It’s prospect day for Cubs fans here at BP, as our friends over at the main site dropped their final top 10 list for the defending top farm system of 2015. You should definitely check out Craig Goldstein and Chris Crawford’s outstanding write-up before reading this piece. In addition to individual assessments of the best prospects […]
Category: Articles
Prospect Day: 10 Takeaways From the Major Prospect Lists
Over at the main site, the BP prospect team released the Cubs’ Top 10 Prospect list today. This is, of course, cause for celebration. It also means that we can finally wrap up prospect season with a comparison of six of the most popular prospect lists: Keith Law’s at ESPN, Baseball America’s, John Sickles’s at minorleagueball.com, FanGraphs’s, MLB.com’s, […]
Pitch Counts, Innings Limits, and Jake Arrieta
Just a few weeks ago, the Cubs indicated that Jake Arrieta would have his first spring start delayed, in part out of a desire to place some limit on his workload this season. Arrieta has made it clear that he’s fine with this, and that he sees the value in some mindfulness about his workload in 2016. […]
Choosing and Developing Young Players: The Mental Side of the Game
In a piece for the main site last week, I mused about how a relatively new test used by the NFL might serve as a blueprint for psychological testing in baseball. Many teams already test prospects before drafting them, but each test is different, making the process as a whole a little bit all over the map. If Major […]
Harnessing the Power: Kris Bryant’s Next Level
In the summer of 1998, the baseball world was captivated by a steroid-assisted home run race, and six-year-old Kris Bryant was in his second season of serious training with his dad. A student at the Ted Williams school of hitting since age five, he was already swinging for the little league fences with the advice, “hit the ball […]
Cactus Catchup: Marching On
The march through March continues, as we draw ever closer to baseball games that count. That does not mean, however, that the games being played now are meaningless; quite the opposite, actually. Veterans and young players alike are playing for a chance to make the Opening Day roster, and the professional and financial implications of that […]
Let it Flow: The Psychology of Joe Maddon’s Cubs
“I think we’re too young to even realize what we just did,” Kris Bryant said last October after the Cubs clinched their spot in the NLCS. Instinctive and honest, the statement was emblematic of that 2015 team, which excelled in such an unselfconscious, fearless way. But that fearlessness wasn’t just a product of youth and talent; essential to the effort was […]
Competition in the Cubs’ Rotation? Maybe Not.
Now that we’re four games into spring training, it’s time for the worst and least-fruitful discussions to begin: the early looks at “position battles.” The Cubs’ main position battle is for the final two starter spots, which features incumbents Kyle Hendricks and Jason Hammel—who have the inside edge, to be honest—along with new Cub Adam Warren, […]
Cubs Have No Reason to Trade Soler
About a week ago, the 2016 Cubs seemed set. The offseason was over, spring training had begun, and apart from a few battles for the 24th or 25th spot on the roster, there wasn’t much left to be decided before Opening Day. Then, on Thursday afternoon, that all changed. Such is life with the qualifying offer. The signing […]
Cactus Catchup: Let the Games Begin
Welcome to the fourth edition of Cactus Catchup and the first since the start of “real” games. The Cubs opened their Cactus League play against the controversy-ridden Milwaukee Brewers on Thursday, a contest which resulted in a 2-1 loss. (Don’t worry about it; the Cubs definitely aren’t.) Joe Maddon’s strategy this year is to ease his players into the exhibition […]