craig

Anybody have info on Nick Dean's velocity? Draft reports had him as an 88-91 type of guy, but made reference to touching up to 93 late last spring. Any update or increase? All the reports mention the good changeup. Changeups can be great, but that's a hard pitch to control every outing. Hadn't expected Dean to be pitching in AA this quickly. And 16K/3BB in his first 3 starts, 13.1 IPS, is pretty good in the eensy-teensy small sample. Would be fun if his velocity played up enough to have a shot.

Thanks for Riley Martin notes, Jason. Will be interesting to follow him moving forward. He actually signed for $1K. He's been a high-K guy for a couple of years now. But he walked a lot of guys, and he was variably inconsistent. Would have a bunch of high-K outings, but then some bad ones, high-walk ones, would mix in. Seems like the results recently have been more consistent. But also have have a higher strike-percentage? I often look at the strikes-pitches numbers in box scores. He's recently been sequencing a lot of good ones, with high strike/pitch ratios, per my subjective observation. Not sure whether he's just locked in, for a while, and this too will pass? Or whether he's better figured out what works? Earlier, I think he was a multi-pitch guy. Maybe if he's largely simplified to fastball/curve, maybe it's easier to throw strikes? Kinda crazy, Cubs have so many bad bullpens over my memory, it's kinda hard to envision a scene where a guy could be running as hot as Riley, but still get no opportunity (yet) because there aren't really any glaring weak-links in the big-league pen.

Nice to see Flanagan with a good outing!

A friend was the Iowa game on Sunday. he said Neely topped out at 94. Same game Little pitched, said stadium gun had Little at only 92-93. Pearson 98, Fulmer 92, Omaha pitcher 99, so probably not a super slow gun. Neely being barely faster than Fulmer surprised me.

Agree. I think he's completely off the table.

Agree, lot of volume of options. No bad contracts. No vets are overwhelming problematic contracts. Taillon-Boyd-Shota-Brown-Horton+Steele make nice starting 6. Wiggins impending 7th. Rea-Assad-Sanders-Birdsell-Wicks give a lot of depth. Many young guys have lots of options-years left, so should be able to keep guys situated for Iowa yo-yo for a while. Many young guys who should keep the rotation budget friendly for a while. It's a pretty good setup. Lets extend Tucker! Taillon, Boyd, Shota contract, rotation, modest salary. Rotation worthy. Brown, Horton. Young, cheap, ceiling, rotation worthy. Steele in waiting, rotation worthy. Wiggins high-ceiling rotation option, lots of cheap years and option years. Rea, Assad, club-control modest contract depth gy. Sanders, Birdsell, Wicks cheap deep-depth guys. Iowa yo-yo guys. Trade options.

Any more thoughts on that? What could you envision for him as a pathway to big-league success? Pitch-labs are always fiddling, so maybe there's a way. Beats me. Totally reinvent himself? Go Brad Keller, somehow add 3-5 mph and become a power pitcher? Reinvent into a side-arm slinger? Or do you think the existing guy is close, doesn't need to reinvent, just needs to get a tweak more consistent and locate a little bit better, and he might make it work?

I feel kinda conflicted. Is it great? Obviously no. But my expectations were so low, that I'm pleasantly surprised. In January, I probably saw Horton, Wiggins, and Birdsell as pretty much the only pitching-prospects of any relevance or ceiling. And had lots of worries for Horton, and for will-he-be-wildman Wiggins. So I think the Horton-Wiggins progress has been very nice. Birdsell injured, Wicks a bust, those are disappointments, yes. But having Gallagher, Sanders, and Kipp being even interesting, those are some very pleasant unexpected surprises, for me.

Thanks, Cal, that's really helpful. 92-95 with a low arm slot seems fine for a guy who's going to live on his breaking pitches. I looked up earlier Bryan Smith note on Kipp back in April, he wrote: "There’s a lot of Colin Rea in what Kipp is showing out there, if you want an idea of the potential we’re talking about. He can support heavy breaking ball usage, probably able to get away with only 30-40% fastballs and not have it hurt him."

So, there's Wiggins in one class. Gallagher, Birdsell, Sanders. Kipp. Noland. McCollough exists, too. How would you rank those guys? Obviously with Birdsell and McCollough, if they resume pitching, hard to guess how the injuries might impact delivery/stuff/location. Mule from the HS group. Florentino from the Latin pipeline?

Is Kipp a big-league prospect? Or not really? His numbers look pretty good. Enough fastball to use it as a offspeed pitch?

Thanks for the info. That's helpful context, and encouraging. Reese McGuire was 4/19, 17%, so Mo is no worse. If opponents perceive a guy as being hapless they sometimes will attempt lots more steals. But Mo's 7CS/30SB, that's in 30 games. So teams are only averaging 1.0 SB/per game, So the modest attempts-volume also supports the "not-that-bad" perspective, I think?

I'm an idiot. Genesis Cabrera. Oops.

Just to belabor, I'm not arguing against trading guys. It depends on the value. Just wondering whether we NEED to trade guys. If so who needs to get traded? Why? And if we're going to trade, what are the big-league needs that we need to trade for? If you can get a starting pitcher who's going to be in playoff 3-man rotation for Alcantara, or Caissie, by all means! I like that value. If you can get nice circle-of-trust caliber reliever for Christian Franklin, I'm listening. If you get a quality reliever for Cristian Hernandez, or a cover-a-couple-starts-to-rest-Horton/Brown starter, I'm listening. It's just a question of value traded and value received.

Agree. Protecting their workload is a thing. Maybe Rea, Assad, Flexen, can pick up some starts? So maybe you do want to pick up an 8th/9th starter rental to cover some additional starts, so that Horton and Brown can skip a variable number of starts each. Not sure I'd trade Wiggins, Moises, or Long to get a 2-month cover-a-couple-starts 8th-starter rental, though..... Not sure I'm tracking? Playoff rotations are only 4-deep, and 4th starter only needs to make three starts even if you win the world series while taking every series to max. So Imanaga, Boyd, Taillon, Horton, and Brown gives you 5 guys from which to choose 3, really; and than a 4th to maybe make up to 3 starts max. So, I assume Counsell makes sure that Horton and Brown skip enough starts during the season so that they're available for the playoffs? Use Rea, Assad, Flexen to cover those skipped starts; maybe a cheap trade-deadline rental? Are you instead reasoning that the Cubs will just burn Horton and Brown's usage during the season, and they will be unavailable for playoffs? Or are you just meaning that Imanaga, Boyd, Taillon, Horton, and Brown aren't good enough to be playoff starters? Certainly the prospect of trading for a high-end starter, who would be good enough to unambigiously fit into the 3-man playoff rotation (and who could also be back for 2026), that would be very appealing, and worth some prospect sacrifice. I'm just not thinking I want to trade Moises, Wiggins, or even Long for a pick-up-some-Brown/HOrton-starts-in-August rental who you won't actually start in the playoffs. Not sure I track this. In what landscape do the Cubs have too many prospects, and why do they have to move any of them? Like, who presently might have to get moved? There is no shortage of Iowa BA's for Alcantara, Caissie, Triantos, Long, and Moises. It's not like Alcantara, Caissie, Triantos, or Moises belong in the majors right now, but are blocked by Cub starters. Alcantara with his .241 BA, 62K/170AB, and .424 slug, it's not like he's earned a starting opportunity with the Cubs but is just blocked by PCA and Tucker. Same with Caissie, .243BA, 65K/169AB, it's not like he's earned a starting opportunity but he's just blocked by Happ and Tucker. This isn't like Freeman-blocking-Busch or anything. They just haven't improved enough yet to earn a big-league starting opportunity yet. If the thinking is they're never going to get much better, so they'll never get good enough to become big-league starters, so trade them before their value declines, that's a different argument. In a sense, I think that we're nowhere near any point of having too many prospects. Either they progress and earn their way to the majors, or they stall and decline their prospect-rank status.

I have no idea what might happen. In part because I don't really know how the Cubs scout their own guys. In part because I don't know how other teams scout our guys. In part because I don't know what good pitchers will be available, or at what price. In part because I don't know what Hoyer will be looking for. Who knows what health situations will change over the next two months, or performance issues? Me dreaming best-case: None of the current starting position players gets hurt. Amaya is back, and catcher is doing fine. Shaw looks like he can hit. Hoyer isn't prioritizing a starting 3B. Brown settles in and looks like a good, asset pitcher. Horton settles in, and looks like a good, asset pitcher. Imanaga comes back from injury and is good again, looks like a good, asset pitcher. Boyd keeps rolling, and looks like a good, asset pitcher. Taillon keeps rolling, and also looks like a good, asset pitcher. Assad recovers fully over the next few weeks. As July progresses, he looks as good or better than he's ever been, and is available as a quality rotation-depth guy. Rea bounces back from his couple of off outings, and looks like the decent, competent professional pitcher he was for his first 7 starts. Reasonable rotation-depth guy. With Assad and Rea as depth guys, we're 7 starters deep, so Hoyer doesn't really need to be looking for back-of-rotation depth starters. (Heh heh, I'm being idealistic dreamy, but I'm not going to go so over-the-top as to dream of Wicks actually emerging as healthy and anti-awful....) Palencia keeps throwing strikes, and settles in as the closer, and as a flat-out good closer. Hodge gets healthy, and comes back as a good, really good setup. Keller stays great. In this dreamland, Hoyer isn't really facing many pressing needs. Upgrading on the bench fringes, yes. Brujan, Berti, Turner, those are spots to improve. But, don't think he's trading wiggins for a 2-month Brujan-upgrade, or Moises for a rental-upgrade on Turner. Upgrading on the bullpen fringes, yes. Pressly, Brasier, Marquez, sure he might be looking to upgrade there. But again, you don't trade Moises or Wiggins for a Brazier upgrade. So in the dreamland, *IF* you trade one of your TOP prospects, it might only be if you're getting a BIG-value guy. Maybe a starting pitcher that will be starting in playoff games, not just a depth back-rotation guy. Maybe a relief pitcher who's really good, and could make your leverage-relievers really deep and great. Maybe a guy who isn't a rental, but could be a top-3 rotation guy for another year or more? Or could be core leverage-reliever for next year and beyond? But I think Hoyer is still pretty long-view minded. Yes, for sure he's in for this year. I think there's a chance that he won't have many crisis needs, and may keep most of the prospects that are most significant.

That Gallagher stuff is pretty great. Seems they've done some good work with some non-first-round college pitchers lately. Riley Martin (2021, $1K bonus), Birdsell (5th round, 22), Wiggins and Sanders (2nd, 4th, 2023), Gallagher (6th, 2024), that's a shot to get some value out of non-first-rounders. I wonder how far away Birdsell and McCollough are from box-score games?

Wow! That's really fun story.

Long with HR's is nice. Seems like some of them have been pretty deep. Not really cheap ones. Maybe the projection of a 16-HR-DH is underselling his power?

Totally fair. *If* Rojas sustains his current production, he'll be top-100 for sure I'd love that. Time will tell. But as a guy who slugged .336 last year, there's a risk that after his wonderful 2-HR night last month, his numbers might regress. We'll see. I surely hope he can sustain or improve his slug as this year progresses.

Wiggins absolutely. Within the org's minor-leaguers, I'd have him and Moises as the top 2 in whichever order. With Horton and Shaw graduating, that doesn't leave that many. I won't be that surprised, really, if Wiggins and Moises might be the only top-100's left after the season, if they don't add somebody in the draft? Alcantara, Triantos, and Caissie, I assume may be hitting their way off top-100 lists fairly soon, unless something flips? Long, perhaps he'll pop onto the back-end of some top-100's sooner or later. But as a DH without big HR-production, not sure 100's usually prioritize non-HR DH's that much that often? Nor do I fault them for not doing so. Rojas, we'll see. I hope he produces enough and has enough scouting tools to stay on top-100s. But I'd not be that surprised if he wasn't on all or many. I'm not really sure what his upside is? HR-slug? Plus big-league defensive SS? Pure contact hitter? Hopefully he hits enough HR's this year to stay top-100, but we'll see.

First HR this month! After nothing but singles this month, he got a double last game, I think, and now a HR. Nice.

I think Long is a super puzzling prospect, and super hard to predict. Hitting is invaluable, and there is space in the majors for a 1-tool guy. But will he be good enough big-league bat to command multi-year big-league career? Defensively will he be more than a DH/PH? Ever good enough to back-up 1B or LF? Good enough defensively to ever **start** at 1B or LF? (I assume he'll always be variably below-average at any position, but where on the anti-awful spectrum will he fall?). Power, will he hit many HR? K's, he's a high-K guy now, will he control that? Platoon-wise, will he become reasonably good against LHP? (Worse thus far.). Good hitters often make adjustments. Will he make some to hit more HR, to pull more, to lift more? Or perhaps to K less? Just really hard to guess how he'll fit into a major-league team this early in his career. He's whipped up to Iowa fast, which seems one step away. But I think he may be a number of adjustments away from what he'll be down the road. I suspect that anybody who thinks they know what he'll end up becoming might end up being surprised.

Interesting with Lopez. He got cut in camp, and he's got zero offense, so hardly surprising. But I'd thought he might stick as a defensive replacement for Shaw. This would seem to make Shaw a 9-inning guy, given that Brujan and Berti haven't looked like defensive-replacement guys.

Thanks, Bertz and Cal. Helpful insights for sure. Yeah, I'd like to thing Sanders would have some higher ceiling than Noland just because he's faster. Obivously Noland is kind a proven guy who's pretty good versus minor-league hitters. But he's always going to be limited by his velocity. Obviously Sanders doesn't have a Wiggins fastball or anything, but he's still got a handful of mph more than Noland, right? Seems to me that sometimes guys add some velo at unexpected ages (see Keller), and also in relief. I wonder if a relief-version of Sanders might have reasonably decent velocity, to support his cutter and main pitches.