One of the last major top-100 prospects lists has dropped today for the 2024 season, and it’s from FanGraphs. And I choose to believe it’s a really smart list, because it is not only loaded with Cubs prospects, but they are also pretty darn high up there.
18. Cade Horton, RHP
20. Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF
32. Matt Shaw, INF
33. Kevin Alcántara, OF
43. Jordan Wicks, LHP
65. Owen Caissie, OF
84. Michael Busch, INF
The full list is here, with scouting reports on all of the prospects.
Some notes and thoughts:
Horton over PCA. Wow. Both are ranked very high, so it’s not a slight to PCA, of course. But that’s some very real love for Horton, who is the fourth starting pitching prospect overall, behind Paul Skenes, Andrew Painter, and Jackson Jobe.
That’s now two rankings (together with Kiley McDaniel at ESPN) that have Jordan Wicks as a top-50 prospect in baseball, while the other lists broadly don’t even have him in the top-100. Interestingly, the write-up on Wicks from Longenhagen and Taruskin doesn’t have him this high because they see additional upside. Instead, they see him as an extremely good bet to stabilize as a solid number four starter in the big leagues. We rarely see that kind of profile ranked highly on prospect lists, but the thing is, if you knew for sure a guy was going to be a solid number four starter (about league-average overall, or maybe a tick better in a good rotation), that’s extremely valuable to have for those six years of team control. What are prospect lists if not an estimation of value? (Obviously we as Cubs fans hope there’s more upside there in Wicks, but I guess I just don’t want people to lose sight of the fact that a 170-inning, 95 ERA- starting pitcher at the league minimum is extremely valuable – like, top-50 prospect valuable.)
Although Shaw and Alcántara are separated by just one spot in the rankings, Shaw is actually the last 55 FV player on the list, and Alcántara is the first 50 FV. That indicates there’s a decent bit of distance there, which is fair – not as if I’m going to complain about someone having Alcántara in the top-35, regardless of FV!
It sounds like Busch dropping relative to rankings last year that had him closer to the 50 mark around baseball has more to do with his expected defensive home than his brief and completely explicable struggles in the big leagues last year. Everyone expects him to hit. But if he’s truly going to be just a first baseman going forward, then a lot of potential value as a passable (if below average) third baseman or second baseman is lost, from a prospecting perspective. Fair enough. It’s actually pretty difficult to be a consensus top-100 as a bat-only first baseman.
All in all, a very good showing for the Cubs, with seven prospects in the top-100. It’ll be interesting to see, when FanGraphs releases their full updates for each system, how many prospects the Cubs have that were also close to that top-100 cutoff. We’ve seen guys like James Triantos and Moises Ballesteros get some top-100-or-adjacent love, and I remain extremely high on Jefferson Rojas. Can’t forget about Ben Brown, either.
NEWSLETTER
