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

Cubs Beat Rockies in 11; Zambrano Getting Recast

Aramis Ramirez blasted a one-out, two-run homer in the bottom of the 11th to lead the Cubs to a 4-2 win over the Rockies Monday night at Wrigley. Lou Piniella's post-game press conference, the main topic of which was a player who never even appeared in the game, was at least as newsworthy as the main event.

First about the game:

The Cubs had leads of 1-0 and 2-1 courtesy of run-scoring singles by Aramis Ramirez and Koyie Hill, before the Rockies tied the game in the 8th inning on a single and three walks, two by John Grabow and one by Carlos Marmol. Marmol redeemed himself by inducing an inning-ending double play, nicely initiated by Starlin Castro, to preserve the tie. 

From the ninth through the eleventh, Marmol and Sean Marshall held the Rockies scoreless and hitless while fanning seven (!!!).

Castro led off the bottom of the 11th with a single, his third hit of the night. After Derrek Lee lined out to Troy Tulowitzki, Ramirez pounded the game-winning shot halfway up the bleachers in left-center field. It was Ramirez's first HR in 108 AB's, dating all the way back to April 15th in Milwaukee.

The failing of the Cub bullpen—primarily the failure of Grabow—cost Randy Wells a victory on a night when the righty threw a career-high 116 pitches and limited the visitors to 1 run on 7 hits over 6 2/3 innings. He also pitched himself out of a potentially disastrous fourth inning, striking out Ian Stewart and Clint Barmes to get out of a bases loaded, one out jam.

About the press conference and events leading up to it...

When Grabow took the mound to begin the eighth inning, Kasper and Brenly pointed out that only Carlos Marmol was warming up in the pen. Our 8th Inning Man, Carlos Zambrano, was nowhere to be seen...at least not until the tv cameras found him sitting in the dugout alongside Geovany Soto.

In his post-game meeting with the press, Piniella explained that Zambrano's role in the bullpen would be changing. Piniella, as quoted by Sullivan in the Tribune:

We thought the outcome (of moving Z to the bullpen) would be different. He's not as comfortable in the bullpen pitching short. So we're going to use him in a different role, give him some stamina, build up his arm.

Piniella said his lefties, Grabow and Marshall, would serve as setup men and in answer to a direction question, Lou finally said that Zambrano would rejoin the starting rotation "down the road, if need be."

I guess that means long relief for now. Thing is, Cub starters are averaging better than six innings per outing so it doesn't seem like there is much "long relief" duty to be had. Unless we're talking about mop-up duty in those lost cause games, in which case I'd say that having an $18MM-a-year Mop-Up Man seems a lot sillier than having an $18MM-a-year Setup Guy.

Like just about everything involving this team this year, the Zambrano situation should be fascinating, if not actually enjoyable, to watch.

Comments

Z stuff is weird, but before you give up on your $18M pitcher Cubs, take a look at Zito in San Fran. It does sound like he's just on his way back to the rotation as soon as they can make that happen. Marmol pitched on his 3rd straight day and went 1+. And Marshall has gone 2 straight. Wonder who would get the save opp Tuesday night if it comes to that?

reached base 3 times with 2 SB's out of the leadoff spot for the O's... here's to small miracles

from the Daily Herald...
"He told me today there may be a chance to go back to the rotation," Z said. "We'll see how everything works in the next outings for me. Tomorrow will be a big day in the bullpen for me. I may throw 40 or 45 pitches. Like I told one of my teammates in BP, Silva may come tomorrow dealing and throw 80 pitches and I might pitch tomorrow."
~snip~
"I'm happy," Z said. "As long as this team is happy, I'm happy for this team. Like I said before, guys, whatever this team wants me to do, I do. This is a business, and they're the boss. If the boss wants me to close games, I close games. If the boss wants me to start games, I will start games.

[ ]

In reply to by Rob G.

props to Z for taking it in stride. i hope he gets a shot to prove he's the high pitch throwing front-rotation starter he's shown he can be. it's not like his last start before he got bumped down was some tragedy or his arm gave out after 80-90 pitches or something.

The other thing with Z is if Hendry turns a couple overachieving starters into prospects or a machine to teleport Grabow to North Korea, then Carlos is going to be rested and fresh for the stretch run.

has CZ been castrated [who's that procedure named after]? cashner wins again last night, tho only one k in 6...perfect inning for deep threat...jackson threw 2 scoreless night before...something is coming - what is it?

Maybe the Cubs should try piggy-backing their starters, like they do at Extended Spring Training (Mincone/Liria, F. Batista/Figueroa, Kirk/Mitchell, and M. Perez/Y. Wang, becomes Silva/Zambrano, Wells/Gorzelanny, Lilly/Cashner, and Dempster/Russell), with Marmol, Marshall, Caridad and Grabow the late-inning relievers. And if a pitcher is struggling or has thrown too many pitches in the inning, the manager just yells "Roll it!" and the inning is magically over (great way for getting out of bases loaded no out jams!). And a ten-man, two-DH batting order would be a good way to get Soriano off the field and Nady, Colvin, and/or Fontenot into the lineup at the same time.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=5197935 After all of the Ramirez benching stuff and the rift that seems to be developing between him and Fredi Gonzalez, who goes first? Ramirez or Gonzalez? Hanley Ramirez is arguably the most exciting player in the major leagues. If you are Jim Hendry and you need a ridiculously large shake-up like this team needs, do you consider dealing for Ramirez? I'm kinda torn on this. I feel like it would be a great move to acquire him and his defense and his bat, but at the expense of essentially completely cleaning out the farm system, as well as taking on a player with his attitude. Does the good outweigh the bad? I'm not interested in insults, just good baseball conversation

wasn't ramirez yanked for doing essentially what castro did last week? neither a rookie nor a star vet should have to be called out re: basic hustle, but times have changed...gonzalez maybe should have handled this in the dugout tunnel; if one has to go it won't be the star ss; managers are a dime a dozen - not so, batting champs... cub trivia: lee & soriano tied @ 297 homers; who gets to 300 first?

[ ]

In reply to by The Real Neal

I think you're the only one here who is interpreting it like that. The ball wasn't that deep in the hole although I'm sure Theriot would have never thrown him out. After flubbing it, he takes a quick look back and then jogs lazily after it. Problem is Hanley never stopped running, slowing down slightly rounding the bag, so not sure what Castro saw when he looked back. Castro wasn't dogging it purposefully like Ramirez, but he let himself get frustrated with his third error. Of course Soriano wasn't really busting it either trying to get the ball behind him either.

[ ]

In reply to by navigator

hanley is a long-known issue/attitude problem. the guy makes sosa's "homer watching" tendencies look like sosa busted ass around the bases from the second he made contact. he's VIP and expects to be treated as such. got a problem...then trade him to someone who can deal with him. he's probably not "shaping up" any time soon.

[ ]

In reply to by navigator

if you watch the video, you'll see the CFer is over 100 feet from the play and that Hanley kicked the ball in the direction he was running and for a moment sprinted after it which is when the LFer figured Hanley had it, before Hanley went into shutdown mode.

thanks for the link...little i heard on car radio @ lunch sounded like simple failure to hustle after a booted ball @ short...definitely more to it than that...whatever the result, i'm w/ gonzo!

Recent comments

  • crunch (view)

    madrigal at 3rd...morel at DH.

    making room for madrigal or/and masterboney to get a significant amount of ABs is a misuse of the roster.  if it needed to get taken care of this offseason, they had tons of time to figure that out.

    madrigal doing a good job with the glove for a bit over 2 chances per game...is that worth more than what he brings with the bat 4-5 PA a game?

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    There are two clear "logjams" in the Cubs minor league pipeline at the present time, namely AA outfielders (K. Alcantara, C. Franklin, Roederer, Pagan, Pinango, Beesley, and Nwogu) and Hi-A infielders (J. Rojas, P. Ramirez, Howard, R. Morel, Pertuz, R. Garcia, and Spence, although Morel has been getting a lot of reps in the outfield in addition to infield). So it is possible that you might see a trade involving one of the extra outfielders at AA and/or one of the extra infielders at Hi-A in the next few days. 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    18-year old SS Jefferson Rojas almost made the AA Tennessee Opening Day roster, and he is a legit shortstop, so I would expect him to be an MLB Top 100 prospect by mid-season. 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    Among the relievers in the system, I expect RHRP Hunter Bigge at AAA Iowa and RHRP Ty Johnson at South Bend to have breakout seasons on 2024, and among the starters I see LHP Drew Gray and RHP Will Sanders at South Bend and RHP Naz Mule at ACL Cubs as the guys who will make the biggest splash. Also, Jaxon Wiggins is throwing bullpen sides, so once he is ready for game action he could be making an impact at Myrtle Beach by June.

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    I expect OF Christian Franklin to have a breakout season at AA Tennessee in 2024. In another organization that doesn't have PCA, Caissie, K. Alcantara, and Canario in their system, C. Franklin would be a Top 10 prospect. 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    The Reds trading Joe Boyle for Sam Moll at last year's MLB Trade Deadline was like the Phillies trading Ben Brown to the Cubs for David Robertson at the MLB TD in 2022. 

  • 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.