craig

Agree that Marmol, Marshall, Nolasco, and Pie are in... *if* Marshall's arm is expected to be healthy. If ITI is wrong and he needs shoulder surgery or something, different story. Sing maybe, although I don't think it would be the end of the world to expose him, and I'm not sure how much the Cubs like him or how they see him contributing as a big-leaguer. When a guy is hitting 6th for the home stretch, when offense is his strength, I wonder how much they really like him? Won't be much trouble fitting those first 4 on. What happens with Sing, Ryu or Brownlie will depend on some scouting stuff (if Ryu was regularly throwing in the 89-93 range, and touching 95 on occassion; he's on. If he was mostly 88-90, less clear. If Brownlie was getting into the 92's more regularly late in the season, and if they still think that may become more consistent in future, he could make it. After the Sisco thing, they'd look pretty sillly if they let Brownlie go, then he showed up throwing 92-94 next spring and looked really solid...) I don't think Craig has any shot whatsoever. Will be some issue with who to deroster. Cubs have tended to be pretty slow to deroster people. Lewis seems like the only no-brainer. Leiecester obvioius candidate. Koronka and Rohlicek are good suggestions, but the Cubs have an undying love for lefties, so they may see things differently. Other possibilities, IMO, could be Fontenot (hasn't been improving, no power, not notable defensively, pretty expendable...); Soto (he'll stay, just to have a catcher, but he's obviously not close to being an asset major-leaguer); Aardsma (seems pretty limited). Obviously Mitre, Welle, Leiecester are all out of options, so two or all three of those will be gone by opening day.

That's awesome news. For a while there, when Nolasco was slumping and injured, before Ryu had risen, before Marmol had done much at AA yet, and while Pinto still seemed like wildman supreme, Marshall looked like perhaps the best bet of the AA bunch. If his injuries are nothing that will limit his future, that's fantastic. Nolasco, Marshall, Ryu, Pinto, and Marmol, all five of those AA pitchers are pretty solid prospects. None are great, dominating ace prospects, but all five would seem to have a solid chance to be decent major league starters, useful relief guys, and/or meaningful trade bait. Some separation (Nolasco probably on top) but given how young they are, and how little Marmol and Marshall have pitched, and how Ryu is a little younger and maybe is the most likely to pick up some mph, any of them could end up being the best of the five, even if it isn't quite equally likely. All five throw more or less in the low 90's. All five seem to be mixture pitchers with standard fastball/change/breaker repertoirs. Pinto's anti-HR profiile is special, unfortunately his control is not. All five were born within less than a year of each other (the similarity in age sometimes surprises me), even though the pitching experience is less comparable. In 1982, Pinto was born in July, Marshall in August, Marmol in October, Nolasco in December, and then Ryu the following May of 2003.

I know Marshall missed a lot of time last year with the hand problem, and my understanding was that he was late starting this year for the same reason. Is that true? Or was he held back this spring because of arm trouble? I know that he pitched well, then got shelved with IIRC was shoulder problems. I thought at the time it was described as shoulder tendonitis or tired shoulder or whatever; at the time I don't recall the report being any more severe than when Nolasco got shut down for his bad shoulder during the summer. But whereas Nolasco came back, and must be fine to do as well as he's been doing recently, Marshall never did. But I haven't heard anything since. Is he just resting/rehabbing? Has he had surgery? Is he going to take the Ben Christensen/Mike Meyers route where he has a little shoulder stuff, and will be perpetually two weeks away, until 15 months later he has major surgery and his career is done?

I know, and recall being pretty disappointed. A lot of RHP have good success in low-A, where there aren't all that many dangerous LH hitters. But the higher the level, it seems the more enriched lineups are in good-hitting lefties. In the majors, you need to have a good way to attack them. Perhaps Gallagher already has a good way. But it's often common for a RH curveballer to have problems with lefties, if he doesn't either have an effective change or an effective cutter. I assume Gallagher will pursue the typical Cub way, which is to have the standard fastball/breaker/change. But a cutter might be an option, especially in the event that the change doesn't become as excellent as needed.

Yes, I am indeed interested, and puzzled, by that. To rest from throwing and to stay off an off-season throwing program, that I can understand. But to "rest" rather than to be one a fitness/conditioning program, that I don't understand. What risk would that have? And what's gained by "resting" and getting fat? Curious. I don't think the comment that he "hit 95" is that surprising, particularly from his agent. If a guy works at 87-92, at some point during the season he'll have touched 95 on one pitch or another. And if he normally works in the 87-92 range, an agent is obviously going to talk up the higher end of that. People always refer to the higher rather than the lower end of the ranges. I think the idea of developing his change makes total sense. Perhaps cutter as well. But whatever the agent may have said, and regardless if he has touched 95 once, most observers don't seem to read him as a guy with an overpowering fastball. He's going to need to locate/finesse his way if he's going to have a big career. Mastering the change is essential. Perhaps especially so if he wants to have a good attack against LH hitters. With neither a cutter nor a quality change, I'd guess that LH hitters could give him some trouble down the road. I'd like to see one or both of those two pitches become an effective tool for him.

Yeah, I don't know if Manual has any idea whether Ryu is throwing 88 or 95 these days. So, to repeat a question I asked a few weeks ago, how much velocity has Ryu lost? Early spring/summer I was hearing mostly 80's. 2-3 weeks ago DJAXXFAN said he was consistently 91. Was that a good day, and most other days he's 88-91? Was that a finesse day, and as often he's popping 92-94 these days? Touching 95-96 when he just feels like gunning it? We know the guy has an interesting curve and change. But how good is his fastball, really? And how good does it project to be next year? My guess is that he's been throwing it pretty good lately.

Interesting comment. Fleita is super-gush, so no harm in him giving an optimistic spin. Also not a bad idea for Gallagher, who's perhaps fitness challenged. If he's got a shot for AA, perhaps he'll be more motivated to stay fit this winter, whereas if Daytona is a lock, what's the urgency? Gallagher seems very bright, and his control is pretty good. I think he's a guy who might benefit from AA. He might perhaps learn more from getting knocked around a bit than by having a solid start in high-A? Also, everybody likes young guys. If you're trying to build a guy up to be a good trade value, that might work better if he's always age-impressive relative to his league? Anyway, Gallagher may be young, but he seems to know how to pitch. He may be better prepared to skip a level than most others.

Thanks for the encouraging view. You've seen him all the time, so if you don't think the holes are that bad, that's really encouraging. I hope your expectation of a big 2006 for him proves true. I admit I'd be shocked if he improved so abruptly that he could be ready for any significant AA time next year. Hope I'm wrong, and that his improvement is so exceptional that by next July he'll be dominating high-A and compellingly worthy of AA. Good question. I think the purpose of the minors is to develop major league players. So I would always prioritize what's best for the better prospects. If the Cubs think Fuld has a fair chance to be an asset big-leaguer, perhaps a starting leadoff CF who could play good defense, hit .290, and have a .350+ OBP, then I think what's good for Fuld should override what's good for Collins or JJ Johnson or Chris Walker. So if it was me, I'd have no problem at all giving an AA spot to Fuld over Johnson or Collins. They can bench, or DH, or whatever. If I'm mistaken in thinking that Fuld may actually be a solid major-leaguer, then the outcome might be different.

Full-A is clearly way better than college. But that's not relevant, IMO, to the Fuld question. If Fuld skips one level and jumps to AA at age 24, and that's too much for him and he struggles, I would conclude that he really isn't going to be a significant big-leaguer anyway. If he can't handle that jump at that age, after hitting .320+ for the past three months, he probably isn't good enough to be a significant major leaguer. AFter hitting .320+ for the past three months, I'd think he probably is well ready to advance to AA and perform well. And if he does so, that would confirm that he can be legitimatlely viewed as a genuine prospect. Obviously he can go one step, but if it's 23 at low A, 24 at high A, 25 in AA, 26 in AAA, and 27 before he reaches the majors, that would be one of the oldest major league rookies I know of. I can't think of more than one or two position players who were rookies at age 27, and who ended up being quality starting players. Some fringe guys, yes, but not many asset starters. Most likely Fuld will never be good enough to be a quality starting player. But if he's going to be an asset regular starter down the line, then I assume he'd be able to move more quickly. That's one extreme, obviously. Certainly he can start in Daytona next year, and get promoted mid-year. Then he could begin 2007/age-25 in AA and promote mid-year to Iowa, or begin 2007/age-25 at Iowa. But I guess I'd like to see him producing well at Iowa by 2007/age 25 by mid-season at least, and preferably from the start of the season. Fuld and Harvey seem like totally different cases. Fuld seems to have an advanced eye, remarkable contact guy (<10% K rate), and I have assumed (without really knowing) that he's a pretty polished defensive player. Given his contact profile, I'd guess that he's already able to handle breaking stuff pretty well, and doesn't have any major holes in his swing that are going to get exploited. Given his K/BB profile, I'm assuming he already has an eye for the strike zone. So I guess I don't see why AA would really be too much for him, or exactly what he'll need years of minor-league development to develop or learn. Harvey, different story. He needs to get a clue about what the strike-zone is like. He needs to get an idea of how to recognize breaking pitches. He needs to learn how to keep his stroke consistent. He needs to learn how to put the bat on the ball. He needs to learn how to balance his swing, and how to get the most out of his power without missing the ball all the time. He'll probably never be able to learn all that stuff, but if he is going to learn all that stuff, at best it's going to take him a long, long time. Certainly giving him even a single step may be too much (see Dopirak), and given that he has so much trouble putting the bat on even low-A pitching, he's going to need to improve a lot or he'll get massacred by high-A and certainly AA pitching.

That's some good hitting, for a guy who also takes walks. Also has a miniscule K-rate. Will be interesting to see how he does next year in high-minors. But seems to me that if a guy a) IsoD's like Fuld does, and b) K's as little as Fuld has thus far, then if he can sustain a decent BABIP (as would seem reasonable for a decent runner) he ought to be able to sustain a decent BA and OBP. Suppose he can hit 5 HR per 500 AB, and BABIP at .320, and IsoD at .070. If he can keep his K-rate at 14% (a shade under 10% this year), then he ought to be able to hit .282, and OBP at .352. That's allowing a substantial jump in K's as the result of facing higher pitching, and a diminished IsoD. The only thing that would be sustaining was his HR power and his BABIP. If he could keep at the 5 HR/500AB, BABIP at .320, IsoD at .070, but K at only 10% (this year), then he could hit .295 and OBP at .365. I think he's got a shot to be a pretty good performer next year. My view is that guys who are true-blue contact hitters, and rarely K even though they do walk a fair bit, guys like that are less likely to get blitzed by higher-level pitching. If Harvey's K's jump by 40%, he's K'ing a deathly 41% of his AB. If Fuld's K's jump by 40%, it's still less than 14%. I don't think he'll be that badly blitzed by promotion, unless his swing goes to pot again. Problem is, where will he play? Daytona's CF is entitled to promotion to WTenn. Fuld is obviously entitled to a promotion to WTenn. I guess he'll need to play corner outfield there.

Great to have your input, Bruce. Hendry is a popular guy, and is obviously quite safe. Reality can differ, but he's always said he's on the same page with Dusty and loves Dusty, etc.. Dusty remains the second biggest free agent sign Hendry has ever done, second only to Maddux. It's just a shame that managers need to always be extended in advance. Would be nice to ride things out, but clearly they aren't ready to fire him yet, and probably figure that if he goes into his FA-year, the media hassle will be too much to bear, better to buy it off by extending him. But once you do, then money reasons force you to keep that up until you're finally ready to eat some guaranteed contract. "If healthy, Wood will begin next year as a starter. With so many holes to fill on offense, I don't see them signing a big-name starting pitcher." Bruce This will be interesting to watch. I admit it's kind of scary to envision an opening rotation with at best both Maddux and Williams in it, and in the likely even that Wood or Prior or Z pops an injury, then having a rotation where fading Maddux is the #3 starter and no-stuff Williams is #4. Kind of scary. On the missed signs: Cedeno said a sign was on, but Hairston wasn't running. So during the split second when pitch-is-in-flight, he's watching pitch to hit, he's watching which middle infielder is abandoning position, and he's seeing Hairston standing there, he's got a nanosecond to figure out what to do. Did I miss the sign, and it was really bunt? I'm thinking that Hairston's missing his sign was the problem, and cedeno's "mistake" was a result of Hairston's mistake. Had Hairston caught his sign, Cedeno would have hit-and-run as signed to do. If Dusty gets a 2-year extension, should that then change the winter planning? Maybe try to trade Hill, Cedeno, Murton, and perhaps also Pie now, while their trade stock is high?

Ron or others who have watched or listened to DJaxx games: What's the story on Ryu's fastball velocity this season? If he throws 40 fastballs in a game, what kind of breakdown would you think there would be for >92, 90-92, 87-89, and 83-86? I'm under the impression that he's somewhat like Brownlie, a guy who's going to need to win in spite of his fastball velocity rather than because of it. Is that accurate?

Will be interesting to see how quickly Guzman comes back and pitches again, how many innings he gets before the month is out, and then to see what happens in fall/winter ball. Can somebody clarify for me; I thought I'd read Fleita saying he wanted to have Guzman pitch regular rotation in AFL. But I also thought that AFL wasn't allowed to use players from winter-league countries (ie Venez and DR), in which case Guzman wouldn't even be AFL eligible. Am I crazy? Assuming so, which of those two things am I misremembering? Did Fleita never say anything about him in AFL, or am I wrong that Venezuelans are ineligible for AFL? Or am I correct on both, and Fleita just doesn't know that yet? I'm puzzled. Anyway, will be interesting to see if Guzman can stay healthy enough to continue to pitch effectively for a little while. We've seen that Wood can look great for some simulation throwing, some short rehab starts, and for a start or two with Cubs, but then his problem reappears. They've been saying he can throw for a while, but after the pitches build up the inflammation and pain return. After Connolly got his cortisone shot, he pitched one really good game and felt strong; but after a couple of games the arm hurt again; Prior always seems to look really sharp in his first game after a rehab, but doesn't look quite so strong at regular rotation. We saw Guzman throw 96 or 98 or whatever and look sharp in his first spring game this year; not so fast his 2nd and 3rd, and back to DL by then. We also saw him start off good in his rehab last year, but then be inflamede and hurting again after a month. So it seems it's one thing to get yourself rehabbed well enough to feel good for a couple of innings or a couple of games; but if there is an uncured underlying problem, that tends to cause inflammation and pain after use and seems inevitably to cause recurring problems. Hopefully Guzman is 100% now, and will remain so, and will be good for good. He's had enough medical care, you'd think. Hopefully whatever has caused the varying problems, from his shoulder to his forearm to his elbow, have all been truly cured, and there is no underlying structural problems that will inevitably bite him again once he pitches regularly. But it's going to take more than two innings to demonstrate that the internal structure is healthy and sound. Would sure be awesome if it were.

Serena, sounds like a fun game. Have you seen Billek before, and how did he look? How fast was he? Did he throw many breaking balls and changes, and how did they look? Odd to have an almost no-hitter with almost no K's; were they just htting everything at people, or was he somehow pitching to contact but getting a lot of weak contact? Does he look like he'll be a control pitcher, and hopefully his stuff will be good enough? Or like a guy who might have pretty excellent stuff, and if his control can be solid he might be good? Did he look like he was in pretty good shape, or does he look like he could easily get fat and be a David Wells/Ruben Quevedo type? Thanks in advance. Would be cool if he has a good major-league arm with big-league stuff.

Ramos was drafted out of Puerto Rican HS by Pittsburgh as a catcher. Last year he switched to pitching, with a 1.64 ERA and sub-1 WHIP in 33 innings of shortseason ball. Pittsburgh released him and the Cubs picked him up. He didn't have enough years to qualify as a 6-year-free-agent, so I'm sure Pittsburgh released him. Probably nothing exceptional about his arm or velocity, or they'd have kept him.

Mike Billek (1-0, 4.50) is going tomorrow for the Chiefs. A first-hand on Billek would be very welcome, actually. Go, Flames, go!

MacLynchHendry have often done this, and made August deals. IIRC, they've traded Mulholland, Fassero, Gordon, Muehler, Tyler Houston, Frank Castillo in September deals. Most of these have been motivated by salary dump (even if it's only a few hundred thousand dollars...), or to clear 40-man roster space, or to clear out a bad attitude, or simply to give a veteran a shot to get into the playoffs. Obviously it requires that a guy pass waivers and that some team be interested in picking him up. When St. Louis picked up Fassero in 2002, I was surprised. Remlinger could possibly be a comparable.

Do you have any qualitative feel for how Leiecester's fastball looked? He was a power pitcher last year, but had shoulder trouble earlier this year. Was he able to throw a pretty solid fastball, as far as you could tell without radar? Maybe ditto for JVB? Does he throw a solid fastball, or pretty much sinker/slider/nibble? Thanks for the report. For others: 1. Does anybody know what's been up with Leiecester this year, hear anything about his shoulder problem, know how his velocity has been, or hear anything about why he's struggled so much? 2. Have anybody heard any velocity reports on Brownlie since he had his sore shoulder DL and moved to relief?

Tim, you've probably discussed this elsewhere. But how is that you still have Dopirak so high? It's his fourth year as a pro, and unlike Harvey it's not the first season that he's faced full-season calibre pitching. At 21 he's not all that young relative to high-A, he's an easy out there (OBP, BA) and has shown little useful power (12 HR's in August isn't very good, no matter how many he might hit in BP). And his defense is a liability. I guess I'd think that if a guy is going to be able to adjust to pitchers who can throw both 90's fastballs and curveballs for strikes, they should have begun to figure that out by their second year in full-season ball. The continues preference for Dopirak at least a gap ahead of Sing is intersting. I assume a major factor in this is age, that Sing is already 24, whereas Dopirak is only 21. But the current performance gap is enormous. Seems to me Dopirak's best and most optimistic hope would be to approach Sing's current AA performance at age 23, two years from now. (He's not going to both get a big jump to AA and raise OPS from .600's to 1.000's next year; either he'll need to do some repeat at Daytona or else repeat WTenn if he ever wants to match Sing's AA competence.) If the absolute best happens, and two years from now Dopirak is as good relative to AA as is Sing, will we then be badly sliding Dopirak because, at 23, he's almost too old to take seriously? I dunno, I think if Dopirak's our #2 position prospect, we're in deep trouble.

I'm basing that on scouting reports. I haven't seen any of them play. Chief's voice, for example, in regards to Harvey! On Dopirak, I've heard that from a Cub scout 2nd hand (Cub scout said that to friend after last season, friend passed it along...), and from several amateurs who went to several Daytona games this season. On Moore, got observation to that effect from amateur Cub prospect lovers who went to several Daytona games this season, and that was also the scouting impression I seem to recall from the Baseball America writeups.

1. pie, not even close. Serious prospect. Limitation: high K's, low walks. 2. Cedeno. Limitation: offense. Power and patience are low. 3. murton. Limitation: power and defense 4. Eric Patterson. Limitation: K's. Speed and power are nice relative to low-A; unclear how decent they'll be in majors. 5. Sing. Limitation: K's and defense. 6. Harvey. Limitation: K's, ability to make solid contact, anti-walk, ability to hit breaking balls. 6B. Fontenot. Limitation: maybe below average at too many things, defense, hitting, power... 7. Fox. Limitation: Dunno, receiving maybe? Unclear whether any of his skills are quite major-league caliber, but maybe they are? 8. Richie. Limitation: Hitting seems doubtful, but in the world of catchers, who knows? 9. Moore. Limitation: K's, breaking balls, and defense 10. Fuld. Limitation: Power. Still, at least a chance to do what Hairston does and do it better. 11. Greenberg. Limitation: No power, high K's 12. Dopirak. Limitation: Breaking balls, defense, K's, no walks, batting average. Seems to me the majority of guys have some pretty serious limitations. If your plusses are good enough, that can outweigh the minuses. If you hit enough HR's, it can overcome a lot of K's, for example, and still enable usable batting average and acceptable OBP. Time will tell whether most of the guys are good enough at what they're best at to make their limitations seem relatively unimportant.

Yesterday was Johnson's best game as a pro. Any scouting report on what he's throwing these days? I know he's got the sinking fastball. Is he still in the 87-91 kind of range velocity-wise, or in a career-game like last night is he a little faster than that? Is he using the slider as his second pitch, and does that look very good? Why was Harvey taken out? Anything serious?

Mucho thanks,WilliS. That doesn't sound exceptionally bad. To be able to possibly resume throwing a quickly as NOvember is sooner than real severe labrum surgeries, it seems. And to have a shoulder op in July and have even a chance to be pitching for real the following spring training is also pretty fast. Most likely, as with most of these sorts of things, we won't see him in any full-season games next year, but hopefully this will be one of the lucky ones where a surgery works and the guys comes back 100%.

I'm not an ITI subscriber, so couldn't read the article. Any details on how severe the injury was, and what kind of timetable he's on? When Guzman had his summer shoulder surgery, they originally said it wasn't too severe, and that he might be back the following spring. Wood's shouulder stuff, they hope to be able to "clean it up" after the season and still have him ready next spring, if there aren't any bad surprises. Matt morris has shoulder work done, and came back quickly and improved. Jon Connolly seemed to think his shoulder work would not necessarily interefere with his next spring training. I'm guessing a torn labrum is worse, so Petrick's will be one of the slower recovery schedules? Just wondering.

I agree that sometimes the light goes on, and looking at what a kid did years before is non-predictive. Hill and Cedeno seem to have been lights-on guys. Doesn't always work out, of course. I hoped Richie Lewis was a "something clicked" guy last year, but this year has indicated otherwise. Much of this discussion is semantics. Great prospect, prospect, OK prospect? IMO, the Cubs farm has weakened substantially compared to 2, 3, and 4 years ago, and even compared to last year with all the pitchers that have lost their shine due to the injuries. Certainly Sing will be in BA's top 10 this winter; he was in their top 15 last winter, before having a big year in high minors and before Guzman, Petrick, Dopirak, Lewis, Brownlie, Grant Johnson, Dubois, and others have had very bad or relatively un-inflating seasons. Whether being in the top ten means he has much chance to ever command a starting position with the Cubs, or ever command a starting position and be an asset for a contending team, that's a bigger reach. Ron, from seeing all his AB's, why does he strike out so much? Is there any pattern? Inside heat? High heat? Breaking stuff? K's in streaks, but if he can learn to avoid what causes the bad streaks he may not K so much later on? Simply because his strategy values the walk so much, he's constantly putting himself into deep counts and K counts? Because he's chosen not to expand his strike zone even when he does get to 2 strikes, and he'll take a pitch that he thinks is outside on 2-2 just as he would on 1-0, even if umps sometimes call outside pitches strikes? Does he K so much because in the minors he can take the approach of guessing fastball, and if a pitcher can throw breaking balls in the strike zone Brandon is willing to give him his strikeout? The concern, of course, is that so many K's may reflect some holes in his swing, weaknesses which big-league pitchers may be able to take better advantage of. If it's breaking balls that kill him, big leaguers tend to have better breaking balls. If it's hard stuff, big leaguers throw hard more consistently than AA guys. From a defense side, how would you compare him to former Jaxx outfielders we've now seen, namely Dubois and Murton? In fact, as a prospect, Sing has been often compared to Dubois, even though his walk-rate is much superior. How would you compare your feelings about Sing now versus when Dubois was there two years ago?