Cubs MLB Roster

Cubs Organizational Depth Chart
40-Man Roster Info

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

28 players on MLB RESERVE LIST are ACTIVE, and twelve players are on OPTIONAL ASSIGNMENT to minors. 

Last updated 3-26-2024
 
* bats or throws left
# bats both

PITCHERS: 15
Yency Almonte
Adbert Alzolay 
Javier Assad
Jose Cuas
Kyle Hendricks
* Shota Imanaga
Caleb Kilian
Mark Leiter Jr
* Luke Little
Julian Merryweather
Hector Neris 
* Drew Smyly
* Justin Steele
Jameson Taillon
* Jordan Wicks

CATCHERS: 2
Miguel Amaya
Yan Gomes

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

OUTFIELDERS: 4
* Cody Bellinger 
Alexander Canario
# Ian Happ
Seiya Suzuki
* Mike Tauchman 

OPTIONED: 12 
Kevin Alcantara, OF 
Michael Arias, P 
Ben Brown, P 
Alexander Canario, OF 
Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF 
Brennen Davis, OF 
Porter Hodge, P 
* Matt Mervis, 1B 
Daniel Palencia, P 
Keegan Thompson, P 
Luis Vazquez, INF 
Hayden Wesneski, P 

 



 

Minor League Rosters
Rule 5 Draft 
Minor League Free-Agents

I'm Just A Fuzz Machine & I Don't Work For Nobody But You...

No official word yet as to whether or not the mysterious "fuzz machine" made the trip from Des Moines to Chicago along with Von [when there's somethin' wrong in the neighborhood who you gonna call?] Joshua. The unorthodox device is a pitching machine contraption that somehow both accelerates and decelerates a batter's swing, according to Carrie Muskat's expose earlier in the season. If Joshua couldn't get it through security at Des Moines International he may have just rented a car, thrown it in the trunk and headed east.

The Sun-Times has a piece this morning about "three Cubs to watch." In that spirit, here are three I-Cubs who currently bear a little closer watching:

1. Kevin Hart - Since moving from the bullpen, where he was struggling early in the year, to the Iowa rotation, Hart has found his groove. In five starts he's compiled a 1.38 ERA, a .128 BAA while permitting only 11 hits in 26 innings. He starts tonight in Oklahoma [kiss of death; watch him get hammered]. Remember; we got him for Fast Freddie Bynum...

2. J.R. Mathes - The old reliable of the staff has walked only 6 in 61 innings pitched this year while notching seven wins.

3. Sam Fuld - After a slow start, Fuld is hitting at a .419 clip in June. He's second in the PCL with 8 triples and has stolen 15 bases in 18 tries. The lefty-swinging Fuld is hitting .301 against southpaws; only .256 when facing right-handers.

Samardzija dropped to 3-3 in yesterday's 5-1 loss to the Redhawks. The game was scoreless into the bottom of the 5th when he was reached for four runs.

Jake Fox wasn't in the lineup. He may still have been catching his breath after legging out his 3rd triple of the year on Sunday.

Finally, fuzz machine notwithstanding, Joshua leaves behind a team whose three homers in the month of June rank last in the PCL...MW

Comments

"the mysterious "fuzz machine"...he may have just rented a car, thrown it in the trunk and headed east. --- is there a blue flashing light on top of the car? --- Elwood: It's 106 miles to Chicago, we got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark, and we're wearing sunglasses. Jake Fox: Hit it.

having a nice CWS http://muskat.mlblogs.com/archives/2009/06/616_cws_update.html DJ LeMahieu had three hits and scored two runs in LSU's 9-1 win over Arkansas in the College World Series Monday night in Omaha. LeMahieu, the Cubs' second-round pick in the June Draft, also stole a base. I believe he's the only Cub draftee playing right now..

have you seen him pitch much Mike? curious on your take, his repertoire, etc?

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/columns/story?columnist=maisel_ivan&id=41… Wildcats athletic director Jim Phillips is in discussions with Cubs chairman Crane Kenney about moving either the Iowa or Illinois game in November 2010. Another possibility for Northwestern to play in Wrigley Field, according to sports information director Mike Wolf, is a home game in November 2011 against either Michigan or Rice. I know George Halas would build temporary bleachers to up the attendance when the Bears played, so I wonder what they would do to get more seats in if this happened? Or probably just double or triple the prices for a normal Northwestern game.

[ ]

In reply to by Rob G.

And Papa Bear obviously did not mind the health of his players to get some extra bucks. According to Wiki- "The football field ran north-to-south, i.e. from left field to the foul side of first base. The remodeling of the bleachers made for a very tight fit for the gridiron. In fact, the corner of the south end zone was literally in the visiting baseball team's dugout, which was filled with pads for safety, and required a special ground rule that sliced off that corner of the end zone. One corner of the north end line ran just inches short of the left field wall. There is a legend that Bronko Nagurski, the great Bears fullback, steamrolled through the line, head down, and ran all the way through that end zone, smacking his leather-helmeted head on the bricks. He went back to the bench and told Coach "Papa Bear" George Halas, "That last guy gave me quite a lick!" That kind of incident prompted the Bears to hang some padding in front of the wall. " Doubt Big Ten would be as careless with their student-athletes, then again this is the NCAA. ~zing~

[ ]

In reply to by jacos

According to Wikipedia Ryan Field (where NW plays) holds 47,130, which is only 6,012 more than Wrigley. This isnt exactly like Michigan or Ohio St moving out of there stadiums that seat over or around 100k. They are only losing 12% of seating capacity and demand for tickets to the first game would likely justify a 25% increase over what Northwestern charges for admittance into Ryan Field.

[ ]

In reply to by The Real Neal

cause I'm bored...

7 IP, 1 K, 0 BB for Carpenter...way to pitch to contact I guess

my boy Justin Berg with a shutout inning in relief, 3.18 ERA since returning from injury, 10 K, 7 BB, 3.44 GO/FO ratio...

Reinhard with a run allowed  in one inning of work, June ERA looking much better than May though and still K'ing everyone.

not a HR hit yesterday in the minors, Flaherty 1/3 with 3 RBI's though...Vitters is having a rough June.

[ ]

In reply to by Rob G.

Carpenter had a pretty good GO/FO ratio as I recall. Vitters isn't getting a lot of hits, but his K's seem to have come down as well. I was listening to the I-Cubs game yesterday (actually I think I cursed them, the Redhawks started scoring as soon as I turned it on) and the announcer said Reinhard had a gimmick pitch, which he didn't elaborate on, but it would explain his difficulty as a starter, I guess.

Hilarious that the Cubs dumped Perry and called up Von Joshua to "change the voice". Yet, in the article MW links to (written 5/5/09) Ryan Theriot says this: "The cool thing is Gerald and Von are close and share stuff," Theriot said. "It's a perfect scenario for guys coming up to the Major Leagues to have the same message." Tell me dumping Perry was nothing more than a PR move and I'll sell you some beach-front property in Florida.

[ ]

In reply to by Chifan

I don't believe Wilken says, "Let's draft athletes over baseball players." He does draft two-way players, because the Sings, Dopiraks, Duboises, Murtons, EPats, Hoffpauirs, Foxes et al. ad nauseum are very hard to place in the majors. Wilken didn't draft Felix Pie, who might be a good example of a non-ballplayer. "Athletes vs. ballplayers" suggests track stars. The only Wilken draftee who steals a lot of bases is Tony Campana (27 steals), who got a quick promotion from Peoria and is hitting .275 in high-A Daytona after being drafted last year.

[ ]

In reply to by The Real Neal

I think a 2-1 K/BB ratio is typical of young two-way players who have slugging propensities. I don't know how many names it would take to convince you that "controlling the strike zone" is not the holy grail, but the first two that I looked at were Justin Upton and Ryan Zimmerman. Zimmerman didn't spend long in the minors but while he was there, he struck out 41 times and walked 17. In four+ seasons in the majors, in which he has hit a very respectable .285/.346/.468(/.814) while anchoring third, he has struck out 377 times versus 189 walks (1.99). Justin Upton has a .958 OPS this season, while striking out 62 times versus 30 walks. I thought Evan Longoria would help your case, but no: in the majors he has 183 Ks to 76 BBs. Chase Utley started to get his Ks under control when he was 28. Before then, his Ks-to-BBs were 303/158 = 1.93. Derrek Lee, I'm sure you know, has always had high counts for both strikeouts and walks. The career totals are 1308/716 (= 1.83). I'd like to think that this is the kind of player that Wilken is drafting, not just slow-footed sluggers that pitchers don't mind walking.

[ ]

In reply to by big_lowitzki

I'm using the Google home page, not Google Reader and am having the problem but I suspect it is a Google bug. Techwise, it is probably because Google is cacheing some feeds. They've probably built their own Akamai-like service and it's serving up these cached feeds. The last feed I've got is "Miles Activated; Fox Trots to Iowa". If others have the same then that means I'm right. Clearing your browser cache won't help. The cache is server side on Google's servers (or whatever cacheing service they use). I've had trouble with other feeds in the past on Google home page. Sorry for the tech speak. I'm at work and just in that zone. Which is better than being in Amy Winehouse's zone.

[ ]

In reply to by Rob G.

Rob, I added via your URL, but no luck. I am using the iGoogle homepage, so its probably their problem as mentioned above. iGoogle was having problems all last week. I thought it was fixed over the weekend, but I guess not for all sites.

Recent comments

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    Javier Assad started the Lo-A game (Myrtle Beach versus Stockton) on the Cubs backfields on Wednesday as his final Spring Training tune-up. He was supposed to throw five innings / 75 pitches. However, I was at the minor league road games at Fitch so I didn't see Assad pitch. 

  • crunch (view)

    cards put j.young on waivers.

    they really tried to make it happen this spring, but he put up a crazy bad slash of .081/.244/.108 in 45PA.

  • Childersb3 (view)

    Seconded!!!

  • crunch (view)

    another awesome spring of pitching reports.  thanks a lot, appreciated.

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    Here are the Cubs pitchers reports from Tuesday afternoon's Cardinals - Cubs game art Sloan Park in Mesa:

    SHOTA IMANAGA
    FB: 90-92 
    CUT: 87-89 
    SL: 82-83 
    SPLIT: 81-84
    CV: 73-74 
    COMMENT: Worked three innings plus two batters in the fourth... allowed four runs (three earned) on eight hits (six singles and two doubles) walked one, and struck out six (four swinging), with a 1/2 GO/AO... he threw 73 pitches (52 strikes - 10 swing & miss - 19 foul balls)... surrendered one run in the top of the 1st on a one-out double off Cody Bellinger's glove in deep straight-away CF followed one out later by two consecutive two-out bloop singles, allowed two runs (one earned) in the 2nd after retiring the first two hitters (first batter had a nine-pitch AB with four consecutive two-strike foul balls before being retired 3 -U) on a two-out infield single (weak throw on the run by Nico Hoerner), a hard-contact line drive RBI double down the RF line, and an E-1 (missed catch) by Imanaga on what should been an inning-ending 3-1 GO, gave up another run in the 3rd on a two-out walk on a 3-2 pitch and an RBI double to LF, and two consecutive singles leading off the top of the 4th before being relieved (runners were ultimately left stranded)... threw 18 pitches in the 1st inning (14 strikes - two swing & miss, one on FB and the other on a SL - four foul balls), 24 pitches in the 2nd inning (17 strikes - three swing & miss, one on FB, two SPLIT - six foul balls), 19 pitches in the 3rd inning (13 strikes - seven swing & miss, three on SL, two on SPLIT, one on FB - three foul balls), and 12 pitches without retiring a batter in the top of the 4th (8 strikes - no swing & miss - four foul balls)... Imanaga throws a lot of pitches per inning, but it's not because he doesn't throw strikes...  if anything, he throws too many strikes (he threw 70% strikes on Tuesday)... while he gets a ton of swing & miss (and strikeouts), he also induces a lot of foul balls because he doesn't try to make hitters chase his pitches by throwing them out of the strike zone... rather, he uses his very diverse pitch mix to get swing & miss (and lots of foul balls as well)... he also is a fly ball pitcher who will give up more than his share of HR during the course of the season...   
     
    JOE NAHAS
    FB: 90-92 
    SL: 83-85 
    CV: 80-81 
    COMMENT: Was called up from the Hi-A South Bend group at Minor League Camp for the day... relieved Imanaga with runners at first and second and no outs in the top of the 4th, and after an E-2 catcher's interference committed by Miguel Amaya loaded he bases, Nahas struck out the side (one swinging & two looking)... threw 16 pitches (11 strikes - two swinging)...   

    YENCY ALMONTE
    FB: 89-92 
    CH: 86 
    SL: 79 
    COMMENT: Threw an eight-pitch 5th (five strikes - no swing & miss), with a 5-3 GO for the first out and an inning-ending 4-6-3 DP after a one-out single... command was a bit off but he worked through it...   

    FRANKIE SCALZO JR
    FB: 94-95
    CH: 88 
    SL: 83
    COMMENT: Was called up from the AA Tennessee group at Minor League Camp for the day and worked the 6th inning... got the first outs easily (a P-5 and a 4-3 GO) on just three pitches, before allowing three consecutive two-out hard-contact hits (a double and two singles), with the third hit on pitch # 9 resulting in a runner being thrown out at the plate by RF Christian Franklin for the third out of the inning... 

    MICHAEL ARIAS
    FB: 94-96
    CH: 87-89
    SL: 82-83
    COMMENT: Was called up from the AA Tennessee group at Minor League Camp for the day and allowed a hard-contact double on the third pitch of the 7th inning (a 96 MPH FB), and the runner came around to score on a 4-3 GO and a WP... gave up two other loud contact outs (an L-7 and an F-9)... threw 18 pitches (only 10 strikes - only one swing & miss)... stuff is electric but still very raw and he continues to have difficulty commanding it, and while he has the repertoire of a SP, he throws too many pitches-per-inning to be a SP and not enough strikes to be a closer... he is most definitely still a work-in-progress...   

    ZAC LEIGH: 
    FB: 93-94 
    CH: 89 
    SL: 81-83 
    CV: 78
    COMMENT: Was called up from the AA Tennessee group at Minor League Camp for the day and tossed a 1-2-3 8th (4-3 GO, K-swinging on a sweeper, K-looking on another sweeper)... threw 14 pitches (11 strikes - one swing & miss - eight foul balls)... kept pumping pitches into the strike zone but had difficulty putting hitters away (ergo a ton of foul balls)... FB velo is nowhere near the 96-98 MPH it was a couple of years ago when he was a Top 30 prospect, but his secondaries are better...   

    JOSE ROMERO:  
    FB: 93-95
    SL: 82-84
    COMMENT: Was called up from the Hi-A South Bend group at Minor League Camp for the day and worked the 9th (14 pitches - only six strikes- no swing & miss) and allowed a solo HR after two near-HR fly outs to the warning track, before getting a 3-1 GO to end the inning... it was like batting practice when he wasn't throwing pitches out of the strike zone...

  • crunch (view)

    pablo sandoval played 3rd and got a couple ABs (strikeout, single!) in the OAK@SF "exhibition"

    mlb officially authenticated the ball of the single he hit.  nice.

    he's in surprisingly good shape considering his poor body condition in his last playing seasons.  he's not lean, but he looks healthier.  good for him.

  • crunch (view)

    dbacks are signing j.montgomery to a 1/25m with a vesting 20m player option.

    i dunno when the ink officially dries, but i believe if he signs once the season begins he can't be offered a QO...and i'm not sure if that thing with SD/LAD in korea was the season beginning, either.

  • crunch (view)

    sut says imanaga getting the home opener at wrigley (game 4 of the season).

  • crunch (view)

    cubs rolling out the who's who of "who the hell is this guy?" in the last spring game.

  • videographer (view)

    AZ Phil, speaking of Jordan Wicks having better command when he tires a bit, I remember reading about Dennis Lamp 40 years ago and his sinker that was better after 3 or 4 innings when he would tire a bit and get more sink with a little less speed on the pitch.  The key for Lamp was getting to the 4th inning.