Baseball Prospectus is out with its Top 11 prospect lists – presumably they do Top 11 to differentiate from everyone else – but for the Chicago Cubs, they’ve actually offered a Top 15 list.
Five-Star Prospects
1. Josh Vitters, 3B
2. Starlin Castro, SS
Four-Star Prospects
3. Hak-Ju Lee, SS
4. Brett Jackson, CF
Three-Star Prospects
5. Andrew Cashner, RHP
6. Jay Jackson, RHP
7. Chris Carpenter, RHP
8. Chris Archer, RHP
9. Kyler Burke, OF
10. Ryan Flaherty, INF
11. John Gaub, LHP
Four More:
12. Chris Huseby, RHP
13. Logan Watkins, INF
14. Dae-Eun Rhee, LHP
15. Darwin Barney, SS
The Chicago Cubs’ farm system, unlike the big league squad, was a huge success last year, so the emergence of several top prospects should be no surprise. Once again, the top six on the list are no surprise – some order of Vitters, Castro, Cashner, Jackson, Jackson, and Lee appear as the top six on virtually every prospect list you’ll see. The order changes up a bit, however, and this list sees Vitters stay on top over buoyant prospect Starlin Castro.
Interesting to see that the top four prospects on the list are all positional players. It wasn’t but a year ago that fans would decry the lack of positional prospects making a difference for the Chicago Cubs, and in fact, it remains a system lauded largely for its pitching depth. Thus, that four positional guys ended up on top of this list is both very complimentary and very exciting.