Here are the Lou Brock Fan Club top 25 hitting and top 25 pitching prospects for the Cubs entering the 2011 season. These tables follow closely the hitting- and pitching-prospect tables that we finalized at the close of the 2010 season, with the new tables reflecting several recent trades involving prospects. Like many, I suspect, [...]
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Posted 29 January 2011
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Also tagged: aaron kurcz, alberto cabrera, brandon guyer, brett jackson, chris carpenter, esmailin caridad, fernando perez, jay jackson, jeff stevens, jeffrey beliveau, john gaub, josh vitters, justin berg, kyle smit, marcos mateo, marquez smith, max ramirez, michael burgess, rafael dolis, robinson chirinos, scott maine, thomas diamond, trey mcnutt
You’re the Iowa Cubs. You’re in Albuquerque in game eight of a nine-game road trip, trying to make it home still clinging to a slight edge over the fast-closing Memphis Redbirds (Cardinals), who will meet you in Des Moines this weekend for a season-ending, division-clinching four-game set. Two of your starting pitchers, Coleman and Diamond, [...]
Like many fans, I have enjoyed the work of some (not all) Cub rookies this year, and look forward to September, when the Cubs will have nothing to lose by filling the dugout and also the daily lineup card with fresh faces. The top prospects may be otherwise engaged, however. Double-A Tennessee is a sure [...]
The Cubs would score runs in more innings, and thus do better in low-scoring games, if they had hitters who were better adapted to the top of the order. Obviously, Byrd is not a leadoff hitter, nor does Baker belong anywhere other than six through eight. Can either of them bunt, or hit and run, [...]
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Posted 20 April 2010
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Also tagged: bobby scales, brandon guyer, brett jackson, hak-ju lee, james adduci, jose valdez, josh vitters, kyler burke, logan watkins, matt camp, starlin castro, tony campana
Lou Piniella says his pitching coach won’t let him keep fewer than twelve pitchers on the 25-man active roster. That leaves thirteen position players, of whom ten, I would say, have already made the team. The ten includes two catchers (Soto, Hill), four infielders (Lee, Fontenot, Theriot, Ramirez) and four outfielders (Soriano, Byrd, Fukudome, Nady). [...]
I fancy myself a bit of a scout–a scout of the armchair, box-score persuasion, one who never set eyes on any of the players mentioned in this post unless they happened to be on WGN on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon in March. The results of my scouting are tabulated, weekly during the season, in [...]
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Posted 12 March 2010
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Also tagged: alex maestri, alfonso soriano, andrew cashner, aramis ramirez, blake parker, brandon guyer, brett jackson, carlos marmol, chris archer, chris carpenter, chris huseby, david cales, derrek lee, dexter fowler, dustin sasser, geovany soto, greg reinhard, hak-ju lee, james adduci, jay jackson, jeff beliveau, jeff stevens, jeffry antigua, john gaub, jose valdez, josh vitters, juan pierre, koyie hill, kyler burke, logan watkins, manolin de leon, marlon byrd, matt camp, micah hoffpauir, michael bourn, nyger morgan, ryan buchter, sam fuld, starlin castro, tony campana, tyler colvin, willie taveras, xavier nady
Word was out last week that nineteen Cubs not currently on the 40-man roster have been invited to spring training with the major-league team. Infielders: Barney, Camp, Castro, LaHair, Lalli, Scales, Vitters Outfielders: Jackson, Snyder Catchers: Chirinos, Clevenger, Robinson Pitchers: Cashner, Coleman, Diamond, Kennard, Mathes, Perkins, Russell Say hello to your 2010 Iowa Cubs!–with the [...]
The Cub team that I’m excited about is a couple years away, but 2010 is shaping up as a solid season, largely because Jim Hendry has been demonstrating the same patience and shrewdness in selecting players that new owner Tom Ricketts has applied to the choice of a spring-training site. Hendry corrected a few old [...]
The Rule 5 draft will take place next Thursday, December 10, on the last day of the winter meetings in Indianapolis. Arizona Phil has a list of Cub players eligible to be drafted–and lost to another team–that he maintains in the right margin of The Cub Reporter website. Of the names on that list, I [...]
Several Cubs have been performing well in the just-completed Arizona Fall League season and also in winter ball in Mexico and Venezuela. On the hitting side, I would single out Brad Snyder, Robinson Chirinos, Starlin Castro, Josh Vitters, Matt Camp and Andres Blanco. player team g ab r h 2b 3b hr rbi bb so [...]