The MLB Draft wrapped this week, and now the process of unpacking the picks, signing the picks, assigning the picks, and generally transitioning our thoughts on these guys to “professional baseball player” begins. The signing deadline is July 25, and I see very few – if any – Cubs picks that I’d say obviously aren’t going to sign. When you take 17 college players and only 3 high schoolers, your chances of signing everyone go way up.
UPDATE: Just like that, top Cubs pick Matt Shaw has already signed. According to Keith Law, Shaw is getting the full slot value at pick 13, which is what it felt was increasingly likely as we saw the Cubs’ other picks (i.e., they didn’t seem to suggest the Cubs expected a big savings in the first round). Shaw was ranked around where he was picked in a deep draft, and having seen (below) that Nolan Schanuel was getting full slot at pick 11, this again seemed pretty likely. Great to have him already done and in the fold, though.
Back to the original notes …
Baseball America updated its top 100 after the draft, and it already slotted Cubs first round pick Matt Shaw into the top 100 at number 95. There are 10 draft picks ahead of him on the list – that’s a lot of just-drafted players to slot immediately into a top 100 list, but that tells you how deep and impactful BA saw this year’s draft crop. Getting a potential top 100 prospect at pick 13 – and not some huge over-slot guy who slid – is kinda nuts.
Sahadev Sharma wrote about some of the position prospects the Cubs took in the draft, with a mini scouting capsule on several of them. I found particularly interesting the sections on the team’s 7th and 9th rounders:
Yahil Melendez, SS, B You Academy (seventh round): Melendez is a long and lanky player who hits the ball harder than his frame would indicate. Some with the team see a comparison to prospect Ezequiel Pagan with the potential for a bit more pop. Melendez turns incredibly quickly, and the hope is that if he can convert that turn speed into bat speed, he’ll develop more power. How does that happen? With increased strength. If a player turns quickly but doesn’t have the strength to control that, it leads to a disrupted swing path, which can cause a hitter to get around the ball, have a long swing or just have the bat cut out of the zone too early. But with the right development, the Cubs hope they can harness this skill. As Melendez goes through their strength and conditioning and high-performance program, the Cubs see a twitchy athlete who has a chance to grow into his body and develop some in-game slug.
Jonathan Long, 1B, Long Beach State (ninth round): As teams get into the later rounds, they’re often just looking for a carrying tool to lean on. Long has one of the higher bat speeds in all of the draft. Essentially, he’s done what they will attempt to do with Melendez: convert turn speed into bat speed. Long is physical, strong and creates high-end exit velocities while not having the type of extreme strikeout rates one would expect to come with this type of big raw power.
The MLB Pipeline crew identified one pick for each organization that stood out to them for one reason or another. For the Cubs, it was third rounder Josh Rivera: “After batting .259 with 16 homers in his first three seasons at Florida, Rivera erupted to bat .348 with 19 bombs this year while helping the Gators reach the College World Series finals. He combines some pop, patience and flashes of solid speed with a chance to remain at shortstop. He comes with a relatively high floor with a good chance to be at least a useful utility type.”
Kiley McDaniel wrote up each team’s haul, and the word you see again and again for the Cubs is “power.” It was clearly a focus of their draft on the positional side. Among McDaniel’s thoughts:
While I preferred Jacob Gonzalez and Kyle Teel in my rankings, I liked the Cubs’ first-round pick of Matt Shaw (10). I think he’s very likely a big leaguer with a shot to play multiple positions in the infield and post above-average offensive numbers with plus makeup. They followed Shaw with a number of position players I liked, too.
Third-rounder Florida shortstop Josh Rivera (92) turned into the player many of us expected in high school as a 22-year-old senior, with low-end everyday potential. Fifth-rounder Davidson catcher Michael Carico (62) has been very productive and young for the class with a shot to hit for power at a premium position, he just hasn’t proven it at the highest level yet. Ninth-rounder Long Beach State 3B Johnny Long (138) has above-average raw power, some feel to hit and the ability to play all four corners.
A profile at The Athletic on Cubs second round pick Jaxon Wiggins, who did not pitch this year after offseason Tommy John surgery. It’s a significant risk and upside play, with the Cubs feeling confident on where Wiggins is in his rehab process (a good relationship with the Arkansas staff helps), and believing he could be a front-of-the-rotation type down the road. Bonus for the Cubs? They had some extra information on Wiggins’ makeup, conditioning, health, and rehab thanks to the fact that their new director of strength and conditioning and performance nutrition, Blaine Kinsley, just spent the last five years as the strength and conditioning coordinator for Arkansas baseball.
The Cubs will reportedly get 11th round outfielder Zyhir Hope to sign, rather than going to college (remember, that’s not always a lock with your round 11-20 picks, since they do not count against the bonus pool if you fail to sign them):
Cubs VP of Scouting Dan Kantrovitz on 16th rounder Daniel Brown from Campbell, who can touch 102 mph from the left side, but who more or less straight up could not throw strikes in college (Cubs.com): “He had a little difficulty finding the zone. But to be fair to him, he probably didn’t really get the chance that a guy with that kind of arm strength probably, in our estimation, deserved. And we want to give him that chance. To be able to touch triple digits from the left side, be able to spin the ball the way he does and just have the athleticism that he does, we’re excited to work with him.” Look, in the 16th round, if you can get ANYONE who can throw triple digits, why not take the chance on being able to help him throw strikes? I loved that pick at that spot in the draft.
20th rounder Drew Bowser from Stanford not only went to the same high school as Pete Crow-Armstrong, they were teammates, playing at Harvard-Westlake at the same time. That’s fun. Bowser has tremendous power and was a legit prospect coming out of high school, but there’s a reason he lasted to the 20th round – there are questions about whether his swing plays against pro pitching. So, if he signs rather than going back to school for his senior season to try to improve his stock, there is likely to be a lot of work to be done. Pretty fun to think about high school teammates climbing the ranks together, though.
Keith Law’s Cubs writeup is relatively high on Matt Shaw (his 7th overall prospect in the class), and sees the upside in Jaxon Wiggins if he gets healthy and can improve his strike-throwing. Interesting thoughts on 5th round catcher Michael Carico: “(M)issed a chunk of the year due to a broken hand, but the Davidson backstop mashed when he returned from the injury, showing more power than before and rarely whiffing. He hasn’t seen good velocity in college and struggled against it last summer. He can probably stay at catcher, and if he shows he can hit better pitching he can be at least a backup.”
Bit of a surprise that pick 11, first base prospect Nolan Schanuel, is getting full slot from the Angels:
His college performance was out of this world, both the results and the underlying metrics. But Schanuel was seen as more of a second-half-of-the-first type pick, or an under-slot guy if taken earlier, because he may well be first-base-only, and wasn’t necessarily playing every week against tip-top college competition. I’m curious what it says about the draft, about the Angels, and/or about Schanuel, specifically, that he required full slot to sign at pick 11. We’d heard rumors about the Cubs liking him at 13, but at the time, that DEFINITELY struck me as an under-slot maneuver. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe Schanuel was much more highly-regarded than we thought.
Early thoughts on Matt Shaw’s path through the minors:
Optimistically, you’d love to see him end the season at High-A South Bend, and then have a chance to open the 2024 season at Double-A Tennessee. That’s aggressive, even for an experienced college bat. But Shaw is definitely a very advanced hitter, so you would LIKE to see him challenged.
Early signees – we don’t have any confirmations yet – will start to trickle in soon, and some guys (either just before or just after signing) will start showing up in Arizona:
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