It’s midseason, which means rankings are going to be updated around the prospecting sphere, and despite a hit-and-miss first half for the Cubs’ organization, they’ve got some jumpers in the new MLB Pipeline rankings.
52. Nico Hoerner, SS
76. Miguel Amaya, C
And my guess is that Adbert Alzolay is like number 101 or something, because he can’t possibly be far off.
It’s nice to see the Hoerner helium still flowing, despite his hit-by-pitch wrist injury. He hasn’t played in a good long while after his scorching start at AA, but he is expected to begin playing games in Arizona later this week. It will be very nice to see him back in action, even if there should be some patience if the power/hard contact takes a little while to come back.
As for Amaya, the 20-year-old excellent glove catcher is hitting just .208/.344/.350 on the season, but (1) it’s at High-A (great for his age and position), and (2) the league playing super pitcher-friendly, and his slash is actually 6% better than league average. My guess, based on his low BABIP and high groundball rate, is that Amaya is still working on generating hard contact against older pitching (and his body is still filling out).