll be better prepared and will sustain excellence better this summer.

Yes, that seems awfully high. I wonder how real or sustainable that is? But I think BA runs with the numbers they list, and that helps to establish why guys rank where they do. If they'd been told Maine was 89-94, he'd be in a different spot. I was also surprised to see Smit listing as touching 97. I hadn't appreciated that he was that fast. If Smit is the guy that scouting report describes (92-97 velocity, deceptive, pretty sharp slider), with 63K/14BB/4HR numbers that his stats report from last year, then he's better than I'd appreciated. I certainly didn't have high-velocity touching 97 in mind, nor deceptive.

A different report I saw (before I saw this thread) had Silva at $1.2 rather than $1.0. I wonder if part of the time is getting the legalese and the citizenship stuff squared away correctly? At any rate, I don't think the Cubs would be paying at least a million on a guy who couldn't get anybody to sign him for a year. If he's 21 now, he'd have been 19 back during his Cuban championship season? His numbers don't look great, but don't look bad given his age and the level of serious competition. Would be cool if he turned out to be good.

Yeah, I wasn't thinking this way either, but this is kind of their MO, next year when we're debating this, I bet we all remember the reliever fetish of BA. Well, I don't know that it's some crazy reliever fetish. But, I think they do tend to like to hit on guys who are going to make the major leagues. Barney will be in the majors. Cales was a reliever that didn't make it. So I'm not sure it's that much reliever fetish. Maine has a very good chance to be in the majors. He looked pretty good, and if they have him 90-92, lefties can hang around for a while. They said Kurcz's change advanced a lot, so they kind of think he'll be starting, at least for a while in the minors, even if most minor-league starters do end up in relief. They may figure Lake will end up in relief, but I don't think including him was really reliever fetish! (Joke...) I think they do tend toward guys they get upper-90's talk on, even if they are relievers. They always get talk about Mateo hitting 97 from their scouting sources, which helps keep him up around 20 on their list, and I imagine they liked his 10:1 K/BB ratio in AA. They had Smit at 92-97, tight slider, splitter, deceptive delivery. So basically they have their 18-19-20 Mateo-Lopez-Smit guys all touching 97 or better, with their 24-25 Wells-Kurcz hitting 95.

...Based on what was said on here about what was asked in the chat and all, I think that Rhee, Ha, Reed(remember, he made their rookie league top 20 list) Barney, and Beeler appear like their on it as well. To me, it only leaves 2 spots where we really don't know who's going to be in. My guess is it comes down to Struck, Kim, Wallach, and Cales for the final 2 spots. Not sure what BA may have on Kim yet, but the 1.2 mill bonus should probably get him on the list and I think they'll favor Struck's season to Wallach's for the final spot personally. Heh, so of those seven open spots, even by tossing out 13 names I got only three of them right (Ha,Barney, Smit). Dave, you were right on getting Rhee in there. cal thought Cales would be a lock, nope. I actually brought up Mateo, which got mocked, but there he is in the top 20. Funny. I admit when evaluating their original list, I didn't really even have relievers like Caridad, Mateo, and Maine in mind.

For a guy good enough to make a top-30 list, I think Lake's review highlighted more problems than I've ever seen. Basically Callis reports that of the five tools, he can't hit, run, or defend. The arm strength is the one truly exceptional tool. Callis's scouting report of Lake as a 1.5 tool guy seems rather different from the five-tool scouting report that Tim and this board have in mind. Not all scouts agree, of course, and somebody has to be wrong. Hopefully the scouts feeding Callis their views are the ones who are all wet. Callis mentions "now a below average runner", "lacks range for short", "needs to improve defensive focus", "holes in swing" "chases too many pitches out of the zone", "could return to Daytona", "could be moved to mound if he doesn't show progress in 2011." Heh, with all that negativity it's no wonder Callis doesn't have him in the top 10! The positive: "signature tool is cannon arm which is an 80 in 20-80 scouting scale". And "plus raw power". Great arm but can't hit, run, or field is probably why Callis thinks a switch to mound is possible.

... I'm kind of hoping that he can end up being kind of a Marshall-type pitcher, who is pretty good without being noticably fast. Not sure if Marshall is a good comparison, just because he has a plus pitch (curveball) that makes him an effective reliever, while Rusin doesn't appear to have any plus pitches. Best case scenario for Rusin is that he somehow improves his value (either in the majors or minors) to the point where we can trade him for something useful with a little more upside. Rusin's breaking stuff will obviously need to be plus for him to become a successful big-leaguer. But my best-case scenario is that it does emerge as a plus pitch. That is has enough bite so that major leaguers just chop them into the ground. Or whiff on them absolutely. He had 99K/110 IP, so his breaking stuff must have been good enough to make minor leaguers miss. Not likely that his breaking ball is as good as Marshall's, but that's what I'm hoping for. There are a lot of useful lefty relievers who aren't quite as good as Marshall, too. So even if it isn't quite as good as Marshall's, he might still be useful anyway. It isn't easy to be a consistent pitcher when you're living on the breaking ball. So being able to snap some sharp ones is important, but that doesn't do it without some degree of consistency. That Rusin had a 99K/19BB ratio in 110 innings suggests that his control must have been pretty good. If you have a pretty good breaking ball and you can control it pretty consistently, I think you've got at least a chance to make some millions in the majors.

Thanks much, TT. I don't think I've really gotten any scouting reports since the rather brief draft ones, which tended to basically follow the "senior, old, had surgery, doesn't throw hard, but polished" kind of formula. He wasn't in last year's B book. So this is helpful, even though I admit I'd hoped that i'd read that he doesn't work at high velocity but he can hit 92 at times, and has a great curveball, or something like that. 86-89 comes across bad, of course, but that's basically where Marshall works. 87 with sink and command is presumably a lot more useful than 90-94 that's kind of wild and kind of straight. Does anybody have any idea of what kind of an arm slot he has, or his splits versus lefties? Would he project particularly well as a situational lefty, or not really? I'm kind of hoping that he can end up being kind of a Marshall-type pitcher, who is pretty good without being noticably fast.

You're probably right. I don't have this drafts numbers, because I'm going off of my 2010 prospects book. But it has KC at only $6.7 for 2009, which seems explainable strictly with high pick. 2008 they were at $11.1, but that's $6 for Hosmer and another $1 for their other 1st round pick. So spending $4 after the first round isn't much diffeent from what the cubs hae been doing. And from 05-07, KC was always in the $6's, pretty easy to reach given a top-5 pick every year. But, certainly being willing to pay Hosmer $6, their budget didn't stop them. Pittsburgh, they didn't get over $6 until 2008 ($9.8, Alvarez $6.3) and 2009 ($8.9). In 09 they gave out two 7-figure superslots to guys after the 2nd round. So clearly their new management seems to be ready and willing to superslot, that's probably their niche to beat the competition. In any event, it doesn't seem like there are all that many teams who are way more aggressive in terms of superslotting guys that the Cubs. Other than the handful, most of the teams who outspend us do so by virtue of having high top picks or extra high picks. Dave, I realize that that the #9 slot isn't a million higher than the #14 slot. I'm just saying that since he didn't pay slot last year, doing so this year will raise the ticket by a million right there.

Including AFL with his regular summer stats, his 2010 K-rate was still 26%. Not sure I'm that buzzed about progress like that.

By BA's accounting, $6.5 would be our highest draft spending probably since Brownlie. They have the last five years (from most recent backwards) as: 4.0, 5.5, 6.1, 5.0, 2.8. (Obviously they have some formula for counting that did not include all of Samardz's cash.) I just browsed through some of the other teams, as listed by BA, from 2009 back to 2005: Cardinals: all around 5.0, max of 5.6. Atlanta: 8.1 in 2006 when they had 4 extra bonus picks, but otherwise max of 5.1 Boston: They are clearly signature spenders, and have really taken that direction over the last three seasons. $10.5 in 08, with Kelley and Westmoreland, and they dished out $7.1 in 09. Prior to 08, they weren't big spenders unless they happened to have extra comp picks. New York: Neither the Yankees nor the Mets have been regular big spenders, although the Yankees did pay a lot to Brackman that one year. Los Angeles: Dodgers have never spent more than $5, Angles only when they had extra picks, same with Giants. Anyway, in looking at various teams, it seems that the only notable super-spender over the last three years has been: Boston. And that just for the recent several years, it's not a long-standing habit. Otherwise, teams are pretty consistently under $6 unless one of the following applies: 1. They have extra comp picks. 2. They have a real high pick that costs more. (When you're drafting Strassburg or Upton or top picks, then of course you spend more.) An interesting observation, in browsing: often some of the biggest markets and best teams have had the most compensation picks. I suppose to get comp picks, you need to have players who are good enough that other teams want them. And you need to be willing to offer arb, which is more difficult when you're on a tighter budget. Hendry has been very avoidant of offering arb. Anyway, if the Cubs are up to a $6.5 kind of spending budget even without having had a pricey 1st rounder or any comp picks, that's pretty high. If Ricketts is telling Wilken he'll get more, that could potentially put the Cubs perhaps in the upper five in terms of aggressiveness. (To spend more to sign extra comp picks, or to spend more to sign a top-five pick isn't really being aggressive.) Of course, the flip might be that Wilken isn't really getting more to be more aggressive. It could simply be that the budget will go higher because we're picking higher. If we pay slot in the first round, that will add more than a million relative to what we've paid in either for the last two first rounds.

No. But money is part of the scout's job. Whatever faults the Cub scouting staff may have, they are not idiots. Everybody knows that after the first couple of rounds, the normal "slot" for college picks is significantly lower than for most HS picks. At least for HS picks who are college material and who have any sincere interest in college. Yes, some limited guy like Blair Springfield are the exception,but that is indeed the exception. So basically any time you draft a HS kid after the 3rd round, no scout boss will do that unless one of the following is true: 1. You know the guy really wants to go pro, and thus might sign around slot. 2. You know the guy doesn't really like school at all and really doesn't want to go to college, and thus might sign around slot. 3. The player has already indicated, for whatever reason, that he'll sign for slot. 4. If none of the above are true, and usually none are, then you draft the player only if you like him enough to pay overslot. That is the majority situation for HS prospects who might otherwise go in rounds 5-10. It's why not many HS guys are drafted in that area, and it's one of the reasons why rounds 5-10 are dominated by college picks and superslots. Over the last 8 Cub drafts, how many American HS guys have they both drafted and signed between rounds 5-10? 2010: Wells, major superslot. Missed on DeJesus 2009: Springfield, willing to sign for slot, had academic problems. 2008: None 2007: None 2006: Cliff Anderson (overslot); 11th round Huseby super-duper slot 2005: Scott Taylor, overslot and not that smart and schooly 2004: Adrian Ortiz (didn't sign), and Mitch Atkins (mild overslot, not that schooly) That's 7 HS guys in 7 years, of which two didn't sign; only one (Springfield) signed for true slot; only three others (Atkins, Taylor, and Anderson) required only modest overslots to sign. There just aren't that many guys in that area who are drafted and sign for no more than a modest overslot. My point is, there just aren't that many HS guys taken in that part of the draft. If you're good and promising enough as a HS kid to get picked in the 6th round, then you must be good enough to move up into the high-round high-dollars later on, if you develop. It's not really a great business decision to sign for slot. So unless you just love baseball and want to be going pro ASAP; or have family needs; or just aren't really academically oriented and don't want to be in college; it just doesn't really make great business sense to sign for slot. Of course there are HS players who are academically oriented who still do get drafted in rounds 5-10; but it's my assumption that in those cases the team understands it will need to pay what college-capable 5-10th round type guys get paid, which is well over the slot for equal-round college picks. The college-oriented prospect is a class of it's own, and gets paid at it's own rate. Slot isn't it. Therefore I suspect that the Cubs knew in advance that deJesus was college committed and wouldn't sign for slot. But they took him anyway knowing they'd be willing to superslot. Slot is $180K, guy says he wants $600K, you figure that guys often come down once actually drafted so that you've got a good shot at him for $350K. How high of an overslot they offered I have no idea. But I think it's almost inconceivable that they didn't offer overslot. It just wasn't superslot enough for him to bite.

http://chicagocubsonline.com/archives/2011/01/2011cubscon3.php Another account of the convention, with the most detailed account of the Down on the Farm Segment. DaveII, you will particular appreciate the following note: "Tom Ricketts told Tim Wilken he will be given a significant increase of funds to spend on the 2011 draft." I also found the following interesting, and toonster will too: 'Tim Wilken pointed out that is the reason he stresses athleticism in the draft and amateur signings. It is called "Projection Scouting." When LeMahieu was drafted he checked in at 6'4" and 195 pounds. D.J. is up to 220. Wilken pointed out guys are going to get bigger and stronger. "Projection will come to fruition," according to Wilken.'