Top 31 Prospects: Chicago Cubs

50 FV Prospects

Even as he struggled early as a pro to perform on paper, Amaya drew trade interest from clubs hoping to leverage the Cubs’ championship aspirations to convince the club to part with him. The Cubs refused and have been rewarded, as the offensive potential promised by Amaya’s graceful swing and burgeoning physicality began to actualize in 2018. Amaya’s hands have life, and work in a tight little loop as he accelerates them to swing. He can pull and lift balls in various parts of the zone with regularity, and the impact of his contact is only limited by his average bat speed. The physical grind of catching is likely to dilute his in-game offensive production a little bit, but unless the beating he takes back there starts to take away from his defensive abilities (which sometimes happens to young catchers), Amaya is a pretty good bet to have some kind of big league career, and, if the bat maxes out, he’ll be an above-average regular. He turns 20 in March and will likely head to Hi-A next year. How his advanced defensive ability and less-advanced bat develop could affect how quickly the Cubs push him: slowly if they want to wait for the latter or, depending on how much he hits early as a big leaguer, quickly if they don’t.

Already, Hoerner’s swing has changed. He was making lots of hard, low-lying contact at Stanford, but since signing he has added a subtle little bat wrap that has made a substantial difference in how he impacts the ball. He hit for much more power than was anticipated in the summer and fall, and the identifiable mechanical tweak is evidence that the change is real and not small-sample noise. Hoerner makes routine plays at short and so long as scouts are okay with his funky throwing motion, he has a chance to stay there. There are scouts who have him projected to second base or to center field. Hoerner’s previous swing enabled a bit of a jailbreak out of the batter’s box, exaggerating his home-to-first speed. With the new swing, he’s a 55 runner. Hoener’s bat and probable up the middle defensive profile mean he’s likely to be at least an average regular, and he could move quickly.

We’re chalking up Ademan’s terrible 2018 statline to an overzealous assignment. At age 19, the Cubs sent him to Hi-A Myrtle Beach, where he barely hit above the Mendoza Line. He did look a little bit heavier than he had the year before, and his swing was more upright and less athletic than it has been, but all the physical tools to stay at short are still here (quick actions, sound footwork, plenty of arm) for now. Much of Ademan’s offensive woes can be explained away by his age relative to the level. He doesn’t project to be an impact bat, just one that is better than is usual at shortstop. Ideally he shows up to Mesa in the spring looking a little leaner and twitchier. He’ll likely repeat Myrtle Beach (at least for the season’s first half) and projects as an average everyday player.

45+ FV Prospects

Alzolay felt a weird sensation in his throwing arm in the fourth innings of a late-May start at Triple-A. It was a lat strain, for which he’d need a PRP injection and the rest of the summer to rehab. He was throwing again in the fall and is expected to be ready for 2019. Alzolay may have also had some health issues during his breakout 2017. He was given extended rest throughout July and August, his starts often spaced out by six days. He didn’t throw more than 80 pitches in any August start and was shut down late in that month, then asked to pick up innings in the Arizona Fall League. He has this system’s best two-pitch mix, a fastball/power curveball combo that is ready for a major league bullpen as soon as Alzolay is healthy. To profile in a rotation, he will need a better changeup than the one he has shown in the past; missing several months of action with his lat issue likely slowed that process. The combination of injury and the changeup reps lost to it make it more likely that Alzolay ends up in the bullpen, but he could be a dominant high-leverage option there.

45 FV Prospects

Steele signed for $1 million as one of several over-slot players in Chicago’s terrific 2014 draft class and was tracking through the minors at an even pace before he blew out his elbow in August of 2017. He returned from Tommy John just eleven months after his injury and by the end of his six-week Arizona Fall League run, looked as though he might contribute to the Cubs in 2019. He was touching 95 in the fall and living in the low-90s with less life than his spin rate would indicate. He has an above-average curveball and will flash an average change and a pitch that looks like a cutter, but it may just be a variation of his changeup. He projects as a no. 4 or 5 starter.

As a high school underclassman, Roederer looked like a hit-first tweener outfielder. He added a bunch of good weight and strength and had significantly more raw power when he arrived in the AZL after signing. He has already begun trading a little bit of contact for significantly more game power. With added mass and strength typically comes a reduction in straight line speed, but Roederer hasn’t slowed down just yet and still looks like a possibility to stay in center, though most scouts who saw him in pro ball think he’ll eventually move to left field. Regardless, there’s a whole lot more bat here than there was on our pre-draft evaluation of Roederer, who has risen to the top of the promising teenage hitter group in this system because he has a chance to hit for average and power while the rest are likely to do just one of those.

Name another teenage lefty who touches 99. As far as we know, this is the only one, meaning Marquez is perhaps the hardest-throwing teenage southpaw on the planet right now. He also has pretty advanced fastball command for someone with that kind of heat to go along with a 6.5% walk rate over his last 100 innings of work. His secondary stuff is pretty pedestrian, but everything of his plays up against left-handed hitters because Marquez has a weird, sawed off, low-slot arm action. He’ll need to develop better ways to deal with right-handed hitters, either via command or better secondary stuff, and ultimately Marquez projects as a no. 4 starter because one cannot live on velo alone, but the elite arm strength means his ceiling is higher than that if the Cubs can work some magic with his stuff.

Lange had a legendary college career at LSU, where he always performed despite some year-to-year fluctuations in his velocity. He carved up the SEC with just two pitches, and repertoire depth, the velo issues, and the violence in Lange’s delivery all contributed to the amateur scouting world’s opinion that he would be a reliever in pro ball. Lange’s changeup usage increased dramatically in 2018 and the pitch improved. His curveball doesn’t have big raw spin but it’s still really effective and remains his best pitch. His delivery is deceptive and enables his fastball to play despite below-average velocity. It appears there’s a starter’s arsenal here and Lange threw plenty of strikes in 2018. If he’s living off of deception, perhaps his future role will be limited to a one time through the order type of guy, but that’s still more than a generic 40 FV reliever.

40+ FV Prospects

Arguing in Short’s favor is best done using the same statistics that have made him a Fringe Five mainstay for the last two years. He owns a 17% career walk rate and gets to every bit of his fringy raw power in games because he hits flyballs at a 54% clip, which would be the highest rate in the majors among qualified hitters. Short exists at the far right tail of the player population where both of these skills are concerned. He’s very similar, statistically, to one-year wonder Ryan Schimpf, except Short has better feel for contact and can actually play shortstop. He may wind up in a utility role, but Short is freaky enough in these ways to be more intriguing than your average bench guy, and the Addison Russell situation complicates the Cubs’ shortstop situation enough that Short might be relevant pretty quickly.

Gallardo signed for an even $1 million in July and was, in our opinion, the most well-rounded pitcher in his IFA class. He’s really loose, flexible, and athletic, and has some physical projection. He sits 89-93 right now and it plays at the top of the strike zone. He’ll likely throw harder as he matures. Gallardo also has a proclivity for spin and his curveball already flashes plus. He checks all the traditional boxes for a teenage pitching prospect, has advanced pitchability, and his stuff works in a specific way (four-seamers up, curveballs down) that fits with contemporary pitch usage. Teenage pitching is risky, but every aspect of Gallardo’s profile is indicative of improvement. He has a chance to be really good.

40 FV Prospects

Garcia, who signed for $500,000, just turned 17 in August and hit .300 in the AZL despite being a whopping 3.5 years younger than the average player there. He has really great feel to hit, and not just for his age. It’s punchy, all-fields contact right now. Garcia’s swing has an abbreviated finish and he’s already a pretty stocky kid without much room for mass, so it’s unlikely he develops big home run power as he matures; he might never hit more than 12-15 bombs. But he’s going to hit a ton and he’s athletic enough to have tried shortstop, though he probably fits best at second base, where he might be above-average. Depending on how his bat develops, he could be a Cesar Hernandez type of regular who makes a ton of contact and plays a premium position, which would generate a significant amount of value even if there’s not much pop here. The Cubs have pushed advanced hitters like this pretty aggressively of late, but Garcia is just so young that we anticipate he’ll be in extended next year, then head to Eugene for the start of his summer. If he hits there, he may get a cup of coffee at South Bend late in the summer.

If you’re looking for the Platonic Ideal of upside, it exists in Davis, who is raw as a hitter but still enthralling in every other possible way. Davis was his conference’s Defensive POY on a 2016 state championship basketball team and didn’t fully commit to baseball until his senior year. His mother was a track and field athlete at the University of Washington and his father is former NBA All-Star, Reggie Theus. In addition to his athletic gifts, scouts rave about Davis’ maturity as a student and a worker (often citing the odd hours he keeps taking care of a goat and llamas at his family home), and all thought he’d be able to cope with likely early-career contact struggles and would work to improve his ability to hit. If Davis grows into a 40 bat, he could be a star because of his power and ability to play center field. There’s some risk he never gets there.

Little’s stuff was down in 2018. He was 92-94 and touching 95 or 96 last year, had a plus curveball, and only lasted until late in the first round because of concerns surrounding his command. This year, he was mostly 89-92 with just an average curveball and no improvement in his ability to locate. There’s a chance he bounces back, but college starters often just never throw as hard as they did in school due to increased usage and a longer season, and that’s possible in this case, too. A left-handed breaking ball like this probably means Little will at least have a future in the bullpen or as a backend starter, but his stuff needs to rebound if he’s going to be more.

Estrada, who signed for $1 million as a sixth rounder in 2017, had a very strong spring and extended spring in Mesa and looked like he might be pushed to short season ball as a 19-year-old. Then, just before short season leagues began, he was placed on the reserve list and didn’t throw again all summer. He is already much thicker and heavier than he was in high school. He was touching 96 before he was shut down and had one of the nastier changeups among teenage arms in Arizona. He struck out a rehabbing Andrew Toles with that changeup twice in extended, though his curveball remains pretty fringy. If his command improves and he finds a third pitch, the curveball or otherwise, he’ll be a mid-rotation option. If not, he projects as a late-inning fastball/changeup reliever.

De la Cruz spent much of 2017 injured, and was sitting 88-92 while rehabbing in preparation for a Fall League stint that was nixed due to a setback. After showing similar velocity in March of 2018, he was suspended for PEDs in the second half of the season. He’s currently throwing about an inning per week for Estrellas Orientales in the Dominican Winter League. Peak prospect De la Cruz would show you a plus fastball and breaking ball consistently, as well as some feel for a changeup. Because of all the lost reps due to various injuries over the last several years, his development has been slow. Assuming his stuff comes back, it makes sense to move him quickly as a reliever before something else happens to him, which would make his lack of a strong changeup and command less relevant. In that case, he could be a high-leverage arm.

Jose Albertos’ final spring training start was unremarkable. As usual, he looked like he was in control of two excellent secondary pitches much more than his mid-90s fastball. When the Low-A South Bend’s season began a few days later, Albertos had issues finding the strike zone and lasted just a single inning. The problem snowballed, and his’ control unravelled throughout the course of the year. He walked 32 hitters in 13.2 innings at South Bend, then was sent back to extended spring training for a month before he was reassigned to short-season Eugene, where he walked 33 in 17.2 innings, at times throwing fastballs in the mid-80s just to try to throw a strike. This happens to athletes in various sports from time to time, but not often enough for us to have developed refined ways of helping athletes deal with it, so we just don’t know if Albertos will bounce back. We do know he is very talented. He had three plus pitches at age 19. There was concern about his physical composition and release variability, though remedying one of those things might aid the other. If that were to happen, he could move quickly because his stuff is already in place. Hopefully, Albertos can flush 2018. He’s only 20 and has above-average starter stuff if he can compose his body and mind.

Mills epitomizes the pitchability righty. He has a below-average fastball but locates it well and can add and subtract from its sink and tail in ways that enable him to work like a power pitcher does. He works his sinker and changeup down and to his arm side or runs either of them back onto his glove side corner to set up a slider. Mills struggles to finish his curveball consistently, but the rest of his fairly generic repertoire plays just fine because his command is so good. He’s a big league ready backend starter.

Verdugo signed for $1 million out of Mexico in 2017. He can really pick it at shortstop and could be plus there at maturity. His hands, range, actions, footwork, and athleticism are all superlative, especially considering his age, and while he is physically projectable, he’s not so big-framed that he’s a threat to move off shortstop. Verdugo’s defensive ability was in place when he arrived for camp in the spring. By the start of the summer, he had already filled out a bit and started putting a serious charge into the baseball during BP and, occasionally, in games. That thump tapered off later in the year and Verdugo has some swing length issues that will likely make him strikeout prone, but it’s possible he was just tired in August and that there’s some pop here, too. It’s unlikely that he has a well-rounded, impact profile on offense, but he could be a plus glove at short who also runs into 15-plus bombs if that power develops.

Abbott was a draft spring popup guy as a junior and went in the second round. He struck out 100 more hitters as a junior than he did as a sophomore in just 28 more innings. His scouting report still lead with affection for his command rather than his improved stuff, but there was thought that the stuff might continue to blossom in pro ball. But it has plateaued and Abbott now projects as a low-variance fifth starter. Abbott’s fastball plays best when it’s moving most, which for him is when he’s locating it just off the plate to his arm side; it is hittable everywhere else, including up above the zone. He can locate there, but Abbott is limited in where he can attack with the fastball, which also makes it harder for him to set up his breaking balls. Those are either two separate pitches or one curveball that has pretty variable shape. The best of Abbott’s breakers are vertical curveballs that bite hard and have enough depth to miss bats beneath the zone; his changeup is okay, used often for first pitch strikes later in game.

Thompson split his first full pro season between Hi and Double-A and looks exactly as he did at Auburn. He throws a lot of strikes with an average four-pitch mix, and misses in places where he can’t get hurt when he’s not locating exactly. He’s going to have to pitch off of his two breaking balls very heavily because of his lack of velocity, but Thompson makes diverse use of his slider and curveball, both of which he can spot for strikes early in counts or use at a chase pitch. His ceiling is limited, but he is arguably ready to take a big league mound right now if the Cubs need a competent start.

Miller’s crafty application of pretty average stuff enabled him to strike out a batter per inning at Hi-A Myrtle Beach last season, albeit as a prospect of relatively advanced age. He can manipulate the shape of his fastball — which can cut, sink or ride — which, in Miller’s best starts, he had pinpoint control of. Both of his secondaries are viable big league offerings when they’re located, but Miller gets in trouble, especially with his changeup, when he misses within the strike zone. He has fifth starter traits. Double-A will be an excellent stress test for Miller’s command, which needs to max out if he’s to fit on a big league staff.

Giambrone’s athletic, contemporary, full-body swing makes efficient use of his little frame, and he’s able to tap into in-game pull power because of it. He can also play several different positions (2B, 3B, OF) at varying levels of skill, and he’s a solid-average runner. Fall League discussion surrounding Giambrone often focused on comparing him to David Bote, both because Bote crushed Fall League the year before and because Giambrone will literally be competing with Bote for a roster spot as an infield bench contributor. Giambrone is a better, more versatile defender, but Bote has more power.

Morel has visible on-field leadership qualities and was the vocal protagonist of an AZL club team that lost the league championship series to the Dodgers. He’s wiry and projectable but already strong, and he has present pull power that projects to plus. He also has plenty of arm for the left side of the infield and has seen time at short, but he almost certainly will move to third at some point, and there’s a non-zero chance he ends up in right field. Morel has some pitch recognition issues that lead to strikeouts. Those create uncertainty about his profile, but they’ll be more acceptable if he can stay on the dirt. He could be an athletic, power-hitting corner bat in the big leagues so long as he hits a little bit.

Cruz is a sinker/changeup prospect in a world where four seam/breaking ball prospects are increasingly desired, but it’s a good sinker and changeup to go along with advanced control. He’s not as physically projectable as most 19-year-olds, but Cruz should add a little bit of velocity simply through physical maturity, and his fastball’s movement profile pairs nicely with the change, which should allow both to thrive as he moves up. He profiles as a no. 4 or 5 starter.

Looking at his stuff without all the context that encompasses ‘mound presence,’ Mekkes is a three-pitch middle-relief prospect. His fastball typically sits in the low 90s and his slider is solid average, perhaps a tick above. But Mekkes is a gargantuan 6-foot-7, takes a large stride toward the plate, and releases the ball much closer to home than the average pitcher, creating a Doug Fister-like effect that allows his stuff to play up. He has a 1.16 career ERA in pro ball and has K’d more than a batter per inning. Like most XXL pitchers in their early 20s, Mekkes struggles with control, but hitters’ inability to adjust to his delivery in short stints has limited their overall ability to reach base. As a result, he has a 1.05 career WHIP despite an 12% career walk rate. It’s hard to say how this rare type of deception will play in the big leagues, assuming upper-level hitters are still flummoxed by it as Mekkes moves on. Jordan Walden was dominant for a half decade with a similar type of deception but he had much better stuff.

Hatch hasn’t developed the control typical of a starter, so while he does have a fairly deep repertoire, he projects in middle relief, where his fastball might tick up beyond where we have it projected.

Sierra has moved one level at a time since signing in 2015 for $2.5 million and finally left the womb of the complex and spent his summer in Eugene. He has plus power right now at age 20 but he struggles to get to it in games. This is a long-levered hitter whose necessary hitting development will likely take a while. He has the power to profile as an everyday right fielder if it does.

Like several Cubs prospects who were handed aggressive assignments for their age, Velazquez struggled at Low-A and was eventually demoted. He performed after being sent back down to Eugene (.250/.322/.458) but was still plagued by the plate discipline issues that were his undoing in the spring at South Bend. Velazquez has big power, and there’s ceiling here if he can hit, though he’ll need to be more selective if he’s going to. He’ll also have to develop on defense.

We assume Correa was hurt for much of 2018 (he threw just two AZL innings) but it’s unclear what ailed him. In 2017, he had some wild fluctuations in velocity (he was seen throwing anywhere between 93 and 100, but mostly sitting 94-98), which continued when he threw in 2018. Correa was 94-96 in the spring and then didn’t pitch until late in the summer when he was 92-93. If his arm strength bounces back, he’ll move up this list.

The Cubs didn’t sign Rodriguez until very late in the amateur signing calendar. He signed in early May of 2017 and barely pitched that year, only seeing consistent reps for the first time in 2018. Rodriguez is a wispy 6-foot-2. He was up to 92 in extended spring training but sat in the upper-80s in the DSL. He can spin a good breaking ball and his fastballs spins well relative to its velocity.

Franklin was only throwing in the low-80s as a high school junior, but his velocity spiked later in the year and he threw much harder the following year. He now sits in the low-90s. Franklin also has a sizable frame and can spin it. He signed for a well-over slot $540,000 as a 6th rounder. He’s a really high variance prospect because the velocity is fairly new and might keep coming.