For anyone else still stewing about how the story in ‘Game of Thrones’ has proceeded, here’s a really good take on how things COULD have gone and still gotten to the same place, while also making so much more sense. Obviously tons of spoilers in there for the whole show.
This will not only put a smile on your face this morning, but I suspect it will ring true, too:
I kinda feel like this year has more of a 2015 vibe, actually (all the comebacks, plenty of doubt about the team early on, etc.), but I’ll certainly take 2016. Feels like that year ended in a generally positive way.
Also, Willson Contreras debuted that year by doing this to the first big league pitch he saw:
It remains unbelievable that his debut was so hyped in 2016, even after all the other hyped debuts, *AND* that he totally deserved the hype, *AND* he walked to the plate with a smile and did that on the first pitch he saw. Willy, man. Love Willy.
Checking in on Ian Happ, who is still putting in the work at AAA Iowa:
"He's going to be a big-league player in Chicago for a long time." Why the #Cubs still have high hopes for Ian Happ and why they believe he may be turning the corner in the minors. https://t.co/pc3Ibb7vRy
The results aren’t so much the thing for Happ, who is hitting just .233/.364/.376 overall in the offense-happy PCL, but his strikeout rate continues to plummet. It’s just 12.6% in the last three weeks, which is kind of insane for a guy like Happ, but as we’ve discussed, it’s come at a price: his .106 ISO looks more like that of a glove-first shortstop in the big leagues than a power-hitting outfielder in the juiced-up PCL. It’s a process, and if the Cubs and Happ were serious about a really significant reinvention to get the most out of his ability, the power tends to come back *after* the changes to the swing and approach effectuate an improvement in contact. Sometimes long after.
The more and more Aramis Ademan succeeds at High-A this year – and is still so young! – the more you think the Cubs actually knew what they were doing last year when they sent him extremely aggressively to High-A last year and let him struggle badly:
He spent the majority of 2018 as the youngest hitter in the Carolina League, and he unsurprisingly struggled. He is still the 9th youngest regular in the CL this season (younger than Miguel Amaya). His 16.8 BB% currently ranks 5th, while his .189 ISO ranks 9th, and wRC+ ranks 8th
Ademan, 20, is a legit shortstop prospect, too, so the plus bat would make him a very serious prospect again. As it stands, he’s still probably a top five guy in the Cubs’ system, but he’ll have to put together a full year like this to get top 100 overall hype.
Very nice plaudit for breakout pitching prospect Tyson Miller:
Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here.
Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.
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