A few Chicago Cubs minor league items to touch on this afternoon …
Chicago Cubs outfield prospect Brennen Davis is officially back. Like, full on, rehab assignment is over, heading to Triple-A Iowa back:
Davis didn’t produce numbers during his rehab stints in the ACL and at South Bend, but rehab is rehab. The point was to make sure he was healthy and ready to face Triple-A pitching after his back surgery, so this is really when we say LET’S GO. Even if Davis doesn’t put up numbers in this final month of the season, I don’t think that’ll be reason to lose heart. This whole season has kind of become an unfortunate punt to 2023. But he can get in a lot of lost ABs right now, and set himself up for a good and productive offseason.
Speaking of guys returning today … Another news update on Miguel Amaya, who is going to be playing in the AFL this year: today, Amaya was activated off the 7-day IL for his dislocated left ring finger. Sweet. So he’s back with Double-A Tennessee, and hopefully getting in a few more weeks of action before the Arizona Fall League.
Tommy Birch writes about the guy who may well wind up the Cubs’ positional prospect of the year, Matt Mervis. It’s a fascinating read on how Mervis got to where he is, and, importantly, how so many have missed on him for so long:
I knew that Mervis had been viewed by many as more of a pitcher than a hitter, and I knew that he got precious little time at the plate in his days at Duke thanks to that and thanks to the pandemic. But what I didn’t realize is that he went through a swing change in the Cape *after* his junior season. That means the 16 games of RAKING he did in his brief, pandemic-shortened senior year at Duke was all anyone would have had to see of the guy he could be. No wonder he went undrafted in a five-round draft that year!
Anyway, Mervis wasn’t pursued only by the Cubs. As Birch reveals, the Yankees wanted him, too:
Because Mervis was underscouted and a late bloomer, (the Cubs) didn’t have much competition. One of the few that was really interested in him was the New York Yankees and vice-president/general manager Brian Cashman, who called Mervis to try to get him to sign with them.
When Swoope found out about the call, he convinced Kantrovitz to get Cubs manager David Ross to reach out to Mervis.
“He had a lot of attributes that reminded me of a lot of good hitters that I’ve seen and signed,” Swoope said.
Mervis signed with the Cubs and started proving people wrong.
The rest is history; er, well, it took a year of adjusting to his new world in 2021 (and some more tweaks to the swing) to get settled for 2022, when he’s obviously exploded. Much more in Birch’s piece on Mervis’s road to where he now.
One of the wildest stats in the entire farm system this year belongs to Mervis, who has done this despite flying up multiple levels and continuing to hit for loads of power:
Speaking of which, Matt Mervis stands alone in the power and contact department: