Cut season is here, with Spring Training rosters across baseball getting the red flag treatment.
The first cut, joking or not, usually is the deepest, as a number of players who were not going to be making the club anyway get sent out to minor league camp. For the Cubs today, it means 22 players are headed out:
Right-handed pitchers Cory Abbott, Tyson Miller and Kohl Stewart have been optioned to Triple-A Iowa. Right-handed pitcher Manuel RodrÃguez, catcher Miguel Amaya and infielder Christopher Morel have been optioned to Double-A Tennessee.
Sixteen non-roster invitees have been assigned to minor league camp: Right-handed pitchers James Bourque, Juan Gámez, Jake Jewell, Tommy Nance, Michael Rucker and Robert Stock; left-handed pitchers Brendon Little and Jerry Vasto; catchers Taylor Gushue and Tyler Payne; infielders Abiatal Avelino, Alfonso Rivas, Chase Strumpf, Andy Weber and Patrick Wisdom; outfielder Brennen Davis.
For the most part, you can ignore the terminologies there. Guys on the 40-man are termed “optioned” out, and the level to which they are optioned doesn’t necessarily mean that’s where they’ll start the season (though in this case, it’s where I’d place my bests for those six). “Reassigned” is for guys who weren’t on the 40-man roster, and again, it doesn’t really mean anything as far as which level of the minors they could start the season.
On the whole, no surprises in this first set of cuts. Taylor Gushue going out now means he’s behind P.J. Higgins and Jose Lobaton in back-up-back-up catcher duties, pending Austin Romine’s injury.
Each of Cory Abbott, Tyson Miller, and Kohl Stewart always figured to open the season as Triple-A starters, and weren’t good bets to make the Opening Day roster. Among others sent out, maybe only Robert Stock had a chance to make the team, but his early-spring struggles and a DFA (he cleared waivers) ended that possibility.
Minor league spring training doesn’t actually begin for another few weeks, so it’ll be interesting to see what actually happens with these guys. It could be that we notice very little difference – they’re still eligible to be brought “up” to play in Cactus League games – but it’s likely we’ll just see less of them.
51 players remain in camp, so there are 25 cuts to go …