craig

My perception is that we don't actually have much speed in the system. Am I missing somebody? I see five players in the system with notable speed: 1. Valdez 2. Lee 3. Campana 4. One of the new Koreans, the short one. I doubt BA considered him, since he hadn't appeared in the US. 5. Watkins I know Watkins is fast, but he successfully stole only 14 bases last year, despite having 91 walks/singles. I'd expect a super speedster would be both more successful and more daring in short-season. So he's not really in the mix for "fastest". So I'd guess that it's really Valdez, Lee, and Campana at this point. Peoria watchers should have a better idea of how Lee and Valdez compare.

Thanks for the note on that. I was out of the loop I think when Struck signed, I knew little about him other than that he's short and 39th round. So today is fun to dig up some of the info on him. An unusually thorough hometown article after he was signed, including comments from both the kid and the scout. Scout (Al Geddes) makes reference to “He throws four pitches for strikes and they’re all good pitches… He’s got a quick arm and a good move to first base.... He’s a good kid, and the family’s very nice too.” Struck "says his fastball was clocked consistently at 89 to 92 miles per hour" during the summer league, and that “...they have one or two minor things they want to change in my delivery — add a couple of miles an hour to my fastball.” If he's actually 89-92 with potential to add a couple more, that could certainly put him into "real prospect" territory. Of course, every kid signed they think might add some mph; and sometimes self-reports on velocity are a bit deceptive, too! Still, for a strike-thrower, that could be fun. This part was funny too: “The final signing day they made me an offer and I said, ‘Could you go a little higher?’ They called me back and said they could, and I asked, ‘Can you go higher?’ And they said they could go considerably higher.” “I’m not allowed to reveal the amount, but — including school — it’s six figures,” Struck said. Did we ever get any info on how much it actually was? I don't think any HS/JC picks ever sign for less than 6-figures unless they are academically ineligible for college. So I wonder whether perhaps he was starting at 6 figures, and it's not just the standard $100K but is $150K or more by the end? Anybody ever find out? http://www.clackamasreview.com/sports/story.php?story_id=125131681593128000 Nathan has some struck info in his blog: http://peoriachiefs.mlblogs.com/

Very happy Flaherty is getting 2nd base time, but a bit curious why he's batting 8th. ..... I still think the Cubs should just put Jeremy Papelbon in the pen. I know he takes time to warm up and isn't really suited to fill a short role out of the pen, but that's his likely future, IMO. 1. Carpenter with shoulder, yuck. OK, remove him from my top ten. Hey, did anybody ever mention that it wasn't so smart to bring him back to the mound after a 45-minute rain delay last summer? Aachh. 2. Flaherty 8th: he's stepped up two levels, and he didn't hit for especially high average last year (.276 average, .814 OPS). Wright, Lalli, Chirinos, Canzler, Guyer, they have all played extensively in AA and shown some production in AA or A+ already. Hopefully it doesn't reflect that Flaherty has looked blah this spring. I do recall last spring being surprised when he not only failed to make Daytona, but started out batting 6th or 7th, behind such Peoria luminaries as N Perez and scrubs like that. Maybe he's a slow starter? 3. Papelbon: hadn't heard the slow warmup thing, that's not good for a fringer whose only decent big-league hope is as a reliever. I think he fills the token lefty role that they want in every rotation (Mathes at Iowa). He was effective in rotation, so a manager who wants to win, I can see that. Frankly, his present in rotation I think may reflect the poverty of alternatives. On the Tenn staff, Carillo is the only alternative, and he's not too exciting, nor LH. With Cal, I wish Dolis had been great in camp and earned an AA spot; evidently not. Actually for Papelbon, he's probably lucky to have the rotation spot; he certainly wouldn't beat out Sasser or Buchter for either of the LH relief spots. I'd definitely keep many the Tenn relievers (Buckter, Sasser, Cales, Maestri, Mateo) over Papelbon. He'd need to beat out either Carrillo or Muyco to make it in relief, I'd think.

Thanks much, toon. If Muschko actually can **routinely** throw in the low 90's (as opposed to touching 91 once every other game...), then I'd think he's in play. As with most guys, the command, movement, deception, and consistency mean a lot more than one or two mph on the fastball.

That Tenn report is good, Flaherty is still at 2nd after all, which is a big relief to me. (I'd thought a move to 3rd might reflect that they were disappointed with his 2B defensive progress. And obviously his bat is more likely to be an asset as a 2B than a 3B.) Surprised that Canzler is opening day 3B! We'll see, Darcy also talking Samson/Opitz/Chirinos for 3B, so obviously that's kind of a committee spot. I'd think Tony Thomas might maybe get into that mix too. Nice to see Muschko confirmed for rotation. I have no idea what his stuff is, how he got so many guys out so consistently 2nd half last year, whether his stuff has any chance to play in the majors, and whether his Daytona success has any chance to sustain. But I'm glad it apparently carried over well enough to sustain a rotation spot this spring, and I'll hope that he does sustain his success in AA.

Fun threat idea. Peoria 1. Lee 2. Antigua 3. Watkins 4. McNutt 5. Su-Min Jung 6. Nick Struck 7. Morla 8. Beliveau 9. Latham 10. Whitenack 11. Morelli 12. Rohan 13. Cerda 14. Jones 15. Bour Daytona 1. Vitters 2. B. Jackson 3. Burke 4. Dae-Eun Rhee 5. Raley 6. Dolis 7. Lemahieu 8. Archer 9. Cabrerra 10. Rusin 11. Huseby 12. Searle 13. Lake Tennessee 1. Castro 2. Cashner 3. Flaherty 4. Carpenter (hard to guess without knowing the injury) 5. Chirinos 6. Cales 7. Muschko 8. Sasser 9. Buchter 10. Guyer 11. Mateo 12. Clevenger 13. Wright 14. Maestri 15. Samson 16. Chen 17. Bibens Iowa 1. J. Jackson 2. Coleman 3. Diamond 4. Gaub 5. Castillo 6. Fuld 7. Gray 8. Barney 9. Parker 10. Schlitter 11. Stevens 13. Adduci Going through these, I find myself listing more pitchers. Seems I think a lot of pitchers could end up being useful. Control improves, velocity somehow gets better, consistency gets adjusted, they figure out what does and doesn't work. Lots of guys have a chance to blossom into useful relievers or perhaps starting pitchers, if they improve, or if they show that their success at lower level is sustainable at higher. But a lot of the position guys, you know some of their limits and you know those won't go away. I'm not sure Dustin Sasser is as talented a pitcher as Tony Thomas, for example, is as a hitter. But Sasser has a much better chance of becoming a useful pitcher.

Tennessee Roster: http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?t=t_ros&cid=553&stn=true&sid=t553 24 players listed (12 pitchers) DL: Lambert, carpenter, Spencer. Patton not listed, but he's also DL. Cut: Blackford Daytona Roster: http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?t=t_ros&cid=450&stn=true&sid=t450 25 players listed (13 pitchers) Gone: Leverton, McDaniel, James Peoria Roster: http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?t=t_ros&cid=443&sid=milb 24 players listed (12 pitchers) Other than the lefty reliever added to get Peoria to the standard 13 relievers, these seem like the real rosters. Very few DL listings, that's good. I can recall spring rosters 6 or 10 years ago where they would be littered with name pitchers who were hurt. (Justin Jones, Ryu, Petrick, Blasko, Clanton....)

Tenn pitching: with Siegfried and Sommer down to Daytona, by my count that leaves 13 pitchers, assuming that Leverton wasn't promoted up. So probably one more cut or DL to make. I'll guess one of Carillo, Blackford, or Muyco.

Even if Raley does stick at Daytona, that's not much of a surprise for a big-college control pitcher. Flaherty skipped, but he's old, fairly mature personally, and with Vitters and Lemahieau playing 3B/2B at Daytona, that was a glut anyway. Not much of a surprise if any. My biggest surprise is Rhee. I wonder if that's just to keep him in a warm weather climate to avoid freezing his arm in Peoria; or if it reflects that he's been impressive in Mesa and has actually earned that surprisingly high start? He's hardly pitched at all as a pro; his full-season pitching was not only brief but it was two years ago; and his actual effectiveness in short-season last summer and in instrux last fall was not very good (even if there were some instrux reports that he was looking closer to his former promise.) Would be really exciting if he's 100% back physically, and if he's pitching well already besides.

OK, rotation guesses (pending the Raley decision): Iowa: Diamond, Coleman, Jackson, Mathes (token lefty), and either Atkins or Parisi. Tenn: Cashner, Muschko, Bibens, Chen, and Papelbon (token lefty). Daytona: Archer, Cabrera, Dolis, Rusin (lefty), Rhee and Searle. I'll guess Raley gets bumped. I'll guess that some kind of piggy-back is used (or two if they end up keeping Raley, or perhaps even three or four if they still think Shafer or Martinez or Leverton would benefit!) They may have plenty of piggy-back candidates. Archer and Dolis are too wild to average more than 8 innings between them per piggy-back start. Rhee is young, is coming off surgery, and has never pitched a full summer. He might benefit from a controlled number of pitches/innings.Raley hasn't pitched a full spring-and-summer before either; perhaps he'd be on a controlled pitches/innings count as well? Peoria: Without Raley, Antigua (lefty), McNutt, Struck, Jung, Morla, Whitenack, Nagel. That's seven, Raley would add an 8th. One or more may not be in the rotation/piggy-back schedule. Struck? Morla?

With Marques Smith having gotten traded up to Iowa with Thomas returning to Tennessee, I'm afraid that might unfortunately mean that Flaherty will play mostly 3B, with journeyman roster-fillers Samson, Thomas, and Opitz sharing 2b. I'd have preferred for Flaherty to spend all his time at 2b, in hopes that he can eventually play acceptable 2B defense. His bat is a lot more likely to be a big-league asset as a regular 2B than regular 3B.

thanks, that's really interesting. Great to hear that Mincone has impressed. I was really interested at first, but then he hurt his arm and I wondered if he was cooked already. That he's pitching, and well enough to impress, is tremendously encouraging to me. I'm disappointed that rusin got bumped down. Tenn doesn't seem too crowded rotation wise, with him gone and with both patton and Carpenter on DL. The Rusin drop-down does really clutter Daytona, though. Not sure I quite get Phil's note that Peoria will either get Raley or Mincone. At present, each roster has at least one lefty rotation candidate: Mathes, Papelbon, Raley/Rusin, and Antigua. For lefty relievers, neither A-squad has more than one, if I'm reading it right (Beliveau, Leverton, Buchter/Siegfried/sommer/Sasses, Gaube/Maine). If Raley goes down, I would hope he'd be used in rotation, so that would still leave Peoria with only one lefty reliever. Perhaps they just try to have at least 3 lefties regardless? So if they drop Raley to Peoria Peoria would have three; then if they dropped one of the Siegfried/Sommer/Sasser/Buchter bunch, Daytona would repalce Rusin as their 3rd lefty?

Yeah, I think there's a huge difference between what's interesting to us as Cubs fans versus what is interesting to Peoria winning. Rohan, Bour, Jones, Rosa, those guys could contribute a lot to a winning Peoria team, without seeming strongly likely to ever contribute to a winning Cubs team. Always hard to predict. The pitching staff is the bigger question. That extra pitcher could be at either end; if it's Rhee or Raley getting sent back from Daytona, that could be the best pitcher and biggest name on the staff. More likely it's somebody for the back of the bullpen who won't change the landscape that much. My guesses for relief versus rotation: Sure relief: Jordan Latham
 Jeffrey Beliveau
 Steve Grife
 Corey Martin
 
 Andres Quezada Sure rotation: Jeffry Antigua
 Trey McNutt
 Five other rotation candidates: Nick Struck
 Su-Min Jung
 Ronny Morla Robert Whitenack Jon Nagel
 Nagel being older and not having shown that well, I'd prefer he was just a roster filler. Struck being a superslot novelty, I hope he's shown enough that he's a rotation guy and a good one. I'd rather have the new unknown come in looking good than look at Nagel. Jung, Morla, and Whitenack, any of them might start and perhaps be pretty good, with some improvement. And I imagine any of them could be relegated to bullpen if they haven't shown some improvement. Nowhere does status change faster than Peoria. Nobody is in their rotation without the perceived chance to blossom into something good. But I have hopes for all of them in March, when we have very little scouting; by end of May it's usually evident that some don't have the stuff.

Agree, it does reflect stronger pitching I think. Agree also that Dolis doing a Daytona repeat, that doesn't reflect well on him having actually shown any improved command. May reflect a wildman that had one or two good outing in instrux, but more fluke than actual sign of the future. Especially since Tenn isn't crawling with what I perceive as serious big-league rotation guys. Yes, disappointing. Still, his was one of the surprising high-placements last year too. Given his age, his very limited experience, and his lack of command, Daytona is probably more fitting. I think he maybe got Daytona last year because Peoria seemed deep and Daytona thin last spring, or one or two good camp days? Rusin at AA is both more and less surprising than Coleman and Jackson last year. They had both gotten in some effective games in A and A+, so while I was really surprised it wasn't a double jump. But he's older and more experienced from big-conference college. But that would be an interesting small-sample semi-pattern of a fairly accelerated promotion rate for college-experienced pitchers who have some control. To have three guys starting right out in AA during their first full season, that's pretty amazing. If Raley really does stick at Daytona (which is not at all certain), that would be another example of a pretty accelerated schedule for college strike-throwers. Raley's an interesting case, since much of the spin was that he's only got two years and his focus was mixed by outfielding; but at the same time control was his foremost scouting virtue even so. I assume Leverton will be relief. I think relief has always been his likely long-term role, a lefty reliever. Possibly something along the lines of a berg, not very sophisticated but just throw the sinker and hope they ground it to an infielder. Searle will be interesting; I thought he might move up a level, but given his age and his mediocre results (relative to the league), I think Daytona return is good. I assume he will start, but I suppose in his case too he could be moved to relief or used in some piggy-back kind of deal. If he does start, it will be a good chance to see whether he is improved. Ditto with Dolis. When a guy promotes, you can always assume improvement and that the numbers are unimproved simply because competition is harder, and you can always say "good relative to his age". But often guys don't improve. It will be easy to tell with Searle, Dolis, and McDaniel. My recall is that they have done the piggy-back thing more at Peoria than Daytona, but perhaps that was because a lot of Peoria pitchers, you don't know who's step up and who'll weed themselves out. So a volume thing. Perhaps with more volume of rotation-possible guys at Daytona, they'll do more piggy-backing there too? When looking at the rosters, it looks like Daytona is the most jazzy one. Lemahieu, Vitters, Lake, Jackson, Burke, that's the deepest crop of position prospects. And while Archer/Dolis could be the front of a wildman good-future-potential-but-not-that-great-now rotation, Archer-Dolis-Cabrera-Searle-Raley-Rhee-McNutt could be a really interesting every-day-interesting rotation. (Obviously depending on which if any of the Raley-Rhee-McNutt trio stick. If Shafer or Martinez somehow get into the rotation, it will not quite be so every-day-interesting.) Five of those seven were already listed in top 22, Cabrera was 31, and Searle probably not that far off behind. Each and every one of those 7 has the potential be a top-20 guy at least by next year, if things go well. I'm really surprised that McNutt still lists with Daytona. I strongly assume he'll end up at Peoria. But if he's at Daytona, that might reflect that his stuff really is pretty good and is not all hype; and that his control is not quite as desparately wild as with Archer or Dolis last year.

Looks like the opening rosters won't have as many surprises as last year. (I recall being surprised with McDaniel and Searle at Daytona rotation, with Shafer and Flaherty starting at Peoria, and the Guyer to AA bit...) Rotation-wise, I think things look pretty deep. Most of the teams will have interesting pitching rotation prospects, good depth. Tenn probably the least jazzy. Cashner and Rusin are the most high profile, but when your next three are taken from the pool of Muschko, Bibbens-Dirx, Chen, Patton, Pabelbon, Carillo, and Blackford, that could be a relatively low-ceiling pool of so-so guys. Muschko was really good at Daytona last half, so I'm hopeful that he'll emerge in the rotation and somehow sustain that success, however it was he did it. Peoria rotation is always a surprise, and of course they often do some piggy-back stuff. It's also the rotation most likely to be supplemented by drop-downs. It doesn't seem that often that rotation starters drop from Tenn to Daytona during the last few days. But it's pretty common that Daytona guys do. If all three of McNutt, Rhee, and Raley were to drop to Peoria, then with Antigua they'd have plenty of name starters. But if all three of those arms did stay with Daytona, and I expect at last Raley to do so, then there will be quite a few rotation openings. Jung, Ronny Morla, Nick struck, Whitenack, Suarez, Yohan Gonzalez, Jon Nagel, it's hard to guess. Especially in A-ball where even if I know a guy is relief-guy long-term, they may still want to start him for innings early. But it looks like we could get a lot of interesting pitching. Hopefully a fair number of the guys I'm interested in now will still be interesting in June.

Agree, Iowa is generic for minors for Lou. I also like it. I think expecting too much too soon from Castro is dangerous. And he did seem to continue to make errors this spring. Keeping him one level further away might make it easier to keep people, himself included, from thinking about callups to the majors.

Arizona Phil with updated camp rosters following the big-league roster finalization. This is a lot closer than the earlier versions, because there aren't 15 guys from big-league camp waiting to push everybody else down. It is probably most useful for specifying where guys are who at one point were considered for a higher level, and who aren't likely to get bumped down another level. Still, there are 14 more guys in AA/AAA than will end there, so the trickle-down for Daytona and Peoria is still likely to be substantial. http://www.thecubreporter.com/2010/03/31/updated-minor-league-camp-rosters?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TCRfeed+%28The+Cub+Reporter%29 OK, so here are some of the interesting guys, who some projected might start higher: Lee at Peoria Cashner at AA Castro at AA (Lou and all the camp buzz had made Iowa a possibility, I think...) Vitters at Daytona Rafael Dolis at Daytona Searle and Leverton at Daytona Heh, we can't complain that any of those seven are being rushed. Some other guys who some projected might start lower than where they are currently listed. Some may still shift down a step when more send-downs happen. Jackson and Coleman both with Iowa. Flaherty at AA. I expect he'll stay. There isn't obvious competition for his spot at AA or in the AAA cut-down candidates. With castro at SS, Flaherty won't play there, and I expect Flaherty will be full-time 2B, which is good for me. If he's going to be an asset starter, 2B is his most likely spot. If he can prove he's capable defensively, he might hit well enough to be a strong value at 2b. Rusin, Patton, Bibbens, Sommer, and Buchter are all listed with AA. They surely won't all stay there. Hopefully that reflects favorably on Buchter and Rusin's performance this spring if they've hung in there this long. Rusin hasn't gotten much buzz. He went 0-4 in short season, he's old, he allowed more than a hit per inning, and scouted as low velocity. But while 4th round doesn't mean "supertalent", I don't think they spend a 4th round pick on a guy unless they think he has big-league potential, even if it's more 5th than 1st starter potential. Anyway, it would be pretty interesting to double-step him all the way from Boise to AA. He may still get bumped down to Daytona; but my guess he really will start in AA. AA doesn't seem to have many appealing rotation starters competing, I don't expect Iowa to send many rotation guys down, and Daytona has a ton of rotation names already. So I'm guessing Rusin really will start at AA. He's 23, plenty appropriate age-wise. Breaking balls are harder to hit than fastballs. So if he can get his breaking stuff over, and his fastball sinks even if it's slow, I don't see why he might not be fairly successful. I'd guess he might be project like Marshall with even less velocity but more sink and perhaps fewer HR? Daytona currently lists Vitters, Lake, and Lemahieu for infield. Certainly some bench infielder(s) will get bumped down. Will be interesting to see how Lake and Lemahieu divide the SS/2B duties. Lake can move off later. As with Flaherty, I'd be happy if Lemahieu were full-time 2B. If he's ever going to be an asset starter, that's going to need to be his spot and he's going to need to defend it satisfactorily. Daytona has not only Archer, Cabrera, and Dolis for rotation (those three aren't going to bump down lower.) But they also have McNutt, Raley, Rhee, Searle, Shafer, Leverton, and Martinez listed. Which is why I don't expect Rusin to bump down and take one of the spots. My guess is that some from Shafer, Leverton, and Martinez will go to relief or get released. I expect one, two, or all three from McNutt, Raley, and Rhee to end up dropping a step to Peoria. But I never know. Last year I certainly didn't expect McDaniel and Searle to open in the rotation. Hopefully still hanging on with Daytona means that mcNutt, Raley, and Rhee have looked good in camp? Those are three critical swing prospects. Young pitchers who are in the 12-25 group of the top 30, any can become top-10 guys with good seasons, I'd think. Peoria currently lists not only Lee but also Jung and Ha. Nice to see that Jung is back; after he returned to Korea mid-season last year, I wondered if he was quitting for good. His results at Boise were very pedestrian, so I'll be curious to see whether he survives the cuts, whether they use him in rotation, and whether he shows any progress. Ha is also a surprise and may be dropped; OBP'ing at an incredibly low .264 with a sub-.600 OPS and switching positions isn't necessarily the recipe for a promotion. But maybe they'll just stry to keep those Koreans together for social reasons, too. Assuming Rhee drops down to Peoria, that could be four. Kirk is already down with XST. Other than Lee and Watkins in the infield, and Antigua in rotation, Peoria is really a mish-mash of who-knows-what. Lots of late-round draft picks and Latins with mixed previous success. I expect an awful lot of the guys Phil lists at Peoria will bump down to XST soon enough, and the pitching staff will be enriched by some Daytona bumpdowns.

http://www.thecubreporter.com/2010/03/19/sweet-sixteen-gets-rushed-cubs?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TCRfeed+%28The+Cub+Reporter%29 Az Phil, with his comments on a) Wagner Mateo, b) yesterday's Fitch action c) his listing of what the current rosters are. (Again, most guys will drop a level once the extras at the higher levels go down.) d) His "Limited Activity Only – injury rehab" guys, which include: Chris Carpenter Justin Bristow Dylan Johnston Marcus Hatley (TJ) Casey Lambert (TJ) Thoughts: 1. Disappointed that Carpenter and Bristow are hurt, again. 2. Cal, if you have a chance to ask anybody, please ask about Carpenter and Bristow and what's up? Insignificant short-term thing, bumped a toe last week and will be back on Tuesday? Versus something serious, or surgery rehab, or whatever? bristow was a possible emergence candidate, so if his arm is bad again, that's disappointing. Carpenter obviously is also one of our premium pitching prospects; if his arm is bad yet again, that would be really, really, really disappointing. (As has been Cashner's super-wild spring.) 3. Do we ever know what is up with Dylan Johnston? He switched to pitcher ages ago, it seemed. Given that he wasn't a pitcher, was the wildest wildarm from SS in recent memory, and has been hurt for ages now, I wonder how long they can stick with him as a longest-of-long-shots in the first place? 4. I don't remember; had we know that Lambert had TJ? I'd like to hope that he may have been pitching with problems for a while, and that if he were to come back with an actually healthier and stronger arm, perhaps he'll get back into worth-watching again? 5. Phil was really gushing on Cabrera, "dominating". Cal, at this point are these guys just throwing fastballs, and his was very fast? Or was he working some offspeed in, too?

I'm not seeing this roster. Are you referring to one he posted on 3/14, http://www.thecubreporter.com/2010/03/14/minor-league-camp-roster-update or has he posted a newer one somewhere? At that time, they still had over 50 guys in big-league camp. When about 25 of them go down, that's basically a full team worth, so most guys can shift down a level after that. Or has he posted another one since Sunday? Perhaps so, since in his Sunday roster he had Huseby on Daytona, but CUBZ99 makes reference to Huseby being listed on Tenn... As cal notes, these things always change, a lot.

Back and forth A. Sandberg bunts too much. B. Sandberg is trying to teach prospects fundamentals A. Bunting is not an important fundamental worth teaching. B. It is. A. 3rd and 4th place hitters will never bunt, so it won't be important to them. B. Guys who bat 3rd or 4th in the minors often bat 2nd or 7th or 8th in the majors, so it may be important. A. Bunting is almost worthless. B. The manager/GM set the job requirements. If they want a potential employee to bunt, it helps if the job-seeker can bunt. Even if it's dumb or counterproductive or rare that the manager will actually ask the prospective employee to do so in a games.

Yeah. I'd figure he'll play in full season, perhaps Daytona, or else if he's not worthy of that he'll be released in camp. The latter would seem very possible. I'd think that might be a little high if anything, but that might be a fair range. $250K, that's comparable to what, slot money for a 4th or 5th round draft pick? And a draft pick has no leverage, whereas Serrano had a free agent market, so if anything I'd guess his potential is somewhat less than your normal $250K draft pick. $250K or a 4th-8th round draft area is a range where I'm always interested and think a guy has a chance to emerge into a meaningful prospect if things go right. So hope is there, rightfully. But certainly most don't succeed, so expectations shouldn't really be there.

When I was 12, I would have wished he'd get called up. If he was good, I'd have liked it, and if he wasn't then I could call him "Smelly". I was actually surprised that BA put him on their LF list. Outside the top-30, but he was notable enough to get listed on the LF depth chart. It's possible he was in DSL rather than US for visa reasons. Obviously to have such unspectacular numbers 7 promotions from the majors isn't too thrilling, though.

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=362735&src=152 "Piniella said this spring Cashner's future likely is as a starter. " Cashner: "I'd say the command of my fastball is getting better," he said. "I've always got room to work on the slider. My slider is one of my better pitches, but my changeup's come a long, long way. I rely on it a lot now. I feel like I'm able to throw it for strikes a lot, and that's what I use against lefties a lot."

Personally, I agree with this. My preference is that Castro would return to AA. Nothing to do with Barney, just because I'd keep Castro at AA longer for some of the Castro-focused reasons that you and jersey have mentioned. But I don't think the Cubs will do that. I think the cubs believe that he's special; that he might be ready soon if not already; that they want to challenge him; and that Iowa will be better for him than AA. Also, Lou doesn't control where minor leaguers go, but in one Castro-related conversation, he specifically stated that he expected him to start at Iowa. All kinds of things pop out of his mouth, so that might be wrong or generic for "minors" without caring where. But it might also reflect what he's heard from the organization, too. Well said, and I agree. I think you are mostly arguing for why you think he'd be better at AA, and I'm persuaded. I'm just not confident the Cubs will agree. But I do agree, that if it's totally an on-the-fence decision, I have no problem having the Barney consideration tip the balance that way. (I need to mix more metaphors, I think...) But I really don't think the Barney factor should have much if any significance. I still think the Cubs will put Castro at Iowa, as I mentioned above. And while it might not be my first choice, I think there may be some merit to that. It is sometimes reasoned that some guys do go straight from AA, and that the talent in AAA isn't any better. But I think there are more breaking balls in AAA than in AA, and for a lot of kids that's what they need to see more of. And for a lot of kids I think that helps to expose them as not so special. Patterson, Kelton, Hill, Choi, Pie were all kids who put up some good to extremely good numbers in AA, but were exposed by the breaking stuff in AAA.

jersey and kaiser, your points are well taken. If it's reasoned that AA is best for Castro, then return Castro to AA absolutely. (Whether that be because you prefer the weather; or think he needs to work on things there; or think that going straight from AA to majors is better than using time at Iowa, etc..) My "holding back" point had the following Ryno quote in mind, in which his assignment of Castro to AA was "simply due to having Barney at Iowa": My view is that you shouldn't make decisions about a top prospect based on the interests of a lesser prospect. Castro is by far the better prospect, Barney by far the lesser. So send Castro where it's best for Castro, and then deal with what that means for Barney. If you think it's best to hold Castro back at AA, because he needs more practice there, or the pitching is easier, or the weather better, by all means repeat him at AA. Personally I'd prefer that they did so until/unless he was relatively dominant there. If the decision is that Iowa is better for him, then don't hold him back on account of Barney. I think the same for Vitters. I have many doubts about him, but I still view him as a higher prospect than any of the other non-Castro infielders. If the Cubs think AA is the best place for him, then send him there. But assuming that Daytona is more appropriate (as I think is the case), don't rush Vitters up to AA on account of Lemahieu or Flaherty or Lake.