Eight Cubs prospects make MLB Pipeline’s Top 100

No team has more Top 100 prospects than the Cubs.

MLB Pipeline, the official prospect arm of MLB dot com, updated their Top 100 prospects list at the end of the season. They have listed eight Cubs among the best minor league prospects in baseball.

Those eight prospects are:

22. Matt Shaw INF

34. Owen Caissie OF

42. Cade Horton RHP

44. Moises Ballesteros C/1B

55. James Triantos 2B/OF

67. Kevin Alcántara OF

73. Cam Smith 3B

100. Jefferson Rojas SS

The eight prospects are easily the most of any system in the Top 100. The Red Sox come in second with six—although three of Boston’s prospects are in the Top 10 so they’re not worried about falling behind.

As noted in this article, this is not a full re-rank of the prospects but rather a fine tuning. The top 15 were all fully re-ranked and unfortunately, the Cubs have no players in the Top 15. Then the top movers — up and down — were adjusted. Players who have exhausted their prospect eligibility were removed and replaced by others.

Shaw, who was named the MVP of the Southern League this year, was the Cubs’ first-round pick last year and has rocketed to the top of the Cubs prospect list. He finished the season in Triple-A Iowa and posted a line of .298/.395/.534 in 35 games there. He’s also demonstrated the ability to play three infield positions (2B/3B/SS) well, giving the Cubs a lot of flexibility as to where he can fit into a lineup.

Caissie, whom the Cubs acquired in the Yu Darvish trade, is a big slugging outfielder who hit .278/.375/.472 and 19 home runs in 127 games in Iowa this year. He strikes out a ton, but as you can see from his batting average and on-base numbers, Caissie does know how to get on base, both via a hit and a walk. Also, Caissie demonstrated what you like to see in a prospect in that he got much better in the second half of the season this year.

Horton ended up on MLB Pipeline’s list of biggest fallers because he missed most of the season with a subscapularis strain and pain in his throwing shoulder. But that he’s still ranked this high is a testament to Horton’s sky-high potential, even if he has a checkered injury history.

I believe Moises Ballesteros has the best hit tool of any Cubs prospect since Starlin Castro, and he’s got above-average power on that to boot. Ballesteros spent half the season in Tennessee and half in Iowa and did nothing but hit in both places. That’s a backhanded compliment — Ballesteros’ defense behind the plate is what kept him out of the majors. But Ballesteros is the best hitter in the Cubs system, hitting .281/.340/.454 with 10 home runs in 68 games in Iowa after his promotion. He’s also only 20 years old.

James Triantos hit .300 exactly between his time in Tennessee and Iowa and stole 47 bases in 56 attempts. The attempt to move him to third base failed, but he’s fine at second base and the Cubs are experimenting with him in center field and the results are promising so far.

No one has more potential in the Cubs system than Kevin Alcántara. Known as “The Jaguar,” Alcántara is big, lanky and fast. He’s also a surprisingly good defensive center fielder with a strong arm that could easily play in right field. Alcántara got off to a bad start in Tennessee this year, but he improved as the season went on and earned promotions to both Iowa and his late-season call-up to the majors. In 35 games in Iowa, Alcántara hit .292/.378/.469 with five home runs.

That the Cubs got the 73rd-ranked prospect with the 14th pick in the first round of this year’s draft is impressive, but so was Cam Smith’s first half-season in professional ball. Smith famously had a streak of six-straight games with a home run in Low-A Myrtle Beach. Like Shaw the year before, Smith blew threw three levels and finished the season with five games in Tennessee. His combined line was .313/.396/.609 with seven home runs in 32 games. Should Smith repeat this performance in Knoxville next season, he will rocket up to the upper echelons of prospects. Smith was already one of the biggest risers in this re-rank.

You might be less familiar with the final Cubs prospect in the Top 100, but Jefferson Rojas should not be overlooked. At only 19 years old, Rojas was one of the youngest players at High-A South Bend this year. His overall numbers don’t look that good—.245/.310/.336—but most players his age are still in rookie ball or finishing their freshman season in college. He makes a lot of contact and when his body starts to fill out, a lot more of that contact should go for singles, doubles and home runs.

As you can see, the Cubs system is quite deep at the moment. It will be interesting to see how the front office approaches it in the offseason, because clearly there isn’t enough room on the major league roster for all eight of them.