Cubs Prospect List-mania 2011
For the fifth year running I go through the various prospect lists. I'm trying to stick the more established ones and there are even more lists available at Wiklifield. Of course, many of them were made before the Matt Garza trade. Click on the image for the link to the original article.
- Brett Jackson
- Trey McNutt
- Chris Archer 3-Star Prospects
- Josh Vitters
- Hak-Ju Lee
- Chris Carpenter
- Hayden Simpson
- Reggie Golden
- Jay Jackson
- Robinson Lopez
- Brandon Guyer
4-Star Prospects
Nine More: Robinson Chirinos, Marquez Smith, Welington Castillo, Rafael Dolis, Ben Wells, Brett Wallach, Darwin Barney, Austin Reed, Alberto Cabrera
What They Say: While the Cubs' system is a deep one that will produce plenty of big-league talents, the team still needs to look outside the organization for the kind of impact talent to turn their fortunes around.
- Chris Archer, SS
- Brett Jackson, OF
- Trey McNutt, RHP
- Hak-Ju Lee, SS
- Josh Vitters, 3B
- Chris Carpenter, RHP
- Matt Szczur, OF
- Hayden Simpson, RHP
- Rafael Dolis, RHP
- Brandon Guyer, OF
What They Say: Life was better down on the farm than it was at Wrigley Field. Righthanders Chris Archer and Trey McNutt went a combined 25-4, while outfielder Brett Jackson pounded Double-A pitching in his first full pro season, establishing themselves as the best prospects in the system. Triple-A Iowa and Double-A Tennessee had the best regular-season records in their leagues, and both Class A affiliates had winning marks, with legitimate talent driving all those victories. One pro scout who covered the Cubs opined that they had more future big leaguers than any other organization.
Rankings are preliminary and could have changed in the book that Sickels publishes. He did update his list after the Garza trade though.
- Brett Jackson (B+)
- Trey McNutt (B+)
- Chris Carpenter (B)
- Jay Jackson (B)
- Hayden Simpson (B-)
- Reggie Golden (B-)
- Josh Vitters (B-)
- Robinson Lopez (C+)
- Austin Reed (C+)
- Alberto Cabrera (C+)
- Marquez Smith (C+)
- D.J. LeMahieu (C+)
- Rafael Dolis (C+)
- Brett Wallach (C+)
- Brooks Raley (C+)
- Su-Min Jung (C+)
- Austin Kirk (C+)
- Jin-Yeong Kim (C+)
- Ben Wells (C)
- Welington Castillo (C)
OTHERS: Jeff Antigua, LHP; Darwin Barney, INF; Matt Cerda, INF, Ryan Flaherty, INF; Micah Gibbs, C; Cameron Greathouse, LHP; Jae-Hoon Ha, OF; Aaron Kurcz, RHP; Junior Lake, SS; Zach Rosscup, LHP, Chris Rusin, LHP; Aaron Shafer, RHP; Kyle Smit, RHP; Matt Spencer, OF-1B; Matt Szczur, OF; Tony Thomas, 2B..
What They Say: The Cubs system is unbalanced. On the positive side, you have a huge amount of pitching, including a large number of high-ceiling arms: McNutt, Archer, Carpenter, Simpson, the big bevy of arms in the teens. There are some polish/command guys as well, and Jay Jackson straddling the midpoint. The foundation for a strong pitching staff is clearly here.
The hitting is another issue. I love Brett Jackson, and there is plenty of up-the-middle material with Lee having the best potential. But there is a significant lack of power and impact bats, and I'm losing faith in Vitters. Golden could be anything.
The theory is that by being strong on the mound and at catcher, center field, and middle infield, you have chips to trade to fill in your offensive gaps at the corners. It's a good theory, but remember von Moltke's dictum: no plan survives contact with the enemy intact.
- Trey McNutt (A-)
- Brett Jackson (A-)
- Josh Vitters (A-)
- Jay Jackson (B+)
- Hayden Simpson (B)
- Matt Sczcur (B)
- Michael Burgess (B-)
- Ja-Hoon Ha (C)
- Chris Carpenter (C)
- Alberto Cabrera (C)
- Reggie Golden (C)
- Matt Cerda (C)
Other Potential Top 300 picks: Welington Castillo, Junior Lake
It's a great write-up on the system so I recommend reading the entire article. My exceprt though comes from their analysis on the Garza trade, which mirrors many of my own feelings on the deal.
But there is another consideration at play here, and that is the concept of perceived value. About a decade ago we wrote a piece about how the Yankees, after bringing Derek Jeter, Bernie Williams and Jorge Posada to the Majors, went through a period of time where their system produced very little, but they were able to trade their ‘top’ prospects and get quality Major League players in return. This was astonishing to us, as time-after-time these were always ‘winning’ deals for the Yankees. The easy theory would have been an East Coast media bias and the hype of the Yankees media machine. At the time we offered another angle—namely, that teams with few elite prospect talents benefit more from trading their top prospects because they garner more perceived value by being the ‘best prospect in an organization’. Kenny Williams and the White Sox have used this same strategy successfully for a number of years now. We would like to offer up the recent moves by the Brewers and the Cubs as more of the same. Yes, maybe Brett Lawrie or Jake Odorizzi was the best prospect in the Brewers' system. Yes, maybe Chris Archer or Hak-Ju Lee was the best prospect in the Cubs' system. But given the current lack of elite talent in the respective systems that is exactly why now is the time to trade them. The reason that a team like the Rangers--with a much stronger group of top tier prospects--wasn't able to reach a deal with the Rays, can likely be found in the fact that when the Rays wanted the better prospects from Texas' system the Rangers found the price too high because they would be dealing better players. A similar ask by the Rays might have been Jurickson Profar, Engle Beltre, Robbie Erlin and Max Ramirez. So, instead of questioning Jim Hendry and Doug Melvin, Cubs’ and Brewers’ fans should be praising them for some brilliant acquisitions that should make baseball a lot more interesting around Lake Michigan this summer.
- Brett Jackson
- Trey McNutt
- Josh Vitters
- Chris Carpenter
- Hayden Simpson
- Matt Szczur
- Rafael Dolis
- Michael Burgess
- Reggie Golden
- A.J. Morris
- D.J. LeMahieu
- Ryan Flaherty
- Jay Jackson
- Ben Wells
- Austin Reed
- Chris Archer, RHP
- Trey McNutt, RHP
- Brett Jackson, OF
- Brandon Guyer, OF
- Josh Vitters, 3B
- Jay Jackson, RHP
- Welington Castillo, C
- Hak-Ju Lee, SS
- Chris Carpenter, RHP
- Ryan Flaherty, INF
- Jae-Hoon Ha, OF
- Aaron Kurcz, RHP
- D.J. LeMahieu, INF
- Reggie Golden, OF
- Darwin Barney, OF
And now for the always humorous list of 16 from yours truly (15 in years past). I generally like guys that actually have done something at AA or higher, but that's just a guideline. I tend to favor position players over pitchers that can blow their arm out at anytime. This is nothing more then for entertainment purposes.
1. Brett Jackson (age 22) - He put up an .888 OPS between two stops at age 21 and could very well find himself at Wrigley at some point this season, although more likely he makes his debut in 2012. A K rate of 21% last year isn't great, but acceptable and when coupled with a 12.5% walk rate, it seems he's willing to work the count. Throw in 30 SB's against just 11 caught stealings and he could have a future as a leadoff man. And at just 22 years old, you can definitely envision the doubles power turning into a few more home runs. Tough call between him and McNutt for the top spot, but I tend to favor position players and some of Jackson's success came at a higher level.
2. Trey McNutt (age 21) - I have no idea if it was even an option for the Cubs, but it'll be curious to see if McNutt or Archer has the better career and did the Cubs trade the right piece away. John Sickels recently did a compare and contrast and had them neck and neck at #20 (McNutt) and #22(Archer) out of his top 50 pitchers. While you can't make too definitive of a judgement on their numbers with such short stops for McNutt, he did seem to do better then Archer at Peoria and Daytona while being a year younger, although he gave a bit back at AA in the 15+ innings he pitched there. So far he's had a better career walk rate, better home run rate, better K rate, better hit against rate and better WHIP then Archer. Whether that maintains as he goes up the organizational ladder is always the great mystery, but that was one helluva a 32nd round pick by Wilkens (he did get 7th round money though).
3. Josh Vitters (age 21) - As Diamond Futures points out, it usually takes him 250-300 PA's to warm up to a new league and then as soon as he has success the Cubs move him up. You do get a sense that the Cubs are much higher on him then the rest of the prospecting world. And he's still way too young to have any notions of being a bust.
4. Jay Jackson (age 23) - His K rate went way down (6.8 from above 9) and his HR rate up with the move to AAA. Nonetheless, he's still pretty young and stands the best chance of seeing Wrigley this year out of most of the top Cubs prospects.
5. Chris Carpenter (age 25) - Despite the great reports on him in the AFL, his minor league numbers aren't too fantastic - 7.7 K/9, 4.0 BB/9 and a 0.5 HR/9 coupled with a 1.3551 WHIP and none of it seems to be improving much from year to year.
6. Matt Szczur (age 21) - I don't know how much you can draw from just over 100 PA's last year, but Baseball America is sure high on him as the Cubs obviously are. He didn't get to show off any of his speed last year, but puts the ball in play and seems willing to take a walk.
7. Michael Burgess (age 22) - A legit RF arm, legit power, decent walk rate north of 10% and still young. The negative is a career K rate over 25% and although it dipped to 21% in Hi-A last year, that was his third attempt at that league. Could be Tyler Colvin, could be Kyler Burke...
8. Welington Castillo (age 24) - (Repeated from last year) This is mostly based off Arizona Phil's recommendations and observations, but he seems like he could be a plus defensive catcher with 15-20 HR power. ~snip~
That being said, I recall a time when everyone couldn't figure out why the Cubs put Soto on their 40-man and what they saw in him and he found his way in AAA at age 24. Now Soto always had better walk and K rates then Castillo, so don't think I'm saying Castillo will be just as good. But Castillo started finding his power last year and he does seem like a guy the Cubs believe in, at least more then they ever did in Robinson Chirinos.
9. Marquez Smith (age 26) - He's shown much more power then Casey McGehee did in the minors and while he K's more then McGehee did, it's still acceptable at 18.7%. Hard to see him as much more then a fill-in/bench guy, but plenty of guys in baseball that turned the opportunity into a starting gig for a few years. It should be a race between him, J. Jackson and Castillo for who makes the majors first this year.
10. Ryan Flaherty (age 24) - Flaherty's OPS numbers dropped 78 points but his walk (9.1%) and strikeout numbers(15.4%) stayed consistent. What happened was a bunch of HR's turning into doubles and I'm choosing to believe that's the fault of the FSL. He didn't have much success in 84 PA's at AA, but hopefully we're all more patient then that.
11. Darwin Barney (age 25) - I really don't like Barney's future as a useful major leaguer, but it appears his glove will get him and keep him on major league rosters and that's a better career then most prospects end up having.
12. D.J. LeMahieu (age 22) - Hopefully Camp Colvin will get him power because so far the numbers aren't too exciting. He does keep his K's down and hits the ball over the field which has led to a nice batting average. The walk rate is non-existent and he seems to be a terrible base-stealer and for the moment, no home run power.
13. Austin Kirk (age 21) - 9.2 K/9 rate, 3.0 BB/9 rate and 0.9 HR/9 rate so far for the third rounder and a south paw. I'll leave it to the more informed prospect guys to tell me why he's being ignored at this point.
14. Reggie Golden (age 20) - Not much to go off on here other then the scouting reports. Diamond Futures put him and Burgess as two peas from the same pod.
15. Matt Cerda (age 21) - Another too young to give up on type of guy. A walk rate of 12.5% to go with a K rate of just 13% so far for his career. Now if he can just find some power in his game...and a position.
16. Chris Rusin (age 24) - 7.9 K/9 rate, 1.9 BB/9, 0.4 HR/9 rate in 146 innings so far, a 4th round pick and a lefty. I find him and Kirk far more interesting then Cabrera, Dolis and Rhee at the moment.
Honorable Mention: Hayden Simpson (just don't know much about him yet), Aaron Kurcz (15.9 K/9 rate last year in 27.1 IP)
After the top 5 guys on my list, you can shake them around Yahtzee style and re-arrange the bottom 11 depending on what you value in a prospect (ceiling, stats, certain tool, what Baseball America says, so forth). As Baseball Prospectus and Diamond Futures notes, a lot of guys that should see the majors but no true elite talent at the moment (discounting Castro and Cashner). Vitters(based on just scouting reports at this point) and maybe McNutt seem like the only real potential All-Stars on the list and I guess if Brett Jackson starts hitting some over the fence. It's good to have depth in the system, that's how you land guys like Garza(assuming you think he's good) and stay afloat when Aramis and Soto find the disabled list this year. It's also how you justify signing Albert Pujols next offseason.
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