craig

Thanks for the links regarding scouting and velocity. I believe the original draft report had him as a guy who could max in the 92-93 range, so the concept that he's added some velocity and can now actually regularly control low 90's velocity sounds pretty decent. If he's locating a good, every-day sinker at 90-92, that's hardly overpowering, but that's a perfectly reasonable fastball to build around. Low 90's sinker is plenty good. Granted, I'm skeptical: if one of the Cubs prospect sites refers to low 90's, my guess is that really means he'll max in the low 90's but probably throws most of his every-day fastballs more in the 87-90 range? Their's nothing fishy about his present results. We'd like the K's higher, but the BB/HR are nice and low. K/BB/HR, excellent on 2 of the 3. Agree with Tom, using the "Hendricks" comp has mixed value. Obviously that's general code for a guy who's velocity-short. But, Hendricks change is a plus-plus pitch. Hendricks without the change is a totally different guy, and there is little evidence that Hedges or Ryan Williams or any of those finesse guys has a Hendricks-like change. But, I think we all understand that any "Hendricks" reference is simply alluding to a guy who lacks velocity but somehow is usefully good anyway. Hedges, I think, supposedly has a very fine slider. Hopefully that becomes a signature pitch for him. There have been lots of effective sinker/slider guys over the years, so for Hedges to make it with that combo would hardly be unprecedented.

Hedges excellent again, 3rd straight AA shutout outing. But taken out after only 5 innings/60 pitches. Hope he's OK. WHIP under 1 for Tennesse.

Thrilho, Tom can answer for himself better. But I think the "1/5" was referring to PITCHERS, not hitters. *Definitely way more than 1/5 of big-league AB's are LH. *A typical rotation has one lefty, so 1/5 makes sense there. Cubs with Lester are typical. So, more often than not 1/5 of the rotation is lefty. That said, I'd think somewhat more than 1/5 of starts overall are by lefty. There are more rotations with 2 lefties than there are with none, I'd think? (I'm just talking off the top of my head here, maybe I'm wrong.) *Pen-wise, though, the population of lefties is definitely >1/5. Cubs aren't rare in having 3 lefties in pen, and certainly most have two. *So, in general I'd guess that a typical roster will have 3 lefties, and more often 4 than 2 or less. So I'd guess about 1/4 of big-league pitchers are lefties. *Thing is, a lot of the lefties aren't that good. Would Cubs have kept Richard so long if he wasn't lefty? I think you touch on my perception for most of my life as a Cubs fan. I've often felt like cubs were forcing in "token lefty" into rotation, even if the guy wasn't very good, and the same for a second lefty in the pen. This is where having lefty prospects provides an opportunity. Teams *want* to have 3-4 lefties, but there aren't enough good ones to go around. So, if the Cubs have a stock of them, that might provide trade opportunities. Second, many lefties last without overpowering velocity. That too perhaps provides an opportunity; you maybe don't need 1st-2nd round arms or 1st-round velocity to get lefties who might end up making it.

Yup. Branch Rickey had the famous "from quantity comes quality" philosophy, and hopefully that will prove out from this pool.

Nice to see Cease going 3.1 with only one walk. de la Cruz, fantastic.

I'll get to this post later but can address this quickly - the pitchers are not doing the majority of the leg work in a trade. Teams are trading with the Cubs to land bats, pitching is just there largely to fill out the depth charts since the Cubs will be looking for pitching from those teams. Guys like Hedgesm Tseng, Kellogg, and Zastrzny are healthy and not terrible bets to throw ML innings, which is all that is really necessary - particularly since the Cubs do have upside arms to deal even around those guys as well as the more well known and regarded bats. Throwins. Yes. Like Blackburn; like Rosscup in the Archer-Garza trade; like Leal in the big Campana/Castillo trade. Grimm obviously was scouted more favorably and had bigger arm, with 1st-degree pedigree and stuff, but he was kind of the 3rd-piece throw-in the Garza-Edwards/Olt trade. Our guys can be some small-nickel throw-ins like that, I agree. But they'll be about as insignificant as McKinney in the Chapman deal.

..Rumors of the Cubs not having pitching to trade this offseason are overstated. There's enough depth at the A/A+ level loving to A+ and AA next year that they can fill something out behind the movable bats. Hell, Tseng and Hedges among hopefully others give them a more interesting/marketable AAA group than they've had. They won't spend like last year, duh, but this is still going to be a pretty active and fun offseason where this FO can dig in and be more about clever buys through their traditional blend of thorough scouting and analytics. Yeah, Tom, I'm really pleased to see a lot of effective pitching recently. Your point is well taken, that management won't be signing multiple external big-ticket FA's like the last two years, but may be active in some clever smaller-scale moves. I think it will need to be some very small-scale moves for our pitching prospects to move the needle much, though. Cease and de la Cruz, yes, those guys could be significant pieces in a trade. But I don't think guys like Hedges, Tseng, Kellogg, Zastryzny,I don't think those guys will get you very far in a high-profile acquisition. Those are the types of guys to add as extra scraps to finish a deal for a back-of-roster guy like Montgomery (Vogelbach main guy; Blackburn a little extra value added); or an end-of-pen pickup like Joe Smith (Castillo); maybe a salary dump (Jeferson Mejia for Miguel Montero); . Sometimes those clever moves can make a big impact (Montero last year), so I don't at all mean to belittle their relevance. I struggle to guess what the offseason will entail. Always tweaking, I'm sure. Big hinges will be $$$, Folwer, and Chapman. By most accounts they stretched/"got creative" to get Heyward, partly under assumption that this winter wouldn't be a plush FA winter. And then they stretched even further to bring in Fowler besides. Perhaps with a fantastic season, tons of jersey sales, hopefully significant post-season revenue, perhaps their revenue this year will be terrific, more than enough to cover those "stretch" signings. Hopefully they'll have so much revenue that they'll be able to resign both Chapman and Fowler, and cover all the significant inflation on existing guys, and whatever they borrowed-ahead to sign Heyward/Fowler. I'd pretty much love to basically retain exactly what they have now. Contracts for Cahill, Richard, Ross, and Travis Wood would come off, but basically if that was all they lost, it would be awesome. Those dollars aren't zero, but I can't imagine they'd get even remotely close to paying for built-in inflation. Which rambles to: my guess is the "overachievement" pitchers (guys whose production seems better than their arms or stuff or scouting reports) don't really have the market buzz to get you a lot, so I think they'll basically keep almost all of them. (Kellogg, Hedges, Morrison, Tseng, Zastryzny types all fall in my minimal-trade-value "overachiever" pool.) Hammel and Lackey expire after next year. I think they'll largely want to keep those guys percolating in AA/AAA, in hopes that the best might emerge as acceptable 6th-starter/emergency options during next year; and perhaps 5th-starter replacement options for Lackey/Hammel for 2018. 5th starter pitches about as many starts as 1st starter during regular season. Last December, I'm guessing most posters would have classified Hendricks/Hammel as 4th/5th starters. One of the reasons the Cubs have an amazing record is because those 4th/5th starters both have <3 ERA's. So, it's not like replacing Hammel/Lackey with two crummy starters wouldn't have a huge impact. Still, if you have a great bullpen, great defense, and a relentless offense, you can win a lot of games with an overachiever rotation guy. Throw strikes, you don't need a power arm to allow 1-3 runs in 5-6 innings during most of your starts. A great team can win a lot of games involving an anti-awful starter. Perhaps one or more from the Hedges/Clifton/Kellogg/Morrison/Zastryzny/Hedges pool will be able to provide that, or more.

Nice to see Bailey Clark with a good outing. I thought he was strong/fast but wild. Small sample, but 13K/0BB is encouraging in terms of control. Fun to see some effective pitching.

Nice to see Clifton sequencing strong starts. His ERA is now under 3.

Add Hedges and Moreno. Hedges is having a really nice year, and in his 2nd/3rd starts in AA, he's allowed 1 run combined. For minor league prospects, I look to K's first since that speaks to stuff, and Hedges does not impress. Neither does his velocity. But actual effectiveness is largely a function of K/BB/HR, and Hedges is excellent on the latter two, especially the HR-rate. His ground ball profile is strong, so the low-HR rate may not be flukey luck? (4HR/121 innings this year, 9HR/271 innings career.) One of the problems that no-stuff guys have is that hitters can kill their pitches; but if a guy doesn't allow killed HR's, perhaps that's a hint that maybe his stuff is actually better than we appreciate? I'm kinda hoping that he's one of those deceptive guys; he doesn't throw 94 much because he's got a comfortable 88-91 sinker that works well consistently, so there is little reason to throw 4-seamers? Anyway, it will be interesting to see whether he can actually sustain his success, or if it has any potential for the majors. He's a guy where I'll be interested to see what the scouting reports say about him after the season. Right now, my assumption is that he's a weak-armed college overachiever with little potential. But if we got a scouting report that his sinker is actually now 90-92, that he's added an effective cutter which has helped, and that he never threw a curve in college because in his small conference he didn't need one, but that it is now developing well and projects to perhaps be a solid major-league curve, maybe he'd look much more interesting as a future Lackey-replacement candidate?

Minor-league pitching has been a black hole this summer, very disappointing. None of the "could be ready to blossom" guys really did so. But, I'm encouraged by some recent pitching, guys who have sequenced some good starts: Zastryzny: No runs over last 3 starts. de la Cruz: 2 runs over last 4 starts, 30K/18 innings, smooth no-problem transition to full-season ball. Paulino: 6 earned runs over 9 starts, 1 in last two games, smooth transition to full-season ball. Steele: 1 run over last 2 starts, 13K/1BB/13 IP. Kellog: 0 runs over last 2 starts. Morrison: 3 runs over last 8 starts. Clifton: 0 runs last start, 0 walks over last 2. Kind of fun to see some guys bunching good starts.

Maddon says he likes the "funk", re Smith. Morrision isn't as low, I don't think, but he seems very funky/jerky/weird even for the low slot he's got. Seems like with these types of guys, Berg, Hendricks, etc., the command needs to be so fine. We'll see, obviously a "prove-it-every-step" guy. Will be interesting to see how location guys like he and Kellogg do when they reach AA next year.

Tom, while giving you credit for some good points, I also have to give you some very good credit for being the strongest Edwards advocate. The dramatic minor-league K-rate, which you valued as manifestation of hard-to-hit and extraordinary stuff, has carried over very well. His stuff really is very special, special enough that it stands out even relative to the high standard of big-league pitchers. And you argued that his control problems were not necessarily prohibitively bad; that too has proven correct thus far. You got that one right. Your guy Kellogg has also settled down in A-, he's been a pretty competitive finesse lefty down there. Not sure how favorably the finesse stuff will advance against higher-level hitters, but when his control is good he's effective versus A- guys. Over last 10 starts, he's 2.25 ERA, with only 7 walks in 60 innings, and only one start of last ten with more than one walk. Will be interesting how he manages in AA next year. I suspect that if Myrtle had been a playoff team instead of South Bend, he'd have been promoted before now. But maybe good to just let him stay settled in a playoff team that will have some extra game(s), and stay in a winning groove.

Thanks Tom, I think you've made some excellent points. 1. Clifton has not carried a high innings worked, he'll probably end with fewer innings than Hatch on the year, and no more than equal. 2. Interesting that Clifton has NOT worked on 5-day cycle. I hadn't noticed that before (although I have several times wondered "why hasn't Clifton worked in a while?") Has that been the same with other young pitchers? I wonder if that's unique for Clifton, or is/will be kind of standard practice for Cubs with guys in the 18-20 age range? 3. I'm surprised Clifton lists at only 6'1". I had the sense he was taller and longer. I wonder if he has grown an inch or two, with 6'1 being his 17-year-old high-school listing or something? 4. I think your point is well taken, that we aren't expecting either of these guys to be 180+ inning workhorse guys. If either ends up becoming a 180+ full-year rotation regular, that's possible for sure. But I think in either case, that would actually be a happy, positive surprise. Odds of that ever happening are less than even, I'd guess. 5. Hatch had a 2.3 BB/9 ratio this season, and 0.15 HR/9. (I'm using baseball cube, not sure if that included playoffs). Obviously college is one thing, pros another. But certainly it would seem that his upside is to have good BB/HR splits. If K's, BB's, and HR's are the big three, and if Hatch perhaps projects favorably in two of those three areas, there's reason to be very hopeful. And obviously many hopes for college pitchers are unrealized in the pros, the walk rate might go way up.

Rubes, great point and I totally agree. *Pre-draft stuff always had guys with high velocity, and they are always listing top-touch velocity rather than routine day-do-day working velocity. A guy might spend the whole season actually getting outs with 88-92 2-seamers, but if he throw a couple of 96mph 4-seamers, the 96 will get listed as if he's a power pitcher or something. *Agree that what a guy does on 7-day rest over a dozen starts, and what he's doing for the last half of a 5-day rotation season is often different. The 5-day rotation pro will be mostly at the tired end-of-season college velocity. In case of Hatch: * I don't expect him to be a velocity guy. I'm hoping that he can be an average-velocity guy, not sub-par. And that his pitching will make him good. Movement, location, command. *I perceive Clifton as stronger arm and a faster fastball. But I'd rank Hatch above Clifton. Hatch has a chance to be a good command/movement guy. Clifton has struggled with control. So I think Hatch has a better chance to have excellent big-league control than Clifton projects to have, even if Clifton has better pure stuff. *An unflattering analogy I have for Hatch is Warren. (It's wrong in that Warren is HR-vulnerable, and Hatch doesn't profile that way, non-trivial difference.) Warren's been terrible for us and we just gave him away at negligible value. But I see Hatch as being of that style, a shortish guy with average arm. When he's on his game and his location is working, he can be effective. Like Warren, if he loses his command he's going to fail. Capable of starting some, perhaps. But perhaps better used in relief.

The Joe Smith acquisition brought Preston Morrison to mind. Smith has assembled a 10-year career with a 2.94 ERA as a no-velocity sidearm guy. Nothing great, but a useful, productive, functional career for him. I haven't seen any Preston Morrison video since college. But he had a very low arm slot in the video I recall. I wonder if he's got any chance to lower it further, and to carve out a Smith-like career as a funky reliever? Or perhaps something more? Preston is a good example of how little attention we pay to results in A-ball. I assume we have the worst collection of minor league pitching of any organization in baseball. But a guy who's allowed 1 earned run in 7 starts still doesn't even get a thought for a top-10 list. I wonder if he'll be a guy like David Berg who finally hits the wall in AA?

Hatch is in the organization now, so whether he pitches 6 innings or not this month, I'd include him too. I'd include both him and Miller in the top 10, both have good arms and neither has failed yet. Stinnett has been so persistently ineffective, and his velocity predominantly too mediocre, to make top-10 for me. But I know I tend to give a guy with a good arm and projection for good arm/stuff/control, and hasn't accumulated evidence to the contrary, ahead of somebody who has a track record of failure. It's a very limited pool, that's for sure. Hopefully some will progress more favorably next year than has been true these last several years.

Dewees with a good night, walk and 4/5. Started fast, then his batting average sagged for a long time, now he's been hot again and his BABIP is back up towards normal. Season average is back up to .291 now, OPS .776.

Why is that? Over his career, he's career .857 OPS vs RH and .627 LH. And .783 overall. My feeling has been that relief might be exactly where he's best suited to be useful. Overall he's tended to be a guy with average stuff, sub-average control, high HR, and overall well-below-average effectiveness. So, I'd say play to his strengths, use him as a lefty reliever. In relief velocity plays up; doesn't need to go as deep in his control-challenged repertoire; and can get used in more innings where he's likely to see one or two lefties, against whom his stuff matches up better. He's been variably effective in relief, hope you can get that optimized and he may become a capable role guy.

Will be interesting to see how Mekkes does over longer sample and in full season. Agree, would be kinda fun to see him in South Bend. That said, he pitched less than 70 innings total in game-action for Michigan State. Obviously did lots of bullpens and batting practice and stuff as a redshirt guy, and as a "rookie" sophomore, and then during summer league. But really the total volume of game innings is what Fergie Jenkins would have pitched in 2 months. So, he may have quite a bit of development and adjustment and "figuring-things-out" still ahead for him. If he's ready to fly through the system, sure. But for a 10th round pick, if you can patiently develop and actually end up with an effective middle reliever, that's a win, no matter how long it takes to achieve that.

Interesting trade. Wonder who the AAA guy back is. And I wonder what the "imbalance" in the deal was. Vogelbach is a little too much value for MM, so the prospect/Blackburn is in our favor to level the deal? Or MM was actually a little too much for Vogelbach alone, so Blackburn was more value and the prospect is pretty much roster-filler? Pries looks like less than Blackburn value, so somebody in Seattle must have been interested in Blackburn, and saw him as added value.

Yes that's that the guy.

Wow, that Cease news is huge relief. My perspective can flip pretty fast. Not many days I kind of assumed that DelaCruz was cooked, and Cease too. Suddenly within a week, and especially after yesterday, De la Cruz is suddenly exciting again, and Cease as well. Potentially almost like having two top-10 prospects come back to life within a week or 24 hours! :)

Arguello's reports on Moreno this spring were that he wasn't very fast, but had a good curveball. Perhaps the fastball has improved or will do so.

Heh heh, yeah. Being a great kid with a bundle of tools (speed, great CF defense, arm, some pop), that's a great start. But if you can't actually hit the ball, hitting is the one tool you can't live without, and can't "develop" either.