NEWSLETTER
In his season-ending press conference today, Theo Epstein mentioned the start of Instructional League this month, the first organized baseball activities for minor leaguers who weren’t at the alternate site in South Bend.
In years past, instructional ball is reserved for the lowest-level prospects who are getting a jump on what they need to work on for the following season. Since most of them were either just drafted or signed, or played only a bit in short-season ball, it’s a way to work on their development in the offseason in a controlled way.
This year, you wondered if there would be more experienced prospects coming since this is their only shot for ball. But, from the look of the Cubs’ just-released roster (Baseball America), it’s still mostly the idea to work with the younger guys. The majority of the group is on the lower-level side of things. Indeed, at first glance, you can see a ton of top Cubs prospects absent, especially among the pitchers.
PITCHERS
Cory Abbott
Danis Correa
Brad Depperman
Manuel Espinoza
Richard Gallardo
Jose Miguel Gonzalez
Porter Hodge
Bryan Hudson
Gabriel Jaramillo
Scott Kobos
Ben Leeper
Luke Little
Joel Machado
Trevor Megill
Erling Moreno
Koen Moreno
Eduarniel Nunez
Bailey Reid
Peyton Remy
Cam Sanders
Tyler Schlaffer
Jerrick Suiter
CATCHERS
Pablo Aliendo
Cam Balego
Ethan Hearn
Ronnier Quintero
Bryce Windham
INFIELDERS
Ed Howard IV
Kevin Made
Matt Mervis
Christopher Morel
Rafael Morel
Fabian Pertuz
Alfonso Rivas
Chase Strumpf
Luis Vazquez
Luis Verdugo
Andy Weber
OUTFIELDERS
Edmond Americaan
Jordan Nwogu
Yonathan Perlaza
Yohendrick Pinango
Cole Roederer
Felix Stevens
Nelson Velazquez
Jacob Wetzel
Jared Young
Bryan will offer a more robust breakdown of the group soon, but immediately you notice pitching prospects like Ryan Jensen, Kohl Franklin, and Riley Thompson are surprisingly absent. Even some recently-drafted college arms like Ethan Roberts, Chris Clarke, and Michael McAvene aren’t listed. I can’t say whether that’s because those guys are experienced enough to have done the work in other ways, or whether there will be other players coming later (some tweets from Cubs prospects suggest there might be others not currently listed).
All of the Cubs’ 2020 draft picks are included except for second rounder Burl Carraway, who was pitching at the alternate site in South Bend.
On the positional side, there are quite a few very notable Cubs prospects, ranging from very young guys to lower-level college bats. The group includes Christopher Morel, who is joining Cory Abbott as the only prospects to be listed who were also at the alternate site. If I had to guess why them, I’d point out that both are Rule 5 eligible this offseason, so maybe the Cubs want more time to evaluate whatever it is they were working on this year before making a decision.
We are likely to have very limited information from Instructional League this year, as spectator access is about zero. There will be about 20 games played per organization, and I hope we at least get some general reports on who is looking like what. It’s been over a year since we’ve really heard much about some of these guys.
