Matt Shaw, your table is ready.
Chicago Cubs 2024
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Paredes’ numbers with Cubs were actually pretty similar to his numbers with TB last year except in one area — extra base hits. With TB he had 19 doubles. 1 triple and 16 HRs. With Cubs in almost half as many AB, he had only 6 doubles and 3 HRs. He is a dead pull hitter and Trop is only 315 down LF line compared to 355 at Wrigley. He’s a career .230 hitter with his highest season average only .250. So if he’s not hitting HRs, his value goes well down.
I think it is reasonable to assume he should show better in coming year without having to deal with a mid season trade, but he’s very unlikely to reach his season high of 30 HRs playing half his games in Wrigley. Tops may be 20 and more likely closer to 15. Basically he’s a fairly competent 3B who allows Cubs to not have to rush a prospect. He can also play 1B and even a little 2B, which gives the Cubs some flexibility when a prospect does take his starting job.
Definitely not a long or even mid-term solution at 3B, but if he can field the position and improve his hitting some, he’s not a terrible stop gap. Rather see Cubs spend money/assets elsewhere to improve roster and hope a prospect can put him on bench sooner rather than later.
If Shaw proves he's ready I just hope the Cubs let him have a legit shot at winning the job. I suspect he would make a fair competition a hard decision.
I looked at his stats and was surprised that he was an all-star. I can't see it happening again.
He'll never break camp with the team because of free agency rules (see Kris Bryant) but could be up as early as May if Paredes soils the bed.
More Arizona Fall League news from Chris Clegg on a Cubs prospect. Depending on where they see Matt Shaw fitting, Long could end up being a trade chip for Cubs. But Shaw could play 2B with Long at 3Bin the future.
Jonathan Long, 3B, CHC, 22
Long blasted his fifth AFL home run on an opposite-field shot to right field in the bottom of the ninth. Unfortunately, the Mesa comeback train ended up just short as they dropped the game to Salt River 13-11. Long added a second hit on the night as well.
During the regular season, Long enjoyed a massive breakout in 2024 between High-A and Double-A, posting a .283/.391/.461 slash with 17 home runs and 21 doubles.
Putting up solid exit velocities, Long has shown the ability to get the ball in the air, with a 61 percent air percentage. The biggest flaw is that Long needs to pull the ball more. In Double-A, the pull rate was just 24.6 percent, something we would like to see improved. The 90th percentile exit velocity of 105 mph is above-average and he is capable of getting to home run power.
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If you’re not familiar with Long, here’s another blurb about him.
Believe it or not, Shaw wasn’t necessarily a no-brainer [for Cubs minor leaguer of the year] despite how incredible his season was.
On the positional side, Jonathon Long really could’ve given Shaw a run for his money. The 22-year-old corner infielder, taken eight rounds after Shaw last year, hit pretty well at High-A South Bend before EXPLODING after a midseason promotion to Double-A Tennessee: .340/.455/.528/189 wRC+. Shaw gets the edge from me for some of the counting stats and doing it a higher levels, but Long’s breakout at the plate should not be ignored.
Jonathan Long, 3B, CHC, 22
Long blasted his fifth AFL home run on an opposite-field shot to right field in the bottom of the ninth. Unfortunately, the Mesa comeback train ended up just short as they dropped the game to Salt River 13-11. Long added a second hit on the night as well.
During the regular season, Long enjoyed a massive breakout in 2024 between High-A and Double-A, posting a .283/.391/.461 slash with 17 home runs and 21 doubles.
Putting up solid exit velocities, Long has shown the ability to get the ball in the air, with a 61 percent air percentage. The biggest flaw is that Long needs to pull the ball more. In Double-A, the pull rate was just 24.6 percent, something we would like to see improved. The 90th percentile exit velocity of 105 mph is above-average and he is capable of getting to home run power.
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If you’re not familiar with Long, here’s another blurb about him.
Believe it or not, Shaw wasn’t necessarily a no-brainer [for Cubs minor leaguer of the year] despite how incredible his season was.
On the positional side, Jonathon Long really could’ve given Shaw a run for his money. The 22-year-old corner infielder, taken eight rounds after Shaw last year, hit pretty well at High-A South Bend before EXPLODING after a midseason promotion to Double-A Tennessee: .340/.455/.528/189 wRC+. Shaw gets the edge from me for some of the counting stats and doing it a higher levels, but Long’s breakout at the plate should not be ignored.
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“Free agent pitcher Kyle Hendricks has agreed to a one year, $2.5 million contract with the Los Angeles Angels, sources familiar with the situation told ESPN.”
A $14 million paycut; wow. So much for Jed's "intelligent spending"
Good for Kyle! I would do a crappy job for someone for $2,500,000. Maybe he will surprise us and do a good job. I'll be rooting for him.
Kris Bryant can blame himself for that awful upper cut swing of his.
Seemed like after that first home run derby things started getting worse.
Another Arizona Fall League update on Jonathan Long by Chris Clegg.
Jonathon Long, CI, CHC, 22
Long, one of the more impressive hitters in the AFL continued to stand out on Wednesday. Mesa collected a total of five hits, and two of them belonged to Long, who had a double and a triple. Both the double and triple were smoked line drives down the right field line. The double was an impressive swing on a pitch on the inner half.
Long now has 11 extra-base hits to pair with six home runs this fall with an impressive .338 average and a 1.087 OPS. The swing can get a bit long at times, but Long has made consistent contact all season. He looks like a player nearly ready for his MLB debut in the windy city.
Jonathon Long, CI, CHC, 22
Long, one of the more impressive hitters in the AFL continued to stand out on Wednesday. Mesa collected a total of five hits, and two of them belonged to Long, who had a double and a triple. Both the double and triple were smoked line drives down the right field line. The double was an impressive swing on a pitch on the inner half.
Long now has 11 extra-base hits to pair with six home runs this fall with an impressive .338 average and a 1.087 OPS. The swing can get a bit long at times, but Long has made consistent contact all season. He looks like a player nearly ready for his MLB debut in the windy city.
Over last 2 days, Cubs have DFA’ed Alzolay, Brennan Davis and Patrick Wisdom. Also made two minor deals, picking up middle pitcher Eli Morgan from Clev (for a minor leaguer) and backup catcher Matt Thaiss from LAA (cash considerations).
I like the Morgan pickup. Good use of a minor leaguer. Alfonsin Rosario (20) spent the whole year at A after being drafted in round 6 in 2023 out of high school. Has a little pop and speed, but also a lot of swing and miss to his game right now. If he makes it to majors, it won’t be for awhile.
I like the Morgan pickup. Good use of a minor leaguer. Alfonsin Rosario (20) spent the whole year at A after being drafted in round 6 in 2023 out of high school. Has a little pop and speed, but also a lot of swing and miss to his game right now. If he makes it to majors, it won’t be for awhile.
Hoyer is really gunning for an extension with those moves
Yeah, not exactly the big moves we’re hoping for, but all of them can’t be sexy. Thaiss is an OK backup and was cheap. I believe he’s average maybe a little higher as far as D.
Morgan is a nice pickup. He’s a very solid reliever, and Cubs really need some guts like this. Probably more a 6th or 7th inning guy, but he can be used in some high leverage situations when needed. He was third in reliever barrel% this past year at 2.5 percent. League average is about 7 percent.
I have a fair amount of Guardians fans in my life from my time in Akron and they uniformly have expressed envy of the Cubs with the addition of Morgan. Really hopeful for this bullpen addition.
Harold Reynolds’s seems to like the Matt Boyd signing. For what it is worth, I picked him up in my fantasy baseball league late in the season.
Until they get another bat or two, this will be the same 83-win team of the last two seasons
This seems like an awful lot of money for a guy who’ll be lucky to give them 180 innings over the course of the contract.
Kind of the going rate these days. Montas got 2 years, $34M from Mets I think and he’s pitched 150 innings over last two seasons. Boyd was much more effective than Montas this year.
I saw him pitch several times on TV during season and then he had a nice playoffs. He looked good every time I saw him. Started 8 games during season and averaged a shade under 5 innings a start with average pitch count of 84. And that was after coming back from surgery. Not likely to go deep into games, but I don’t think 25 starts and 130-150 innings next year is a huge stretch. We’ll see.
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