Cubs MLB Roster

Cubs Organizational Depth Chart
40-Man Roster Info

40 players are on the MLB RESERVE LIST (roster is full) 

42 players are at MLB Spring Training 

31 players on MLB RESERVE LIST are ACTIVE at MLB Spring Training, and nine players are on OPTIONAL ASSIGNMENT to minors. 
11 players are MLB Spring Training NON-ROSTER INVITEES (NRI) 

Last updated 3-17-2024
 
* bats or throws left
# bats both

PITCHERS: 17
Yency Almonte
Adbert Alzolay 
Javier Assad
Jose Cuas
Kyle Hendricks
* Shota Imanaga
Caleb Kilian
Mark Leiter Jr
* Luke Little
Julian Merryweather
Hector Neris 
Daniel Palencia
* Drew Smyly
* Justin Steele
Jameson Taillon
Hayden Wesneski 
* Jordan Wicks

NRI PITCHERS: 5 
Colten Brewer 
Carl Edwards Jr 
* Edwin Escobar 
* Richard Lovelady 
* Thomas Pannone 

CATCHERS: 2
Miguel Amaya
Yan Gomes

NRI CATCHERS: 2  
Jorge Alfaro 
Joe Hudson 

INFIELDERS: 7
* Michael Busch 
Nico Hoerner
Nick Madrigal
* Miles Mastrobuoni
Christopher Morel
Dansby Swanson
Patrick Wisdom

NRI INFIELDERS: 3 
David Bote 
Garrett Cooper
* Dominic Smith

OUTFIELDERS: 5
* Cody Bellinger 
Alexander Canario
# Ian Happ
Seiya Suzuki
* Mike Tauchman 

NRI OUTFIELDERS: 1 
* David Peralta

OPTIONED:
Kevin Alcantara, OF 
Michael Arias, P 
Ben Brown, RHP 
Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF 
Brennen Davis, OF 
Porter Hodge, RHP 
* Matt Mervis, 1B 
Keegan Thompson, P 
Luis Vazquez, INF 

 



Minor League Rosters
Rule 5 Draft 
Minor League Free-Agents

Collage of Coaches

Dusty gets his wish, as the entire Cubs coaching staff will be back for 2006. Pitching coach Larry Rothschild apparently weighed the opportunity to be reunited with his World Series champion co-workers Dave Dombrowksi and Jim Leyland, but decided to come back to Chicago on a one-year contract. I'm a little surprised, actually. It's not that I wanted Rothschild to go, though he would have made a convenient scapegoat for the Cubs' problems in '05. It's that the Detroit pitching coach job is actually a pretty good one. They have a nice stable of young talent in Jeremy Bonderman and Mike Maroth, and Justin Verlander and Joel Zumaya aren't too far away. Then again, the Cubs do still have Prior and Zambrano backed up by Greg Maddux (and hopefully Kerry Wood), with their own flotilla of "don't call them" prospects in AA and AAA. So Rothschild has some good stuff to work with here as well. So he's back for one more year or less, and he has to realize that the seat he's sitting on is as hot as Dusty's. The rest of the staff -- Sarge, Gino, Porky, Dickpole, Sonny, and the Manager-in-Waiting -- are back as well, and in their same slots.

Comments

Hopefully, he will be working with them on covering first on ground ball to right side. Right, Dusty?

Hopefully, he gets to work with pitchers who are capable of understanding the fundamentals they should of learned in little league and are reinforced over and over in Spring Training. Right, Hendry?

Not only is Rothschild horribly overrated, he's apparently not very smart; unless something else is at work here. For, why would you turn down a fresh, 3-year deal to come back to this sinking ship? I don't get it. Either way, we're cursed. Rather than take the moeny and run, he's going to come back and work on his Mark prior Regression--wherein stud pitcher goes from 18-game winner to 120-pitches-in-6-innings questions mark. Oh goody, I can't wait until next year. Maybe he'll have achance to torpedo Angel Guzman's career! Pardon my sarcasm. Now excuse me while I watch the Sox make life even more hellish for me.

Who is Ron Wotus? The answer to: Four of the five managerial candidates to be interviewed by the Dodgers next week will be Terry Collins, Jerry Royster, Alan Trammell and Torey Lovullo, General Manager Paul DePodesta said Wednesday. DePodesta would not divulge the fifth candidate because he has been unable to reach him. The person is employed by another team not in the playoffs. He's the Giants bench coach.

i'd love to see jimenez end up in cubbie blue...the fact cin banished him to AA had a lot to do with his temper tantrums, but if the club can put up with hairston for 1/2 a year, jimenez getting a cheap/fresh start off the cubs bench would just rule.

former Cub and latest Dodger manager to get the axe, Jim Tracey was just hired by the Pirates. Dodgers look at Ron Wotus, the San Francisco Giant bench coach, was announced Monday as the fifth candidate, joining Dodger minor league staffers Terry Collins and Jerry Royster, recently fired Detroit Tiger manager Alan Trammell and Cleveland Indian minor league manager Torey Lovullo. a nice safe job in baseball is being the manager of a team on the rebuilding trail...and the musical chairs continue, when the music stops nobody knows.

Why would anyone get shitcanned after such a great season? I can't believe it was ever even considered.

Yayyyyy! The gang's all back! Dusty and his cronies, bringin' Dusty-ball at ya' one more time. (hopefully the last)

"and the Manager-in-Waiting" If for some reason Baker was fired or resigned the next manager of our beloved Cubs would be Grady Little and not Chris Spier. He and Hendry are buddy-buddy. Little would not be my 1st choice, but I think he got a bad rap in BOS. If he brought in Embree and he gave up the lead he would be gone still. Theo wanted his head and used the outrage over his correct decision to stick w/ his Ace over his suck a** pen. Nobody remembers that he was at the helm when they overcame a 2-0 defcit in the ALDS that year or to get to that Game 7 they had to overcome a 3-1 defcit. If I were in charge of hiring the next manager here would my top 10 list BTW: 1. Terry Pendleton 2. Bud Black 3. Joe Giradi 4. Bobby Dickerson 5. Orel Hershier 6. Ron Jackson 7. Grady Little 8. Ken Macha 9. Rick Sutcliffe 10. Ryne Sandberg

"Hopefully, he will be working with them on covering first on ground ball to right side. Right, Dusty?" Dude, this ain't my department. Ask Larry or Pole... I ain't got no more fresh excuses to pull outta my ass, bro. Maybe it's because we play in this old ballpark without a dome. The wind blows in sideways sometimes and pushes the pitchers away from first base. Damn, dude... I ain't got time for this. I gotta meet Macias in 20 minutes. He's hookin' me up with a new weed connection.

Jose Macias: Please call Manny Alexander. Manuel A.

So Hendry brought back all coaches, now the next step to showing why the Cubs organization sucks is all set up....When will the 2 year extenstions be coming???

Wouldn't you love to be able to finish completely short of year-end expectations and still have your whole staff back the following year as if nothing was wrong???? I know that wouldn't be the case in most well managed and respected companies. I guess thats the mindset difference between the Cubs and companies/clubs that expect to be successful... of course thats just stating the obvious.

The Dude. Cubs Motto - "We reward people for incompetence!" Anyways, don't you think we should all be rooting for the Whitesox to win the World Series? Another franchise that has gone 80+ years without winning a World Series, wins one. And still the Cubs suck. I don't know. I think it would humilate the Cubs franchise. Make them get serious about putting a better product on the field. The Cubs pride themselves on being the toast of Chicago, I think that changes if the Sox win. I know it is a sickening thing to suggest, but if the Redsox and Whitesox winning the World Series doesn't motivate this franchise, nothing will.

MikeC: "Anyways, don't you think we should all be rooting for the Whitesox to win the World Series?" No. But it is easy for a person who doesn't live in Chicago like yourself to say that. "The Cubs pride themselves on being the toast of Chicago, I think that changes if the Sox win." It is going to take more than one magical year for the White Sox to overcome the Cubs as the most popular baseball team in Chicago. It would take 3-5 years of domination for there to be even a dent made. The White Sox will still draw way less than the Cubs next year again. No question!!

I don't have the mega-hatred for the Sox team like I have seen from other Cubs. I just think a Whitesox World Series win would be good for the Cubs. Motivational wise. No doubt the Cubs will always outdraw the Sox, but still their is nothing like pointing to a champinship for validation of being the better team in town.

Manny, I dont care if the Sox draw a lot less next year than the Cubs. I do wish that the Cubs could win a pennant. I think they will get a lot of appreciative PR, and I think some people will make the case that the high ticket prices and payroll on the Northside isn't bringing home the bacon. The Sox are looking more and more like a bargain in entertainment and a way to get behind a team that isn't drawing 30,000 uninterested, drunk, yuppy fans a game... That being said, I agree that its easy for people outside Chicago to root for the Sox, but I can't swallow that pill....

MIKEC: "I just think a Whitesox World Series win would be good for the Cubs. Motivational wise." Until last year, the Cubs were more tied to the Red Sox more than the White Sox in terms of not winning a World Series, so if the Red Sox winning one did not motivate the Cubs, I am not sure how much the White Sox will or even the 100 year anniversary coming up will. "No doubt the Cubs will always outdraw the Sox, but still their is nothing like pointing to a champinship for validation of being the better team in town." Well, technically White Sox fans can use that same argument right now as they were the last team to both make it to the WS and win a WS title.

Jordan- The White Sox and Cubs are both in top 5 of ticket prices, and based on the neighborhood and stadium, i think the Cubs are best bang for your buck. And you talk about drunks at Wrigley, but there are no drunks at the Celll??

When I first became a baseball fan in 1961, I liked both the Cubs AND the White Sox. My mom's side of the family were Cubs fans, and my dad's side of the family were mostly White Sox fans. WGN-TV (Channel 9) televised both Cubs and White Sox games. Jack Brickhouse was the TV announcer for both the the Cubs AND the White Sox. The only time they played each other was in some meaningless exhibition game that raised money for Chicago Boys Baseball, and the game was played with malice toward none. Bill Veeck owned the White Sox in 1961, and they had Little Looie and Nellie Fox (my favorite player) and Minnie Minoso and an exploding scoreboard and some guy named Andy the Clown who had a nose that lit up and he would walk around the stands during the game shouting "Cmonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn! A-pa-reeeeeeceeee-oooooooo! Going to Comiskey Park in the early 60's was like going to Riverview Park. Even The Beatles played a concert there! Compared to Wrigley Field, Comiskey was kind of a scary place, and for a little kid, scary is fun. So I liked the White Sox probably more than I liked the Cubs (the Sox also had a GOOD team, the Cubs did not). It wasn't hard to root for both teams. Jack Brickhouse liked both the Cubs and the White Sox, so I did too. In fact, my dad would take me up to Milwaukee once a year on a Saturday to see a Braves game, and he always made sure the Braves weren't playing the Cubs, so we could cheer for the Braves. So I liked the Braves a lot, too! (Hank Aaron, Eddie Mathews, Warren Spahn, Lew Burdette, et al). But mainly I went to Cubs games, because during the Summer, my friends and I could take public transportsation to the games, and they were all day games, and the ballpark was very clean, and the neighborhood was "safe," and the place wasn't crowded, and it was like going to day camp, and it was just a lot easier to get there and then to get home afterward. 60% of the fans attending a Cubs home game in July or August were probably 14 or under. Whether Phil Wrigley intended to do it or not, the Cubs were secretly indoctrinating an army of Chicago Youth that years later would rise up and take Chicago for the Cubs! So everything was cool. The Sox had a good team and were always trying to catch the Yankees (that was THIR windmill), and the Cubs were just truly "lovable losers," like your Uncle Al who was always unemployed and getting divorced. But then something happened. Something changed. Phil Wrigley hired Leo Durocher to be the Cubs new manager for the 1966 season, and the Cubs became a contender within a couple of years. All the while the Sox got bad (REALLY, REALLY bad) and (worse) extremely boring, culminating with the atrocious White Sox teams of 1968-70. It's one thing to build your team around pitching and defense and contend for the pennant; it's another to build your team around pitching and defense and be so bad that you finish behind the expansion Kansas City Royals! At the least the pre-Durocher Cubs had Ernie Banks, Ron Santo, and Billy Williams; the 1968-70 Sox had Carlos May, Buddy Bradford, and a surly Bill Melton. BOR-ing!!! So that period 1968-70 is when I stopped following both the Cubs and Sox, and just followed the Cubs. And the Bears, of course. And the Bulls. And the Hawks. But NOT the White Sox. It wasn't that I hated the Sox, I just didn't care. They were boring. The Sox games weren't on Channel 9 anymore, as they moved to a UHF station(Channel 32). Jack Drees was the announcer, and he was REALLY boring. Comiskey Park was getting old and creaky and the area surrounding the park (not the Bridgeport neighborhood itself, but the Dan Ryan CTA 35th Street station area) was dangerous, or at least it gave that impression. Much of Chicago back then was losing interest in the White Sox, and started following the "Durocher Cubs." And that included the TV, radio, and print media. That's when Chicago became a "Cubs Town," and it still is. And that's when Sox fans started to get jealous. But then the "Durocher Cubs" whithered away and were replaced by horrible Cubs teams in the mid-70's, all the while Bill Veeck was returning to Chicago and re-building the Sox into an exciting contender known as (the "South Side Hit Men." Ex-Cardinals broadcaster Harry Caray (I used to listen to Cardinals games on KMOX at night back in the 60's) was the new Sox announcer, and man, did he have an ATTITUDE! Just ask Bill Melton! By the time he got to Chicago, Harry had a chip on his shoulder (not his grandson Chip, but another kind of chip) that must have weighed 50 pounds, and he would just do whatever he wanted to do and say whatever he wanted to say on the air. He criticized the other players players, his own players, Sox owners, other owners, the commissioner, everybody. But he loved Bill Veeck. And Harry's broadcast partner (Jimmy Piersall) even more critical. He was like a movie critic. He found fault with EVERYBODY! (Now that was ENTERTAINMENT, folks!). I would watch or listen to Sox games in the 1970's just to hear Caray & Piersall. I didn't care if the Sox won or lost. Then the Tribune Company bought the Cubs, and most Cubs fans thought the Cubs would finally get good. Dallas Green became the new GM, and the Cubs DID get good. and then Harry Caray left the Sox amidst ar contract dispute with Reinsdorf & Einhorn (so they became villains). and Harry came to WGN and the Cubs. Wrigley Field now had it all. A contending team. Harry Caray. Rooftop parties. Cool bars on all sides of the park. While Comiskey Park and the area around it was not doing so well. And the Sox got good, too, and won the A. L. West in 1983, but Sox fans felt that the local media didn't pay as much attention to their team as they did to the Cubs. Well, maybe Sox fans were right. Chicago was a solid CUBS town now (the mostly-suburban kids who went to Cubs games in the 60's were now grown up and Wrigley Field was their ballpark of choice), and thanks to Harry Caray and the WGN Superstation, the Cubs were fast becoming America's team, too. The Cubs almost got into the World Series in '84, and that made them even more lovable. The curse lived on! And all the while Sox fans seethed in jealousy. The Cubs were not better than the Cubs, yet nobody much cared about the Sox. And that's when I really started to notice open hostility from White Sox fans toward the Cubs and Cubs fans. There was some in the 70's when Veeck's "South Side Bit Men" weren't quite as popular as they should have been, but it got really bad in the 1980's. But even so, I never felt hostile toward the White Sox or their fsns. I just didn't care. The White Sox were just another team, and whether they won or lost really didn't matter to me. I still don't care whether the Sox win or lose. It doesn't matter to me, one way or the other, But then I don't live in Chicago anymore, so I don't have to deal much with White Sox fans. The best way for me to compare the Cubs and Sox, is that in his last years, south-sider and two-time Sox owner Bill Veeck chose to spend his days sitting in the Wrigley Field bleachers watching the Cubs. Maybe if Comiskey Park had been replaced by a new "retro" park like the ones in Baltimore and San Francisco, and if the Bridgeport neighborhopod around the Cell had the activity of Wrigleyville, the Sox would be in better shape. But the one time I went there, I felt like I was on the moon and all life had been sucked out of me. It was like visiting a cemetery. It definitely wasn't like going to Comiskey Park and seeing the Go Go Sox in 1961. C'monnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!!!!!!!! Ap-a-reeeeeeeeeeeeeee-chioooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

Well even if the Sox are in the top 5 in ticket prices, the fact is that it's quite easy to get good seats at the Sox game without paying an arm and a leg thanks to all the half-price nights.

"Well even if the Sox are in the top 5 in ticket prices, the fact is that it's quite easy to get good seats at the Sox game without paying an arm and a leg thanks to all the half-price nights." Yeah and the fact that like 33% less people attend White Sox games than Cubs games. It's called supply vs. demand.

>>So Hendry brought back all coaches, now the next step to showing why the Cubs organization sucks is all set up....When will the 2 year extenstions be coming???>>> MannyTrillo, you ain't thinking "long-term", brah. I mean, you have to lock up Nefti Perez, because dude, that "dude" saved us this yr? I mean, without him, we are slightly better the KC Royals, with him, we are slightly better then KC Royals. Nefti and Macias needs brand spanking 5 yr deal, cause man "they CAN play multiple position." Anyhoo....so we get the college of clowns back another yr? I wonder what the excuse will be, when the Cards win the division in April?

Just as an aside to Arizona Phil's very nice historical piece. I grew up in Gary, Indiana and was a teenager when the Sox won the division in 1983. ROn Kittle was rookie of the year and he was from Gary and literally eveyone I knew, be they Sox or Cubs fans, were rooting for the Sox and ROnny Kittle. The next year of course the Cubs had their magical year and the same thing was true - everyone I knew, be they SOx or Cubs fans, rooted for the Cubs. Fast forward 20 years and times have changed dramatically. I don't know any CUbs fans rooting for the Sox or vice versa a couple of years ago. Oh...and here is the aside. My mom just moved from the house I grew up in and I was helping her clean out the attic and I found, in perfect mint condition, my laminated "posters" of all the Sox players that the Sun Times published every day in the build up to the playoffs, which included such greats as Julio Cruz, Britt Burns, Rudy Law (77 stolen bases!) and even Jerry Dybzinski (nice error Jerry!) and of course, Kittle, LaMar Hoyt (great facial hair) Fisk and the Bull. A little historical perspective. Jerry Dyb...truly awful, awful hitter - makes Jose Macias look good.

When I went to college at Notre Dame in 1973, I ran into true, black hearted Sox fans for the Southside Irish neighborhoods, Bridgeport and Beverly. They hated the Cubs, hated Ron Santo, and hated Ernie Banks. Like Arizona Phil I had been a big Cub fan and a minor Sox fan (the Sox in 1972 and 1973 were actually good enough to finish second to Oakland - Wilbur Wood and Dick (don't call me Richie) Allen. But after a couple of years of enduring these jerks, I came to have two favorite teams: the Cubs and whoever is playing the White Sox.

In 1969, when the Cubs were blowing their big N. L. East lead to the Mets, the Cubs lost a big game in New York in September, and it was reported in the Chicago papers the next day that Sox fans cheered loudly when the Cubs loss was posted on the scoreboard. Conversely, when the White Sox were battling the Yankees for the pennant in 1964 (the Sox finished one game back), I can recall being at a Cubs game where Cubs fans cheered when the White Sox scored a comeback win on the road. Generally, I believe true blue Cubs fans in the 1960's (when the Cubs stunk and when the Sox were perennial contenders) were cool with the White Sox and were happy to see them do well, whereas once the Cubs got good and the White Sox got bad in the late 60's, Sox fans really enjoyed seeing the Cubs lose. I'm not exactly sure why, but I would imagine it went back more than one generation. Maybe it even went back to 1906 when the disrespected "Hitless Wonders" Sox upset the Tinker-to Evers-to Chance Cubs in the World Series! Chicago was MOST DEFINITELY a "White Sox Town" (baseball-wise) throughout the 1950's and up through the 1967 season. 1967 was the year when four A. L. teams (the White Sox, Minnesota, Detroit, and Boston) were still alive going into the last week of the season, and all the White Sox had to do to win the pennant was beat-up the last-place (99 loss) A's in Kansas City, and then do the same to the then-8th place Washington Senators at Comiskey Park over the final weekend. But the White Sox lost both ends of a Wednesday twi-night DH to the A's in KC (the A's were led by then-unknown rookies Catfish Hunter, Rich Monday, Joe Rudi, and Sal Bando), and then got swept by the hapless Senators at Comiskey (a five-game end of the season losing streak to two of the worst teams in the league that included THREE CONSECUTIVE SHUT-OUTS!--one of the biggest choke jobs in the history of Chicago baseball up to that point in time), allowing the "Impossible Dream" (9th place-to-1st place) Red Sox to slip through the pack and take the A. L. pennant on the last day of the season. What a fantastic season and what a fantastic pennant race that was! It was just about as exciting as the 1964 N. L. race when the Phillies blew their big lead at the end of the season. Unfortunately, the White Sox seemed to die right then and there (the last week of the 1967 season), and all the positive vibrations associated with the "Go-Go Sox" over the previous seventeen seasons (seventeen consecutive first division winning seasons, including one pennant and five 2nd place finishes, 1951-67) died, too. It didn't help that the "Durocher Cubs" became a solid perennial contender for seven years (starting in 1967) just as the White Sox were falling apart.

another lame non-managerial move ushering in another lame mediocre year in 2006...settle for mediocrisy and you usually get it or worse.

Since we're talking about tradition and fans, I thought I'd chime in. I lived in Chicago for the first 25 years of my life (I was born in 1978, so I don't have the old school perspective/experience that others here have -- my first and happiest sports memory was the 1984 Cubs!), and my anecdotal experience is that most Cubs fans do not hate the White Sox. However, it seems like most White Sox fans hate the Cubs. I haven't met a single White Sox fan who, if they don't hate the Cubs, won't miss an opportunity to take a jab at the Cubs. I've been a true blue Cubs fan since before I could walk (I have the pictures to prove it), and despite the Sox fans I've met, I can't see why any Cubs fans would root against the Sox unless they were playing the Cubs. Like Arizona Phil said, they're just another team. I really don't care, and I sense that most Cubs fans really don't care how well the Sox do. That being said, in a game that matters I'm happy if the Sox win -- they're from Chicago. I hope they demolish the West California Angels of San Angeles (or whatever their name is) and the Houston Asstros/St. Louass Cardinals. I guess since I'm not a Sox fan I'll never understand the hatred that comes from the South Side. Thanks to Arizona Phil and Milky for the historical perspective! As an intesting -- anecdotal -- aside, I think it's interesting how Chicagoans, historically, have chosen their teams according to ethnicity. Years ago (back when either team could actually win a championship), the Sox, being on the South Side, had a fan base of mostly Polish and Irish people. The Cubs fan base, on the other hand, was made up of German and Dutch people living on the North Side. I guess that explains why my father and grandfather who are Germans from the South Side always rooted for the Cubs.

Recent comments

  • crunch (view)

    SF snags b.snell...2/62m

  • Cubster (view)

    AZ Phil: THAT is an awesome report worth multiple thanks. I’m sure it will be worth reposting in an “I told you so” in about 2-3 years.

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    The actual deadline to select a post-2023 Article XX-B MLB free agent signed to 2024 minor league contract (Cooper, Edwards, and Peralta) to the MLB 40-man roster is not MLB Opening Day, it is 12 PM (Eastern) this coming Sunday (3/24). 

    However, the Cubs could notify the player prior to the deadline that the player is not going to get added to the 40 on Sunday, which would allow the player to opt out early. Otherwise the player can opt out anytime after the Sunday deadline (if he was not added to the 40 by that time). 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    Today is an off day for both the Cubs MLB players and the Cubs minor league players.  

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    For those of you keeping track, so far nine players have been called up to Mesa from the Cubs Dominican Academy for Minor League Camp and they will be playing in the ACL in 2024: 

    * bats or throws left 

    Angel Cepeda, INF 
    * Miguel Cruz, P
    Yidel Diaz, C 
    * Albert Gutierrez, 1B
    Fraiman Marte, P  
    Francis Reynoso, P (ex-1B) 
    Derniche Valdez, INF 
    Edward Vargas, OF 
    Jeral Vizcaino, P 

    And once again, despite what you might read at Baseball Reference and at milb.com, Albert Gutierrez is absolutely positively a left-handed hitter (only), NOT a right-handed hitter.

    Probably not too surprisingly, D. Valdez was the Cubs #1 prospect in the DSL last season, Cepeda was the DSL Cubs best all-around SS prospect not named Derniche Valdez, Gutierrez was the DSL Cubs top power hitting prospect not named Derniche Valdez, E. Vargas was the DSL Cubs top outfield prospect (and Cepeda and E. Vargas were also the DSL Cubs top two hitting prospects), Y. Diaz was the DSL Cubs top catching prospect, and M. Cruz was the DSL Cubs top pitching prospect. 

    F. Marte (ex-STL) and J. Vizcaino (ex-MIL) are older pitchers (both are 22) who were signed by the Cubs after being released by other organizations and then had really good years working out of the bullpen for the Cubs in the DSL last season. 

    The elephant in the room is 21-year old Francis Reynoso, a big dude (6'5) who was a position player (1B) at the Cardinals Dominican Academy for a couple of years, then was released by STL in 2022, and then signed by the Cubs and converted to a RHP at the Cubs Dominican Academy (and he projects as a high-velo "high-leverage" RP in the states). He had a monster year for the DSL Cubs last season (his first year as a pitcher). 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    DJL: The only players who definitely have opt outs are Cooper, Edwards, and Peralta (Opening Day, 5/1, and 6/1), and that's because they are post-2023 Article XX-B MLB free agents who signed 2024 minor league contracts and (by rule) they get those opt outs automatically. 

    Otherwise, any player signed to a 2024 minor league contract - MIGHT or - MIGHT NOT - have an opt out in their contract, but it is an individual thing, and if there are contractual opt outs the opt out(s) might not necessarily be Opening Day. It could be 5/1, or 6/1, or 7/1 (TBD).

    Because of their extensive pro experience, the players who most-likely have contractual opt outs are Alfaro, Escobar, and D. Smith, but (again), not necessarily Opening Day. 

    Also, just because a player has the right to opt out doesn't mean he will. 

  • Dolorous Jon Lester (view)

    I love the idea that Madrigal heads to Iowa in case Morel can’t handle third.

    The one point that intrigues me here is Cooper over Smith. I feel like the Cubs really like Smith and don’t want to lose him. Could be wrong. He def seems like an opt out if he misses the opening day roster

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    Childersb3: Both Madrigal and Wisdom can be optioned without any restriction. Their consent is not required. 

    They both can be outrighted without restriction, too (presuming the player is not claimed off waivers), but if outrighted they can choose to elect free agency (immediately, or deferred until after the end of the MLB season).

    If the player is outrighted and elects free-agency immediately he forfeits what remains of his salary.

    If he accepts the assignment and defers free agency until after the conclusion of the season, he continues to get his salary, and he could be added back to the 40 anytime prior to becoming a free-agent (club option). 

  • Childersb3 (view)

    Phil, 
    Madrigal and Wisdom can or cannot refuse being optioned to the Minors?
    If they can refuse it, wouldn't they elect to leave the Cubs org?

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    In my opinion, the biggest "affirmative" mistake the Cubs made in the off-season (that is, doing something they should not have done), was blowing $9M in 2024 AAV on Hector Neris. What the Cubs actually need is an alternate closer to be in the pen and available to close if Alzolay pitched the day before (David Robertson would have been perfect), because with his forearm issue last September, I would be VERY wary of over-using Alzolay. I'm not even sure I would pitch him two days in a row!  

    And of course what the Cubs REALLY need is a second TOR SP to pair with Justin Steele. That's where the Cubs are going to need to be willing to package prospects (like the Padres did to acquire Dylan Cease, the Orioles did to acquire Corbin Burnes, and the Dodgers did to acquire Tyler Glasnow). Obviously those ships have sailed, but I would say right now the Cubs need to look very hard at trying to acquire LHSP Jesus Luzardo from the Marlins (and maybe LHP A. J. Puk as well).