craig

Tim has mentioned that the list doesn't look real strong, in that most/all of the top guys (except McNutt) do have some major issues to worry about. I very much agree with that. I'd be surprised if we ranked much about middle, if that, on BA's list. That said, having graduated Castro, Cashner, Colvin, and Coleman this year, and even without all of them to still perhaps be somewhere around the middle (or perhaps better), I think that's pretty impressive. Personally even with our questions, and even though I don't expect BA to rank us above average, I feel like the system has improved and I think I would rank it above average now. (I may be totally Koolaid optimist and non-objective.) But even with their questions, I think our high group is still pretty decent, given their youth. (Of my top 8, Guyer is the only one who will be older than 22 until Jackson turns 23 next August.) I also think that behind the front group, that we've got a very interesting pool of pitchers. Kim, Jung, Rhee from Korea; Dolis, Cabrera, Lopez, Liria; Rusin and Raley as the big-college lefties; other lefties Greathouse, Kirk, Antigua, Bellivieu; Struck, Whitenack, Wallach, Kurcz, Beeler; and then the new HS drafts Wells, Reed, Hartman, Richardson; and of course mid-20's Carpenter, and of course Simpson himself. Not sure which or how many of those have star potential. But of those 25 names, Carpenter and Rusin are the only ones older than 22? I think it's not at all uncommon for pitchers to still be filling out and gaining arm strength at 21-22-23. So I think a number of these guys who may not have formerly scouted as having strong arms, by the time they get to Wrigley I think it's possible that they'll throw harder than we expect. And certainly many pitchers improve their breaking pitches and their changeups during the 20-23 years. So I am pretty enthused about the depth of pitching talent. From quantity comes quality, often.

If Guyer were LH he'd have a better chance with the Cubs, I think. But with Fukudome expiring, Colvin LH, Colvin not a sure thing long-term, and Soriano often injured, I think Guyer could get a fair bit of opportunity short-term and long as a platoon guy. BA's ranking him 14th in the deep and advanced SL would also seem to support the legitimacy of ranking him reasonably high. One way that I sometimes approach list like this is to see which guys don't have a major flaw, something that will keep them from being productive. And if they do have a current flaw that will keep them from being productive, how likely is it to be corrected? From that standpoint, ARcher has control. Vitters has defense, contact, and IsoD. Jackson has K's. Guyer doesn't really have anything. (Unless being 24 is a fatal and uncorrectable flaw). Neither does McNutt. That approach of course doesn't work real well for new players who haven't had a chance to demonstrate what if any flaws they might have. Simpson? If his flaws are having had mono, having a max velocity of only 95-96, and having only a four-pitch repertoire, that might be not to bad.

On Guyer: it seems my ranking him 5th is well higher than most. I may be way off. But my logic is that he's always been scouted as having really excellent tools. Now he combined in terrific performance. If his tools are so good and his performance is so good, I like him. He's a biggish guy and slugged around .600, and was formerly scouted as having strong HR potential. So my rating uses the premise that he may hit a decent amount of HR's. If the premise was that he'd have Reed Johnson HR-production, I'd rank him lower. A stated concern has been that he might be a 4th OFer. Possible, and none of these guys are remotely close to sure things. But if he's toolsy, and he hits a decent amount of HR's, I don't see anything in the scouting why he couldn't be a very capable regular. Last, I love his low-K profile. Vitters K'd a lot, Jackson K's a lot, Lee K's too much for a singles hitter. But Guyer's K-rate was really low, and has been for two straight seasons, so I take it seriously. I'm pretty hopeful for him. Being RH probably hurts some. Also, in my ranking, I'm not really devaluing a guy because might be blocked. I think some may devalue Lee because Castro is already at SS, but I'm trying not to let that influence me. Same for me with Guyer and the LF/RF situation, which is not easy to crack with Soriano locked in forever.

Given my concerns about Lee, Jackson, and Vitters, Archer came in 1st for me pretty easily. I may be crazy, but I think HR-profile is a very real and tremendously important characteristic, and I think it's routinely undervalued. Archer's is terrific. I think that may be a result of the really good movement, and good hard-to-hit movement is also a quality that withstands promotion really well. Obviously his walk-control is a problem, and may prevent him from being very successful. But given the questions that apply to all of our high-end guys, I think his is far less and his talent ceiling seems to be far higher. My ranking may also reflect that I have a high valuation for good relievers. For some posters, they can't rank him 1st if they're not sure he'll be a starter. But even should he end up as a really good reliever, that's not the worst outcome. And since there is a decent chance that he becomes a good starter, easy #1 for me. I also have the perception that his control may not be as bad as his walk-rate suggests. I was often surprised at how low his pitch counts were this year, or how many innings he got in under his pitch counts, despite the number of K's and walks he was throwing. I'm guessing there may be a lot of batters and innings where he is throwing a lot of strikes. Plus, his walk-control did improve a lot from previous year, so he's on a steady control-improvement trajectory. I think how young he is sometimes also gets overlooked. He was only 21 all season, so he's within that Vitters-Jackson age bracket. Scouts also seem to think his stuff is relatively exceptional. When the scouts who watch him say that he's special and different, I take that seriously. Heh, if the biggest criticism is that your stuff has so much movement that you may not be able to command it, that's not too bad. Last, I think the second-half Zambrano is a relevant analogy. Z had an incredible final two months, ERA-wise, but it wasnt because he stopped walking people. He walked as many as ever. But he didn't allow any HR's. If Archer's stuff is so good that he doesn't allow HR's, he can afford to walk some guys.

Some additional thoughts. 1. I had Lee 2nd on my list, but he could easily have been 5th or 6th. I think in retrospect I should have put McNutt there; he hasn't manifested any real problems/flaws thus far. But Lee, Jackson, and Vitters all have some flaws and just continuing as they are, not sure how good that will make them. * Lee I think has a chance to have an extended career in the majors as a really good defensive SS with speed and OBP, even if he doesn't improve his profile a lot. But to become seriously good, adding to his slugging power or reducing his K's is needed. *Vitters needs to learn to play a position, he needs to develop a playable OBP, and he needs to hit actual game HR's. And, he just needs to hit. As we've seen with Kelton, having a nice-looking swing doesn't mean you can actually hit breaking balls. * Jackson needs to cut down on his K's or raise his HR's or both to become especially good. Jackson is closest. His walks are high enough to neutralize a lot of his K's, and his HR's don't need to jump much to also justify K's. And obviously as a good-defense CFer he's got a much lower bar than Vitters as a 1B/3B. Vitters always gets mention of his age; it's noteworthy that Jackson is only one August older. I constantly flip-flop on Vitters. He had a poor year, IMO, and is off to another bad start in AFL in early action. (In early AFL he's again sub-.300 OBP, as was case in Tenn 2010 and Daytona 2009.) But I understand that scouts still like his bat. If he did put it together, a guy who can hit for average and power, those are invaluable. At the time I was ranking him, I had only the awful defensive reports in mind, most of which seemed to have him going to 1B eventually. Phil and Law have since suggested he's been trying a little harder and might still have a chance to blossom into a mediocre 3B, so that would help his cause a lot. As nice as his swing is, though, that doesn't mean he can read breaking balls. He whiffed 20% this year, pretty high for a guy who's supposed to be a contact hitter and who rarely allows the count to reach 2-strikes. Given his approach, his K-rate was probably a lot worse than Jackson's this year. Still, he hasn't been a consistent K-king before, so hopefully it was just a rough season and this year he'll turn that around. He doesn't need to do anything radical to look a lot better. Add 10 walks, cut 10 K's, add 5 HR's, improve his BABIP, none of those seem remotely implausible; but if he improved a little bit like that in each of his areas, his numbers could look pretty good (if he was getting acceptable 3B reports...)

Will be interesting to see how Wells goes with stuff and velocity. By report, he was throwing 80's for most of the spring and 80's in instrux. But Cubs saw him hit well into the 90's at end of spring, apparently as high as 95 once. Hopefully with a winter to work on his conditioning and strength, and with a spring to stretch out and for the Cubs to work with him on his delivery, hopefully he'll be a guy who will be able to comfortably and consistently be working in the 90's, and reaching 95 if he wants every game or every inning. But there are often guys who rarely or never work effectively or consistently at the "touched 90-X" max velocity that I read about in a BA report. Hopefully Wells will have the full package.

Picking on the prospects I spend the most time defending! :) Well, post your individual list here! So, is your Sunday night chat going to get posted, or how does that work? By, the way, Keith Law apparently had a gush note on Vitters: "That hard-hit groundball to third base was fielded by Chicago Cubs prospect Josh Vitters, who has looked good in the first week-plus here in Arizona, particularly on defense, which was always a weakness of his in the past. Vitters isn't Ryan Zimmerman at the hot corner, but he has shown better hands and footwork and an above-average arm, and I feel much better about his chances to remain at the position. As a hitter, he's showing more willingness to go the other way -- he hit a double off the right field wall on Wednesday -- and he still has one of the best-looking swings you'll see in the minors. And he did finally draw his first walk of fall league, although I'd like to see that become more than an every-other-week event." Lake and Vitters are certainly like pretty much all of our prospects this year, to varying degree. None are certain or safe. Many have a variable chance to be pretty good; and that certainly seems the case for both vitters and Lake. And both have a chance to flop completely, as normally applies to most position prospects. But, after all the negative stuff about Vitters lack of defense, lack of work ethic re defense, lack of brains, and lack of hitting smarts, lots of red flags. But the note from Phil this fall that Vitters looked at least a little bit interested in 3B, and now this note from Law that he looks less hopeless at 3B, that's pretty encouraging. I think given how seemingly relatively dumb he is, it may just take him longer to learn stuff and make adjustments than quicker minds like Brett Jackson. I think it's also possible that a more upbeat, teaching, communicating manager like Quade (theoretically) might be a better fit if/when Vitters hits the majors. Some managers might lose patience with him, but a guy who might be a more patient teacher and encourager and reminder and motivator could perhaps serve him well. Tim, have you heard much in terms of Lake's attitude and coachability and stuff? I know Phil thought he had some non-trivial issues back when he was in Mesa years back, and this fall he rather uncharitably speculated that the reason Lake might not be at Instrux might be because instructional camp is for instruction, and if they figure that Lake doesn't take coaching anyway what would be the point? I'm guessing Phil may be way off, but I was wondering if you have any info or insights into how much of an attitude case Lake might or might not be? Is that actually an issue that will hold him back or should be factored in our projections? Or is that totally a non-issue? Who knows if there were every any real issues, and even if there were he may well have already grown out of them or will do so. And even if he doesn't, there are certainly plenty of attitude guys and jerks in pro sports, so that isn't necessarily any problem in terms of performance and winning.... The radical change in his walk rate from Peoria to Daytona certainly suggests that whatever he is or isn't, he's not beyond making some adjustments for the better.

I think it's interesting that Carpenter is being used in relief. I have no idea what the dynamics and basics are for how AFL guys get used. Maybe other teams have sent guys who need work and need to be starting, or whatever, or maybe he'll start the rest of the month, who knows. But I think there is such a good likelihood that his big-league career, if any and if sustainable, will be in relief. Just to experience that, if even for a couple weeks, seems good. 1. Given his history of arm troubles pretty much every year, can his arm even be considered for relief use? Can he loosen up and let it rip every other day, or even back-to-back days on occasion? How will his velocity be? 2. Many pitchers take an inning or two to get loose and to find their stuff. But it is very rare for a big-league reliever to often go more than an inning. Can Carpenter find his stuff quickly enough for relief? 3. Many pitchers throw considerably harder in relief. In rotation they pace themselves, in rotation they get tired, in rotation they don't have big adrenalin rush for whole game. Is Carpenter a guy who, if he's working short, can get the adrenalin going and let it rip and suddenly is throwing sinkers consistently at 91-94, and flashing in 4-seamer at 95-98 routinely? 4. Carpenter has not been the king of consistency or control, IMO. As mentioned, without knowing when you're pitching and having a long warmup, sometimes relievers can have even worse control problems. But for other control-iffy pitchers, relief can actually help. Pitching every other day instead of once every five, sometimes it's easier to keep your delivery and mechanics in line. Maybe he'll settle into a relief role and find it brings out his best? 5. There have been some questions about Carpenter's "game face", that his pitching can get knocked out of equilibrium and he can seem to tense up, after error or getting in a jam or whatever. Is he capable of handling the pressure of relief? Or if a guy is a worrier and overthinker, might regular relief be a benefit. Instead of stressing for four days after a bad start, and then overadjusting and making something worse, perhaps relief might enable him to just get back out there and keep a more steady good equilibrium? Who knows. Whatever the answers, I think it's potentially a nice chance to see how he can handle relief.

All of the Koreans (except Kim and Na) have been injured. Lee had arm surgery, Rhee had arm surgery, Jung has had arm problems and ended the season with a bad shoulder (never a good precursor), Ha had a bunch of injuries that impacted last year, and the OFer has been injured so much that he has yet to play. They throw and play and practice a lot. I wonder if they aren't more prone to injuries as a result? An age ago Ryu also didn't wait long to have arm problems and lose his velocity. But it does seem that prior to getting hurt, the Cub scouts have done a pretty good job of scouting for talent. Rhee and Ryu may have gotten their arms shot pretty quickly, but until that happened their talent was undeniable. And Lee and Ha both have some obvious talents as well. So other than Na, it doesn't seem like the scouts are just whiffing on talent evaluations.

Agree. It's a small sample size. The 12K/1BB seems nice, the 7+ ERA doesn't; he was good twice, bad another time. Phil's reports on pitchers have been iffy IMO, but when they jive with the $1+ in scouting talk, I'm all in. Agreed. I've got Kim at 15, a bit down from Simpson, but could almost as easily have put him up at, say, 7 in front of Vitters and Lake. I tend to not give international guys quite as much scouting credit as I do for draft. Because the internationals are free agents, I always assume the free market bumps their bucks some. If limited by draft, perhaps Kim would have gotten no more than Golden or Raley? I suspect I've got Sanchez and the always-injured Korean OF a little higher than most, too. We'll see. I hope so. Kim is the best prospect, based on 10 innings of 7+ ERA ball in instrux! Rhee and Jung have both been injured, so it remains to be seen whether they know how to scout a pitcher who can stay healthy through even A-. Rhee didn't show much stuff last year, so whether or not he's going to make it anywhere, time will tell. Lee is the top guy from Korea, but he's in A-, K's, and shows no power. We'll see. Chen isn't much. Neither of the Wangs impressed much. Na appears to have been a complete waste of money, not sure what happened there. Ha is interesting for sure, but a corner outfielder with an IsoD of around zero had better either get some IsoD or else hit with an awful lot of power. So as hopeful as I am with those kids, I think it's something of an open question whether we're going to actually get much payoff out of those signings. Lets hope so.

Heh, heh. I'm shamelessly willing to buy in based on Wilken's scouting. I pretty routinely buy into the scouts opinions who have actually seen the guys play, who are having gobs of hours to think about these things, and who are basing their careers and their reputations on their judgments. I pretty much always put 1st and usually 2nd round picks into top-10 until they prove otherwise and prove the scouts wrong. Just a different approach. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't! (As is true with most other guys outside of the top three...) Not to rehash the Simpson stuff, but I still think it's logical to put more stock into what Wilken sees, having seen him late, seen him several times, and having put in doubtless many hours of thought; as compared to BA who, since they started with him as an afterthought, probably weren't soliciting a dozen scouts opinions about some short D2 mid-rounder anyway. That's part of my logic for why I think it's not that crazy to think that Wilken might be right and BA and the smart scouts they talked to wrong. I doubt they talked to all that many smart scouts about the guy. You're probably right. But: 1. 2011 isn't what it's about. 2013/2014 or whenever is what it's more about. Some bumps in 2011 won't matter unless those bumps interfere with his big-league career. My recall with mono guys, I can't recall any who had any long-lasting impact. 2. He may have lost 15 pounds, but my guess is that he's already recovered most if not all of that. He had mono in July. Apparently a severe case, so obviously he hadn't quite recovered enough of the weight and strength and stamina to pitch in instrux. But I'd guess that if he had it in July and had lost a bunch of weight by mid-August, that now two months later he should have recovered most of it already, and with four-five months left till minor-league spring training opens, he should easily have the weight recovered by Thanksgiving and have three months to recover as much strength and stamina as the next guy. So I'd be surprised if there is any carryover effect next spring. But, perhaps I'm a pure Koolaid optimist, it's possible and wouldn't be the first time. 3. Kim got some quality time in Instrux, but didn't he pitch about 6 innings with mixed results? My enthusiasm for him is based on: 1) the money (heh, again I trust the scouts until proven otherwise) and 2) Phil liked a couple of his innings (as with Wilken, I tend to trust Phil too until proven otherwise.) But if I'm going on scouting either way, I'm usually more inclined to go with Wilken, who watched a bunch of Simpson innings, and is arguably an excellent scout, more than Phil, who watched a couple of Kim innings and is not that sharp of a scout.

Thanks. An anti-HR sinking 2-seam 90-92 seems a lot more valuable to me than a straight 95. The notion that Carpenter works more as a sinker guy than a high-velocity guy probably fits better with his relatively high-hits-low-HR results. Hopefully he comes up with a more consistent quality breaking pitch. So, on simpson, are you and oo thinking that June mono is going to have caused him a career-long weight-loss and arm-loss or something? Not sure I follow why a summer-2010 weight-loss would have much impact on stuff/performance in 2011-12-13-14-etc.?

Interesting that both toon and Dave have Simpson in their 2nd ten (11th and 15th), both have him behind Golden, and toon behind Wells. That may very well prove prescient. Outshined was also shocked that I'd ranked Simpson as high as 6th. So I'm unexpectedly finding myself a real outlier here; perhaps if he turns out well, I'll unexpectedly get to take some credit for not having downgraded him. Obviously he hasn't pitched yet, so I have no idea nor do any of us. Dave mentioned that he thinks he was a signability pick. I'm probably naive, but I don't believe there is much reason to believe that. There may have been $1.6 guys who Wilken liked as well, and signability broke such ties in Simpson's favor. But I honestly don't believe Wilken intentionally took an inferior prospect, or that Ricketts forced him to do so. I think the simplest explanation, which may perhaps be correct, is that Wilken believe he was as good or better than any available player. And was too good to risk waiting till round 2 to pick. Even if I'm wrong, there are plenty of pretty talented guys who would be willing to sign for $1.06. So even if Wilken was forced so sign somebody for $1.06, surely there could have been plenty of talented $1.06-signable guys available. Yet Wilken preferred Simpson. Obviously my higher ranking looks brainless (I'm not contributing any individual analysis), and like a Cubs/Wilken lackey. I'm basing my #6 ranking pretty much on the fact that Wilken must have seen something pretty good, and that given the time and expertise he had to study Simpson, that he saw some pretty good potential. I admit my tendency is to kind of go with what Wilken/draft-scouts seem to think until there comes out reason to think they are/were mistaken. That time hasn't yet arrived with Simpson, so I'm giving him a decent place until/unless he proves Wilken was thinking crazy. I guess I'm also more optimistic about his arm. Throws mid-90's sometimes and rests low-90's most of the time? That doesn't sound like Cashner or young Zambrano, but it doesn't sound any slower than Carpenter or Jackson and perhaps only a touch slower than Archer or Cabrera. Of course, if it turns out in reality that he's mostly 88, that might be different.

Thanks for your list and comments, toon and dave. Fun to read. On Carpenter, how often does he throw mid-90's, and regardless of his velocity, is his fastball actually a good pitch? I was under the impression that he would touch mid-90's many games, and high 90's on a good night. But that most of the time it's low-90's. But I don't really know. I'm just wondering whether, if 90% of his fastballs are <94, is a 40-seam-93 fastball with iffy control better than a 2-seam 90? Maybe it is, I don't know. But I submit that it's at least possible that the fastballs for Whitenack, Coleman, Raley may be actually "better" or more effective. 2-3 extra mph versus better location/movement, who knows? I probably had Carpenter too low, I'm sure I did. A poster who goes to scads of Tenn games said Carpenter looked just fabulous (and fabulously fast) in an August start that he watched. Of course, he'd seen him many times before and said he'd never actually seen him look good before. And in his subsequent start of course he got demolished. I thought his 1.44 WHIP wasn't that good for a guy who'll turn 25 soon. But he's got a shot. I'd love to see him get a little more consistent; maybe in relief he'll be able to throw hard more consistently; who knows, maybe next year he'll show up 100% healthy and stay 100% healthy all year and if healthy he'll be throwing harder more consistently, too.

OK, here's just the list so you can edit easily. Craig’s Top Prospects After 2010/Before 2011 1. Chris Archer, RHP 2. Hak Ju Lee, SS 3. Brett Jackson, OF 4. Ken McNutt, RHP 5. Brandon Guyer, OF 6. Hayden Simpson 7. Josh Vitters, 3B 8. Junior Lake , UT 9. Jay Jackson, RHP 10. Reggie Golden, OF 11. Robinson Chirinos, C 12. Brooks Raley, LHP 13. Jae-Hoon Ha 14. Rafael Dolis, RHP 15. Kim Jin-Yeong, RHP 16. Ben Wells, RHP 17. Wellington Castillo 18. Chris Rusin, LHP 19. Robert Whitenack, RHP 20. D.J. LeMahieu, UT 21. Aaron Kurcz, RHP 22. Jeffry Antigua, LHP 23. Ryan Flaherty, UT 24. Robinson Lopez, RHP 25. Chris Carpenter, RHP 26. Daniel Sanchez, SS/OF 27. Belliveau 28. Cam Greathouse, LHP 29. Nick Struck, RHP 30. Su-Min Jung, RHP 31. Austin Kirk, LHP 32. Austin Reed, RHP 33. Alberto Cabrera, RHP 34. David Cales, RHP 35. Marquez Smith, 3B 36. Dong-Yub Kim, OF 37. Brett Wallach, RHP 38. Matt Cerda, UT 39. Dae-Eun Rhee, RHP 40. Esmailin Caridad, RHP 41. Matt Szczur, OF 42. Marco Hernandez, SS 43. Darwin Barney, SS 44. Luis Liria 45. Charles Thomas, RHP 46. Frank Batista, RHP 47. Aaron Shafer 48. Kyle Smit, RHP 49. TyRelle Harris, RHP 50. PC Chen, UT 51. Delbin Arcila, OF 52. Matt Spencer, OF 53. Logan Watkins, 2B 54. Jeff Lorick, LHP 55. Steve Clevenger, C 56. Colin Richardson, RHP 57. Gioskar Amaya, UT 58. Wilson Contreras, 3B 59. Yohan Gonzalez

Heh, here you go. (Unfortunately I've got comments interspersed with the names. Maybe I'll separate those out, too...) Craig With Comments 1. Chris Archer, RHP Extreme anti-HR guy, really good stuff. Safe pick because he’ll get a lot of opportunity in relief even if he fails as starter. Problem obviously is control, so not at all safe that he’ll become a major impact success. But has improved, and guys with that kind of anti-HR profile have a much easier time. 2. Hak Ju Lee, SS Good fielding SS will advance. Limited by absolute lack of power and a lot of errors. Despite scouted speed didn’t steal a ton; unclear whether they just didn’t want him running more or getting hurt stealing, or whether he just doesn’t have the success margin to become high-volume base-stealer; might make a difference whether or not he’s a desirable leadoff threat or not. Since it’s his defense that makes him, I think he’ll stay at SS. Can either get traded, work as a utility sub, or else will need to hit enough that Cubs will move Castro off of SS. 3. Brett Jackson, OF. Seems pretty safe and scouts like him. Smart. Huge K issue, makes me wonder. If he’s missing the ball that often against A/AA pitchers, he’s probably going to miss a lot against big-league pitchers. Has seemed to have high BABIP; lucky? How good he’ll be depends heavily on how the HR/K ratio shakes out. If he hits a bunch of HR, that can justify a lot of K’s. High HR’s and high walks, he can afford a bunch of K’s. And the K’s may reduce some too, to at least some degree. But without a fair number of HR’s, if the K’s don’t go down he might have a lot of batting-average problems. Seems good if not exceptional defensively in CF. 4. Ken McNutt, RHP Good arm. How much better can he get? Questions are control; movement; and HR. 5HR/116 innings, good. 5HR/56 A+/AA innings, could indicate a problem. Very promising. 5. Hayden Simpson I trust Wilken had good reason, and that he’ll be healthy. Profiled with a good arm, a good blend of pitches, and a good attitude. Q: Is he/will he be truly healthy; how much sustainable arm will he have under the pro workload; and how good will be his stuff/control? Will his stuff and his control be good enough to be serious value or just a guy? I considered him behind Guyer, but not behind any of the Lake/Vitters/JJackson guys. 6. Brandon Guyer, OF Hit really well. Q/concerns: How much HR power will he show? Can he boost his IsoD? Can he sustain his high average/contact/XBH rate? Is his defense really good enough that he might play some big-league CF? 7. Josh Vitters, 3B There are times that he seems like a hitter with some power potential. And I respect the scouts who see a good contact hitter. Will probably need to hit a lot of HR’s to offset his liabilities. Concerns: Can he hit with enough power/HR to justify his IsoD, his defense, and concerns about attitude/effort/brains? I think there may be quite a bit more HR potential than we’ve seen thus far. One advantage is that scouts like his swing; that doesn’t prove future success, but I think they often can future possibilities that stats don’t always reflect. 8. Junior Lake , UT Hit very well 2nd half, has a good arm, and has flashed some power at times. Q’s: Attitude/coachability. How much power will he have; can he keep his K’s to a manageable level and have enough HR’s to offset; where will he shake out defensively? (I doubt he ends up at SS). 9. Jay Jackson, RHP Can he improve enough to be good in the majors? Can he make an anti-awful move in HR’s and get them to a livable level? Rotation or relief? My biggest concerns with him are the incredible HR-allowed rate he showed this year. (I’d noted it as a concern even before this year.) I strongly believe his long-term niche will need to be in relief. 10. Reggie Golden, OF Who knows. Might hit and hit with power, an invaluable combination. Since the onset of the mlb draft almost 50 years ago, have the Cubs ever drafted a HS player who became a good-hitting OFer for the Cubs? Must be somebody, but I can’t remember who…. Maybe Golden will change that? 11. Robinson Chirinos, C Great story, he didn’t just start to hit this summer. His offensive numbers have been improving for each of the last several years. His slugging/BB/HR/K ratios were Wow good; when you K so little, but still hit with power and take walks, that’s a perfect recipe to have some offensive potential. And some say he’s fine defensively. Catching is a grind and a high-injury position, so even if he’s “just” a backup C behind Soto, he could get a lot of playing time. 12. Brooks Raley, LHP Too many HR’s last year. But when he allowed only 1 HR over last 10 starts, he was very effective. He’ll open AA at age 22. If he can improve in some ways and limit the HR’s, he could be good. Not sure how good his stuff is, but I’m very hopeful about his control. Might end up better than his stuff. 13. Jae-Hoon Ha Sky’s the limit. Hit .317 with power at age 19, outstanding talented OFer, good contact low-K hitter. Q: How much HR power will he have? Will he hit breaking stuff, or does his low-K-low-BB reflect that he’s just a fastball guy? Can he improve his IsoD to become anti-awful and at least approach mediocre? Obviously his signature drag is his utterly bad IsoD. 14. Rafael Dolis, RHP Anti-HR guy, good arm. At 22 he’s still young enough where he might improve meaningfully; if he did, he could become a useful major leaguer. Reliever eventually? 15. Kim Jin-Yeong, RHP Big bonus, the scouts must see some talent. Phil said he looked pretty good at times in Az. 16. Ben Wells, RHP Massive guy, paid well. Chance to throw hard and with control. 17. Wellington Castillo Power, seems OK defensively, still young. Will his defense play? Can he improve his IsoD and his batting average without losing his HR power? If his defense actually is good, an .815 OPS is not a bad starting point for a guy who opened AAA at age 22. Could look pretty valuable if he can improve his offense and confirm himself as a capable defender. 18. Chris Rusin, LHP We’ll see how it sustains, but only 19 walks in 110IP. Lefties with so consistently good a breaking ball aren’t that common. Q: Biggest key is whether he’ll be able to keep his HR’s in check. How slow is he, actually? Is he and can he stay healthy? Rotation or relief? 19. Robert Whitenack, RHP Projectible, was really effective over the last 3-4 months, K-rate improved and HR-rate dropped a lot. How much better and/or faster can he get? Too soon to know where his velocity, breaking stuff, control, and HR-containment will end up, but he’s got a chance to be a useful major leaguer. 20. D.J. LeMahieu, UT Good contact hitter, and can catch what he can reach defensively. Q: Which positions can he play at the big-league level, and will he ever add any power or IsoD? Sometimes Cub prospects seem to add their HR power late; if he showed even a modest amount, he’d jump up my list considerably. Whether or not he can really handle big-league 2b defensively as a regular, in the uncertain event that he’s productive enough offensively to be a regular 2B, is a question. 21. Aaron Kurcz, RHP Had a nice run, interesting fastball/slider combo. 22. Jeffry Antigua, LHP Shoulder questions. If healthy, how good is his stuff, really; and can he restrain the HR’s? I think all Q’s/Answers hinge around arm health. If I knew he will stay healthy, I’d have him higher. 23. Ryan Flaherty, UT How much better can he get? Can he boost his HR output? How good is he defensively and what positions can he play? 24. Robinson Lopez, RHP Young, good velocity. Control? 25. Chris Carpenter, RHP Anti-HR stuff, and on occasion quite fast. Wildly inconsistent, with bad control. Q’s: health, control, any real improvement left? Can he throw hard more consistently, and with more consistent control? Does he have the composure to handle pressure in relief? I suspect many will rate him higher than me. I fear his stuff may be somewhat overrated; I fear he has a reputation as having a big fastball, and on occasion that may be true. But I get the feeling that most of the time, his fastball isn’t really that fast and that his fastball movement/command may not be good enough to normally make his fastball very much better than average. 26. Daniel Sanchez, SS/OF May be the highest-bonus Dominican position player the Cubs have ever signed. Scouts must see enough of something to think he might have a chance. 27. Belliveau 97K/64IP, seems to have enough stuff to be a good Loogy prospect. Big control Q, and HR. 28. Cam Greathouse, LHP Had nice K/BB at Boise, strong groundball splits. Not sure how his stuff projects. If he adds some velocity, and if he can sustain HR-suppression against higher level hitters, he could really jump on my list. 29. Nick Struck, RHP Consistently throws in low 90’s, young, and improved during season. Command? Movement? Breaking stuff? Who knows. 30. Su-Min Jung, RHP Health? Was really effective for a few weeks, but had some shoulder questions. Will still be only 20 when the season begins. Any hopes hinge on showing up with a healthy shoulder. But if I was certain his shoulder was fine, I might have him higher. 31. Austin Kirk, LHP Decent progress. 32. Austin Reed, RHP Good arm, projectable, good reports. 33. Alberto Cabrera, RHP Good arm, good sometimes, sometimes fast. Wildly inconsistent. 34. David Cales, RHP Has been good for periods, but consistency? Q’s. Healthy? 35. Marquez Smith, 3B Slugged well over .500, has been variably good offensively. Can he field enough to be a big-league bench guy, or play anything but 3rd? Is his 2010 HR power a fluke, or for real? 36. Dong-Yub Kim, OF Seemed interesting when he signed. Health? 37. Brett Wallach, RHP Good K-guy. Q’s: will he improve? Control? HR’s a huge problem. 38. Matt Cerda, UT Strong OBP/contact guy. Will he hit enough and with enough power? And how good or bad is his defense? If he’s really a quality big-league 2B/3B defender, he may be a good enough OBP guy to be useful. But if his defensive upside is to be average at best, it will be hard to outhit a bad glove with such limited power. 39. Dae-Eun Rhee, RHP Health? Will his stuff improve in year two? Will he get his splitter back, or at least some of his lost velocity? I’m not overly confident, but I am hopeful. He had a number of games where he was pretty good for 3-5 innings, but then gave up a lot of runs late. I’m hopeful that being a year stronger, that all of his stuff will be somewhat better and that what stuff he does have will be more sustainable. But for 2010, his low-K high-HR line certainly fit with the profile of fringiness. 40. Esmailin Caridad, RHP Can he come back from arm? 41. Matt Szczur, OF Will he stick with baseball? If so, will he hit, walk, steal, or add power? 42. Marco Hernandez, SS 17, good DSL numbers. Does he have future punch? 43. Darwin Barney, SS Will he hit enough to be nice utility guy? 44. Luis Liria Solid arm, some changeup. 45. Charles Thomas, RHP Throws hard sometimes. 46. Frank Batista, RHP Wildy inconsistent and huge HR problem. But had some good days.. 47. Aaron Shafer Good numbers at Daytona. No clue on current or projected stuff. 48. Kyle Smit, RHP Decent arm, 49. TyRelle Harris, RHP 50. PC Chen, UT 51. Delbin Arcila, OF Patience and power prospect. 52. Matt Spencer, OF Got some power. 53. Logan Watkins, 2B 54. Jeff Lorick, LHP Phil thought he had some Loogy potential. 55. Steve Clevenger, C True contact hitter. Not sure about his defense. 56. Colin Richardson, RHP 23/2 K/BB. 57. Gioskar Amaya, UT 58. Wilson Contreras, 3B Good contact, strong arm, some rumor of $$. Will he hit for power? 59. Yohan Gonzalez Back-to-back ERA below 3, control pitcher, low-HR, now 20. Will he improve or come up with a K-pitch?

Good points. Cruz is interesting, being lefty, and having improved dramatically from last year. Went from 24BB/21K/22IP to 59/32/52, and a 6'2" lefty might have some projection. Paulino lists as a 6'1" righty. Augusto Colinas might be another name to consider. 37K/10BB/42IP as a 17-year-old lefty. This was his first summer. He got assigned straight to the stronger DSL1 team, and was given/earned 42 innings, quite a bit for a 1st-year guy. Peralta and Paulino, by contrast, both started on the lower DSL2 team despite being older and having experience. Luis Villalba is another 17-year-old lefty who went straight to DSL1 and got 52 innings, although his K/BB weren't as impressive as for Colinas. Both Colinas and Villalba are lefties, and both are from Venez. Colinas lists as 6'0", Villalba at 6'2", so perhaps in the long run Villalba might be the more projectible, who knows. Another guy of some possible interest, although doubtful, is Ramon Garcia, who pitched the season at 18. He had a 0.97 ERA in 46 IP, with 0 HR and only 7 walks. Probably not a guy, because this was his 3rd year in DSL so he should have been more than eligible to come over for instrux, and with only 30K/46 innings he seems doubtful. But I recall being very interested in him in 2008 when he had 45K/13BB/51IP at age 16, and seemed like a guy they signed very young and were pushing. doesn't appear to have advanced much since, though.

Thanks for note on Wells, Cal. Makes sense. If Peralta is one of the top two DSL guys, do we know what the other guy is? And can you or anybody summarize any scouting comments from Phil on the DSL kids? I recall the following, but I'm not sure if I missed some: SS Marco Hernandez. Slap hitter at present, Phil didn't seem especially impressed. 3B Contreras: slow. Delbin Arcila: modest arm/speed suggest LF/1B Zapata: Shorter and stockier than your normal CFer, but has good speed. Peralta: tall and lanky, one of two better pitchers from DSL1. Any other tidbits?

Cal or others, do you know what was mentioned for wells? Just general caution stuff with any HS pitcher? Or something else? He signed two months ago, so you'd think he's have as much time to have his arm loosened up as the next guy in instrux.

Thanks for posting all this stuff. And Nate, thanks a ton for your reports. You see them all season long, so your observations mean a lot. By the way, what do you think of Whitesides as a prospect? He seemed so blah at first, but then was really effective over his last couple of months at Peora, and then again at Daytona. What changed? And is he for real? As cal shared, I hope the notion that Antigua and Jung shoulders are or will be fine proves true. Those are too meaningful prospects, I think. Still, I'm not sure how often guys who have sore shoulders don't have something wrong inside, and it gets them later if not sooner.... As cal noted, at catcher Cerda's offense would have looked pretty intriguing. I hope he can progress as a hitter. I appreciate your observations and am pleasantly surprised that you like Cerda so well as a defensive 2B. I'd wondered whether he was short on quickness and range at 2B, and might have a max ceiling as still sub-par defensively compared to big-league 2B's. Does he have much untapped room to grow and get stronger? My impression is that he's already something of a workout warrior and may not have a lot more room to get stronger. Wrong? That he's not going to hit 20 HR's, that's a given. But there is a big difference between 3 and 13. A good OBP contact-hitting 2B who can get to 8-13 HR's is quite different then somebody more in the Theriot ballpark.

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/teams/vvh I checked on how Szczur is doing football wise. Villanova got beat by Temple, a D1 school, and has trounced a couple of the FCS teams. (Towson and Lehigh). Through 3 games, Szczur has wracked up 8 catches for 42 yards, has run 25 times for 137 yards, is 4-5 passing, and has done kick returning. Having a jack-of-all-trades guy like that is nice for an FCS school. But unless the NFL loves him as a return specialist, I doubt a guy who is 4th on his FCS team in pass receptions is going to get drafted real high, in the 5th round or higher. If he's the #4 receiver and the #3 RB on an FCS level team, I doubt NFL teams are going to be spending 4th round picks on him expecting that he'll be able to be a #4 receiver in the NFL. So I'm reading his Villanova results as being modest enough that he may well end up sticking with the Cubs. Whether or not he really has enough offensive potential to makes it as a LFer who doesn't steal, that is unlikely but time will tell.

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?sid=milb&t=g_box&gid=2010_09_18_tenaax_jaxaax_1 Season over. Sommer gives up 9th inning HR to end the year, 1-0. 25-year-old Muschko has pitched well down the stretch.

Interesting, if true. If you can find a link to that, I'd be really interesting in seeing that.

My guess is that he'll do XST and Boise next year, unless he's really impressive in camp. Remember, he's only 17. Pretty uncommon to start an 18-year-old in Peoria, although of course there are exceptions and perhaps he'll be one. (Perhaps the fact they included a clause like that might be a reflection that they scout him as being pretty polished.) Actually, I'm also guessing that the special 2013 roster thing is *after* 2013, such that it really wouldn't take effect until the 2014 season. I may be wrong. But if he has three pre-option years plus the three option years besides, I wouldn't expect that length of club control would not necessitate any unusual rushing. I don't imagine they're trying to disrupt what would be normal development.

Harman: $150 plus tuition for his senior year at Clemson. http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20100817/SPORTS/100817020/Harman-signs-with-the-Chicago-Cubs I wonder if he might not be something of a Chris Rusin light. More HR-oriented than Rusin and probably doesn't have as good a breaking ball, but that general type of polished good-control lefty. Perhaps Lilly might be another comp, soft-tossing HR-fodder, but enough finesse control to make it work? That's assuming his finesse and control could be at the Lilly level, which is pretty extraordinary. Of all the soft-tossing finesse want-to-have-control want-to-end-up-like-Lilly lefties that get drafted, not many end up like Lilly. Just like a decade ago every slim 80's-velocity lefty might become Glavine and every slim 80's-velocity righty might become Maddux.