Cubs MLB Roster

Cubs Organizational Depth Chart
40-Man Roster Info

40 players are on the MLB RESERVE LIST (roster is full) 

28 players on MLB RESERVE LIST are ACTIVE, and twelve players are on OPTIONAL ASSIGNMENT to minors. 

Last updated 3-26-2024
 
* bats or throws left
# bats both

PITCHERS: 15
Yency Almonte
Adbert Alzolay 
Javier Assad
Jose Cuas
Kyle Hendricks
* Shota Imanaga
Caleb Kilian
Mark Leiter Jr
* Luke Little
Julian Merryweather
Hector Neris 
* Drew Smyly
* Justin Steele
Jameson Taillon
* Jordan Wicks

CATCHERS: 2
Miguel Amaya
Yan Gomes

INFIELDERS: 7
* Michael Busch 
Nico Hoerner
Nick Madrigal
* Miles Mastrobuoni
Christopher Morel
Dansby Swanson
Patrick Wisdom

OUTFIELDERS: 4
* Cody Bellinger 
Alexander Canario
# Ian Happ
Seiya Suzuki
* Mike Tauchman 

OPTIONED: 12 
Kevin Alcantara, OF 
Michael Arias, P 
Ben Brown, P 
Alexander Canario, OF 
Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF 
Brennen Davis, OF 
Porter Hodge, P 
* Matt Mervis, 1B 
Daniel Palencia, P 
Keegan Thompson, P 
Luis Vazquez, INF 
Hayden Wesneski, P 

 



 

Minor League Rosters
Rule 5 Draft 
Minor League Free-Agents

Cubs vs. Brewers Series Preview

Cubs (2-1; 1st in NL Central) vs. Brewers (1-2; 4th in NL Central) at Miller Park

Head-to-head Record
First meeting in 2009. Cubs won 9 of 16 games between the teams in 2008.


Pitching matchups
Friday, 3:05pm
Rich Harden (0-0) vs. Braden Looper (0-0)

Saturday, 6:05pm
Carlos Zambrano (1-0, 1.50) vs. David Bush (0-0, 18.00)

Sunday, 7:05pm
Ryan Dempster (0-0, 3.00) vs. Jeff Suppan (0-1, 13.50)


Hot

Cubs
Hard to say anyone is "hot" after just three games, but the big bats came out in Houston after a couple of lackluster games. Ryan Theriot (5/9, .556) and Aramis Ramirez (6/14, .429 with team-high 5 RBI) are off to good starts and hit safely in all three games in Houston. Kosuke Fukudome (4 hits Wednesday night), Mike Fontenot (5/13, .385), and Alfonso Soriano (5/15, .333, 2 HR) have also contributed. Zambrano had an outstanding, highly controlled start in the opener, yielding just one run in 6+ innings.

Brewers
Milwaukee opened on the road in San Francisco, where Mike Cameron went 4-for-7 with 6 BB and a homer. Ryan Braun, 4-for-12 including a pair of doubles, was the only other Brewer regular who did much hitting. Yovanni Gallardo, not pitching in this series, homered against Randy Johnson on Wednesday, the first time Johnson has ever been touched for a home run by an opposing pitcher.


Not So Hot

Cubs
Milton Bradley is hitless in 9 AB so far, though he has drawn a team-high 4 BB. Derrek Lee was 1-for-6 Wednesday night with 3 K's and is hitting just .154 (2-for-13).

Brewers
Against the Giants, Weeks,Fielder, Hart, Hardy, and Kendall went a combined 7-for-57 with 17 K's.


Other notes: The series opener matches the sometimes brilliant and generally brittle Harden against the former Cardinal, Looper, whose Brewer Spring Training debut was delayed until late March by a muscle pull; when he pitched, he didn't pitch well...In case you forgot, the last time the teams met was on the final weekend of the '08 season, when the Brewers took two of three from the Cubs to clinch the NL Wild Card...This series will mark the first matchup between the two teams since former, WGN extra guy in the radio booth, Cory Provus, left 'GN to start calling Brewers games. I thought Provus did a nice job in Chicago, but since he bailed out on us, he is officially dead to me.

 

Comments

Harden hitting 93-94 with regularity in the first. Should put some doubts to rest.

Just catching up on my pre-game notes from Len & Bob. Harden scheduled to throw between 90-95 pitches. Four pitches into the third inning, he has thrown 38 pitches.

[ ]

In reply to by big_lowitzki

Why? What happened? I only saw the small highlight on gameday (blocked out for Brewers games in Wisconsin). Looked like he went deep in the hole, fielded cleanly, and threw home right away. Better throw would have got him. I'm just getting worried about Gregg, so far his outings have looked like this: Game 1: Single, Single, Sac Fly, Flyout, Groundout Game 2: Flyout, Intentional Walk, Walk-off RBI Single Game 4: K, Groundout, Walk, Double, Wild Pitch, Walk, Walk-off RBI fielder's choice.

[ ]

In reply to by WISCGRAD

I don't agree with this line of thinking, but I'm guessing that Gathright came in for Fukudome instead of Soriano for two reasons: 1. Lou is more concerned about Soriano's ego than Fukudome's. 2. Lou was hoping for extra innings and didn't want to downgrade from Soriano's bat to Gathright's (the downgrade from Fukudome to Gathright being less noticeable). I could be completely wrong, but that's my guess.

[ ]

In reply to by big_lowitzki

We talked about this in parachat after it happened. I'm not 100% certain that they turn the double play, but they certainly have a much better shot at it than gunning down the run at the plate. I'd also rather lose trying to turn it on Braun than getting Weeks at the plate from that deep. The question I have is - why does he even try that when they're already at double play depth? You're at double play depth for a reason - turn it!

[ ]

In reply to by Wes

It always kinda bugged me that Dusty would be so stoic while losing. I liked it when Lou got pissed after Gregg lost control of that pitch to the scrub. I don't remember his name. If I was a pitcher I'd never walk a guy, and then, sure enough, Gregg served up a fat fastball to Weeks. He'll need to learn how to pitch for Lou pretty damn quick. Gregg coulda gotten a coupla calls from the ump, too. I didn't see much of the game but from what I saw the ump had a worse game than Gregg -- although he was right about Theriot's throw. Not even close.

Things that sucked about this game: -Theriot awful in the field. Drops a short fly to left after calling Soriano off to try and make a catch with his back to home plate and drops the ball, and throws home in the 9th on a double play ball that would have ended the inning tied. -Lou torching through the bullpen..but Cotts, Marshall, and Heilman all failed in their roles, not to mention Gregg who will not make anyone forget Kerry Wood by the early returns. -Did I mention Gregg looks like a crap closer? -We pull Marmol out of the game so Miles can pinch hit with one out and runners on the corners, only so he can hit into a DP? If you are not going to squeeze, why the hell isn't Hoffpair hitting? This is the second time this season Miles pinch hit ahead of Hoffpair...what is the point of that? I thought Hoff was your new pinch hit guy and he is 1 for 2 in that role???!! There is no way I should be this frustrated this early in the season...help me out here.

[ ]

In reply to by Pat Kane

Agreed on all points. What is bothering me is that this team will clearly win a lot of games and likely make the postseason. But so far they look like the same old Cubs in close games. The 9th in game one was way too exciting, game two was lost in extras, game 4 lost in the 9th. They need to develop that killer instinct or attain that level of confidence that championship teams have. Right now, they don't have it, but it's early.

[ ]

In reply to by Pat Kane

K hill actually took some nice cuts in Spring training while I was there. I thought I noticed it last year, too. Not sure where the bad rap comes from. Maybe he has lousy stats -- I haven't checked. But catchers can come on late as hitters -- witness one Hank White, who has definitely improved over the last two years. They're students of the game and ...blah blah

[ ]

In reply to by WISCGRAD

If you're right about that and they make the post season, I'd worry more about D Lee than some of the other stuff, which will work itself out overall. It's true that they didn't have a killer instinct but Bradley may help with that if he doesn't implode into a gelatinous pile of broken tendons. D Lee got under a pitch really bad today that he would have driven out of the park on a line drive during his one good year with us. Small sample size, but a trend worth watching. I hope Lou starts easing Hoffpower into more at bats at 1B if that continues, and takes the same attitude with Lee as he has with Kfuk. Although I don't know what our infielders will do if that happens. I guess they'll have to aim at the first baseman's mitt. Which will be really weird for them.

There is some good news today: A 22-year-old man was charged with three murder counts and drunken driving Friday in the crash that killed Los Angeles Angels rookie pitcher Nick Adenhart and two others. I enjoy a nip or three, but I NEVER drive. Which is why I'm old (being a Cubs fan for all these years is why I'm blue).

Recent comments

  • crunch (view)

    yeah, for me this isn't about who's better at 3rd.  it's madrigal, period.  for me it's about who's not hitting in the lineup because madrigal is in the lineup.

    occasional play at 3rd for madrigal, okay.  going with the steele/ground-ball matchup...meh, but okay, whatever.

    seeing madrigal get significant starting time...no thanks.

  • Dolorous Jon Lester (view)

    Yeah I am very disappointed Madrigal is starting. He has no business as a starter. He is AAA insurance, a back up at best. Sure his defense looks fine because he plays far enough in that his noodle arm isn’t totally exposed. It comes at the cost of 3B range.

    He’s garbage, and a team serious about winning would NOT have him starting opening day.

  • crunch (view)

    in other news, it took 3 PA before a.rizzo got his 1st HBP of the season.

  • Eric S (view)

    With two home runs (so far) and 5 rbi today … clearly Nick Martini is the straw that stirs the Reds drink 😳

  • crunch (view)

    madrigal at 3rd...morel at DH.

    making room for madrigal or/and masterboney to get a significant amount of ABs is a misuse of the roster.  if it needed to get taken care of this offseason, they had tons of time to figure that out.

    morel played almost exclusively at 3rd in winter ball and they had him almost exclusively there all spring when he wasn't DH'ing.

    madrigal doing a good job with the glove for a bit over 2 chances per game...is that worth more than what he brings with the bat 4-5 PA a game?  it's 2024 and we got glenn beckert 2.0 manning 3rd base.

    this is a tauchman or cooper DH situation based on bat, alone.  cooper is 3/7 with a double off eovaldi if you want to play the most successful matchup.

    anyway, i hope this is a temporary thing, not business as usual for the rest of the season.  it will be telling if morel is not used at 3rd when an extreme fly ball pitcher like imanaga is on the mound.

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    There are two clear "logjams" in the Cubs minor league pipeline at the present time, namely AA outfielders (K. Alcantara, C. Franklin, Roederer, Pagan, Pinango, Beesley, and Nwogu) and Hi-A infielders (J. Rojas, P. Ramirez, Howard, R. Morel, Pertuz, R. Garcia, and Spence, although Morel has been getting a lot of reps in the outfield in addition to infield). So it is possible that you might see a trade involving one of the extra outfielders at AA and/or one of the extra infielders at Hi-A in the next few days. 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    18-year old SS Jefferson Rojas almost made the AA Tennessee Opening Day roster, and he is a legit shortstop, so I would expect him to be an MLB Top 100 prospect by mid-season. 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    Among the relievers in the system, I expect RHRP Hunter Bigge at AAA Iowa and RHRP Ty Johnson at South Bend to have breakout seasons on 2024, and among the starters I see LHP Drew Gray and RHP Will Sanders at South Bend and RHP Naz Mule at ACL Cubs as the guys who will make the biggest splash. Also, Jaxon Wiggins is throwing bullpen sides, so once he is ready for game action he could be making an impact at Myrtle Beach by June.

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    I expect OF Christian Franklin to have a breakout season at AA Tennessee in 2024. In another organization that doesn't have PCA, Caissie, K. Alcantara, and Canario in their system, C. Franklin would be a Top 10 prospect. 

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    The Reds trading Joe Boyle for Sam Moll at last year's MLB Trade Deadline was like the Phillies trading Ben Brown to the Cubs for David Robertson at the MLB TD in 2022.