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

Tunney Vision

This story is already so old and stupid I apologize for putting it up.
But Tom Tunney suggesting the Wrigley Field scroreboard be replaced with a jumbotron "as big as you want" is, well, I kinda drew Tunney's Vision here.
Really, I just care about making a better baseball team, and usually Chicago politics are just fun to watch.
But this thing gets under my skin.
Did you see "Django Unchained"?
If not, this'll go over your head so I apologize:
Tunney is an ouchebag.
The D is silent.

Now please go back to watching Phil's far more insightful post about Travis Wood!

ps: thanks for the suggestions, guys.

Comments

Don't know what happened on my first attempt, and Rob I couldn't find a "delete post" button.

"Cubs manager Dale Sveum confirmed Thursday that right-hander Michael Bowden will have a bullpen spot." also... "Cubs manager Dale Sveum said Thursday that Matt Garza (lat) is a week or so away from throwing off a mound."

Az Phil, Have you seen Vizcaino throw at all?

[ ]

In reply to by Hagsag

HAGSAG: I have not seen Arodys Vizcaino throw yet.

BTW, today is the first day that a player on an MLB 40-man roster can be placed on the 15-day Disabled List, and it's also the earliest date that a 15-day DL assignment can be backdated if the player is placed on the 15-day DL between today and the start of the MLB regular season. Players on the 15-day and 60-day DL cannot play in MLB Grapefruit League or Cactus League games, and if the DL assignment is backdated, the player cannot have played in an MLB Grapefruit League or Cactus League game during the backdated period, but the player can play in minor league Spring Training games.

It seems very likely that the Cubs will place Arodys Vizcaino, Scott Baker, Matt Garza, and Ian Stewart on the Disabled List prior to MLB Opening Day, and Vizcaino and Baker will either be placed on the 60-day DL directly or wlll be transferred to the 60-day DL from the 15-day DL (a player can be placed on the 60-day DL or transferred from the 15-day DL to the 60-day DL only if the club's 40-man roster is full) to make room on the 40-man roster for IF-OF Brent Lillibridge and whichever NRI pitcher gets the last slot in the bullpen (at this point, probably LHP Hisanori Takahashi).

If for some reason the Cubs don't want to place Baker on the 60-day DL (and I don't see why they wouldn't, since he is now back at "square one"), they could recall Junior Lake from his minor league Optional Assignment prior to Opening Day and place him on the 60-day DL (Lake has a stress fracture in his rib-cage and probably won't be ready to play until May), except Lake would both accrue MLB Service Time and be paid at the major league salary rate (rather than the minor league split salary) while he is on the Cubs MLB 60-day DL, so I doubt that the Cubs would want to do that unless they were really stuck for a 40-man roster slot. 

[ ]

In reply to by Rob G.

Can't say I've paid a ton of attention, the roster will change within a week of the season starting anyway..but is this right?

C: Castillo, Navarro

INF: Rizzo, Barney, Castro, Valbuena, Lillibridge, one bench spot open

OF: Soriano, DeJeus, Schierholtz, Hairston, Sappelt

SP: Samardzija, Jackson, Wood, Feldman, Villanueva

BP: Marmol, Fujikawa, Camp, Russell, Rondon, Bowden, one bullpen spot open

Still Competing for Bench: Clevenger, Gonzalez

Still Competing Bullpen: Wade, Takahashi, Dolis, Putnam

DL: Garza, Baker, Stewart, Vizcaino

[ ]

In reply to by jacos

speaking of...

the new LB

With word that the Bears have reached terms with D.J. Williams to fill one of those vacancies presents more questions. Cheaper and younger (30)? Yes. But Williams' best season was six years ago, and he's gone down a slippery slope since. There have been driving-while-impaired issues. Urine sample swapping issues. Is Williams the better choice than the stability of Urlacher and/or Roach, even if it required some financial juggling? Williams no doubt has something to prove after Denver decided he wasn't worth $6 million. Can he prove it positively? And how will he fit into a group that swore by Urlacher, and to a lesser extent, Roach?

hopefully him and Marshall room together on road trips...

[ ]

In reply to by Rob G.

Urlacher had something to prove, too. I haven't paid much attention to the Bears upper management structure since they switched McCaskeys, but that sure smelled like Ted Phillips still to me.

Today's lineup will be the starting 8 for opening day. DeJesus, Castro, Rizzo, Sori, Schierholtz, Castillo, Valbuena, Barney

Apologies if someone else has posted this link. If you did, I missed it. http://www.csnne.com/blog/red-sox-talk/lessons-boston-guide-theo-his-ne… I liked: "Forbidden fruit," Epstein says of free agency and he shrugs. "We just didn't have the patience to make it across the gap without giving into temptation . . . Free agency is where you get your worst return on investment. It's really that simple. The draft and the international market, that's where you get your best return, dollar for dollar. And free agency is the worst return on investment." Epstein shrugs again. "We knew that but we did it anyway. It was a negative lesson." There was a time where I really looked forward to the free agency period of the hot stove league, but today free agency mostly means bad signings. There will come a time, hopefully soon, where the Cubs will need to add a big time free agent to get them over the hump. But that free agent signing is almost certain to become an albatross at some point because of today's free agent system.

[ ]

In reply to by Old and Blue

He slaps "The Cubs Way" again and admits he's counting on some of that optimism in Chicago because he and Hoyer and Sveum and the rest will not take any short cuts. Last year, when they were going through the 101-loss season, they kept reminding each other to stay together and to remember that it's a long term plan.

that should go over well with some

 

cubs score 4 in the bottom 7th for a 1 run lead...give marmol the top 8th...alarming lack of control today...mid-season form...sigh. walk, hpb, ground out, ground out (play at home), passed ball scoring run, walk, ground out. marmol was throwing a ton of sliders today...most missing, even the ones swung at...lot of movement/action on them, though. tie game...6-6 going to middle 8th.

Recent comments

  • Arizona Phil (view)

    LHP Blake Weiman appears to have been the last cut from the AAA Iowa roster. He is with the Tennessee group at Minor League Camp.

     

  • crunch (view)

    bruce bochy is hobbling rather badly for a guy who's had 2 hip replacements.  his gait is extremely wonky taking the lineup card to the ump.

  • 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.