Post by Deleted on Jan 19, 2014 12:08:58 GMT -5
The Cubs are 9-17 coming in to Saturday's game with the Phillies at home, a one game improvement over the month of April, and for the first time in the history of HOFFBL, the Cubs are actually outpacing their fan expectations, and feel fairly confident that they will be able to do so going forward.
Lot's of news on the prospect front, so we'll start there. Top rated prospect Norm Cash got promoted to AAA after just demolishing pitching at AA Des Moines to the tune of a 1.10 OPS and 11 HR's in only 121 AB's. Thus far he's struggled to adjust to the pitching at AAA, batting only .241 through 87 AB's, but he does already have 5 HR's. Also coming up from AA Des Moines were defensive minded 2B Earl Weaver, who had posted a .394 OBP, and left handed pitcher Jake Striker, who the Cubs acquired from the Indians in last year's Dee Fondy trade.
Bill Mazeroski really turned it around in May after a slow start in his 2nd look at A ball pitching and received a promotion today to AA. He had posted a .276/.365 slash line with 4 homers and 7 steals. Also coming up to AA was nearly the entire 1955 draft class. Paul Toth, Gary Bell, Jim Proctor and John Goetz all were advanced arms coming in to the draft and all were expected to move quickly through the system. OF Ellis Burton and Roger Marquis also moved up.
May rookie of the month:Bob Hazle wins for the second consecutive month. After posting a .283/.356/.752 slash line in April he posts a .283/.361/.757 slash line in May. Talk about consistent! He also hit his first major league HR off of Pittsburgh's Tom Brewer on May 14th. GM Matt Andersen is continuing to have more and more confidence in Hazle and the high OBP has Hazle now moving up to the 2nd spot in the batting order.
Comings and Goings:Leaving is 1B/OF-Joe Collins to Washington for a 3rd round draft choice in next year's draft. The Cubs are clearly trying to clear space for the wave of young OF's coming through the system. Andersen said "Look, Joe was really hitting the ball well this year, and overall has done a nice job for us since coming over from the Yankees. But we knew we were going to need to clear space for Altman, Cash and some of our other youngsters before next year. Joe's a professional and he's still talented enough to be playing every day, which just wouldn't happen here next year. We figured we'd need to make a move early while there were still teams contending with the Yankees and Dodgers, and that's what we did. We reached out to not only the Senators, but also the White Sox and Phillies. We really did take the first offer we had, and we may have been able to get a little more, but we weren't going to wait around for the Yankees and Dodgers to pull away from these other teams, so we jumped. We'll get a decent youngster in the end. We've had good success grabbing 3rd and 4rth round guys who have panned out for us, so we'll hope to do that again".
Coming up is Cubs stud reliever Jim Brosnan, who had absolutely destroyed AAA hitting and who Cubs fans had been clamoring for since his dominant Spring Training performance and reliever Corky Valentine. Valentine is an interesting case. The Cubs had acquired him from the Reds a few years ago thinking he had potential to be a middle of the rotation arm. After failing to stick in his first major league look, and then continuing to struggle as a starter at AAA, the Cubs this year decided to try him in the bullpen and he has thrived. In 26 innings as a reliever he had only given up 19 hits, striking out 16 while walking only 5. They will be replacing Turk Lown and Earl Harrist, who had back to AAA.
Finally..............Ernie Banks looks like he's finally starting to live up to the hype. He had a huge May batting .396 with 7 HR's putting him in the player of the month conversation. Bill Serena had a nice bounceback May after being demoted to the 8 spot in the lineup, batting .307 with 3 HR's. He's still struggling with right handed pitching, but Andersen moved him back up to the 6th spot in the lineup. Johnny Groth and Randy Jackson both keep rolling right along with their hot starts. Jackson now has the batting average up to .300 with 5 HR's in this, his walk year, while Groth is at .304 with 6 homers and an .835 OPS. Andersen recently moved him to the 3rd spot in the linup with Jackson leading off. The Cubs are going to face a real dilema with Jackson if he keeps this up. He's never played to this level of production before and now he's at the end of his contract. Cubs are going to have a decision to make. There's a dearth of good 3B in the league, the Cubs really don't have anyone coming up to take his place. Billy Gardner and Rudy Regalado are both playing well this year, but at the end of the day the Cubs project both as more UT type guys. Another player they may have a decision on is 1B Dick Kryhoski who they pulled off the garbage heap of unsigned free agents. All he's done is hit since given a chance last year with the Browns, and now he's hitting again. He's only keeping the position warm for Norm Cash, but he may allow the Cubs to start Cash in AAA next year to get a little more seasoning. Kryhoski is only 30 years old and one has to wonder if maybe he's starting to make other GM's take notice as to whether it's possible that at 30 years old he's made himself in to a starting level 1B.
Don't look for a lot more rookie call-ups this year. The Cubs have put LRP Charlie Rabe in to a more prominant role in the AAA bullpen and one has to think they'd still like to get a look at him, possibly after the break, but it seems as if George Altman will spend the entire year in AAA, and Stanka's injury will keep him at AAA all year as well. Reports have his rehab going well and if everything goes well he should be back at AAA after the AS break.
Lot's of news on the prospect front, so we'll start there. Top rated prospect Norm Cash got promoted to AAA after just demolishing pitching at AA Des Moines to the tune of a 1.10 OPS and 11 HR's in only 121 AB's. Thus far he's struggled to adjust to the pitching at AAA, batting only .241 through 87 AB's, but he does already have 5 HR's. Also coming up from AA Des Moines were defensive minded 2B Earl Weaver, who had posted a .394 OBP, and left handed pitcher Jake Striker, who the Cubs acquired from the Indians in last year's Dee Fondy trade.
Bill Mazeroski really turned it around in May after a slow start in his 2nd look at A ball pitching and received a promotion today to AA. He had posted a .276/.365 slash line with 4 homers and 7 steals. Also coming up to AA was nearly the entire 1955 draft class. Paul Toth, Gary Bell, Jim Proctor and John Goetz all were advanced arms coming in to the draft and all were expected to move quickly through the system. OF Ellis Burton and Roger Marquis also moved up.
May rookie of the month:Bob Hazle wins for the second consecutive month. After posting a .283/.356/.752 slash line in April he posts a .283/.361/.757 slash line in May. Talk about consistent! He also hit his first major league HR off of Pittsburgh's Tom Brewer on May 14th. GM Matt Andersen is continuing to have more and more confidence in Hazle and the high OBP has Hazle now moving up to the 2nd spot in the batting order.
Comings and Goings:Leaving is 1B/OF-Joe Collins to Washington for a 3rd round draft choice in next year's draft. The Cubs are clearly trying to clear space for the wave of young OF's coming through the system. Andersen said "Look, Joe was really hitting the ball well this year, and overall has done a nice job for us since coming over from the Yankees. But we knew we were going to need to clear space for Altman, Cash and some of our other youngsters before next year. Joe's a professional and he's still talented enough to be playing every day, which just wouldn't happen here next year. We figured we'd need to make a move early while there were still teams contending with the Yankees and Dodgers, and that's what we did. We reached out to not only the Senators, but also the White Sox and Phillies. We really did take the first offer we had, and we may have been able to get a little more, but we weren't going to wait around for the Yankees and Dodgers to pull away from these other teams, so we jumped. We'll get a decent youngster in the end. We've had good success grabbing 3rd and 4rth round guys who have panned out for us, so we'll hope to do that again".
Coming up is Cubs stud reliever Jim Brosnan, who had absolutely destroyed AAA hitting and who Cubs fans had been clamoring for since his dominant Spring Training performance and reliever Corky Valentine. Valentine is an interesting case. The Cubs had acquired him from the Reds a few years ago thinking he had potential to be a middle of the rotation arm. After failing to stick in his first major league look, and then continuing to struggle as a starter at AAA, the Cubs this year decided to try him in the bullpen and he has thrived. In 26 innings as a reliever he had only given up 19 hits, striking out 16 while walking only 5. They will be replacing Turk Lown and Earl Harrist, who had back to AAA.
Finally..............Ernie Banks looks like he's finally starting to live up to the hype. He had a huge May batting .396 with 7 HR's putting him in the player of the month conversation. Bill Serena had a nice bounceback May after being demoted to the 8 spot in the lineup, batting .307 with 3 HR's. He's still struggling with right handed pitching, but Andersen moved him back up to the 6th spot in the lineup. Johnny Groth and Randy Jackson both keep rolling right along with their hot starts. Jackson now has the batting average up to .300 with 5 HR's in this, his walk year, while Groth is at .304 with 6 homers and an .835 OPS. Andersen recently moved him to the 3rd spot in the linup with Jackson leading off. The Cubs are going to face a real dilema with Jackson if he keeps this up. He's never played to this level of production before and now he's at the end of his contract. Cubs are going to have a decision to make. There's a dearth of good 3B in the league, the Cubs really don't have anyone coming up to take his place. Billy Gardner and Rudy Regalado are both playing well this year, but at the end of the day the Cubs project both as more UT type guys. Another player they may have a decision on is 1B Dick Kryhoski who they pulled off the garbage heap of unsigned free agents. All he's done is hit since given a chance last year with the Browns, and now he's hitting again. He's only keeping the position warm for Norm Cash, but he may allow the Cubs to start Cash in AAA next year to get a little more seasoning. Kryhoski is only 30 years old and one has to wonder if maybe he's starting to make other GM's take notice as to whether it's possible that at 30 years old he's made himself in to a starting level 1B.
Don't look for a lot more rookie call-ups this year. The Cubs have put LRP Charlie Rabe in to a more prominant role in the AAA bullpen and one has to think they'd still like to get a look at him, possibly after the break, but it seems as if George Altman will spend the entire year in AAA, and Stanka's injury will keep him at AAA all year as well. Reports have his rehab going well and if everything goes well he should be back at AAA after the AS break.
