Cubs Minor League Wrap: June 19

The consistent ABs Lemahieu gets are at 2B.

Was he at least throwing well? Was he throwing hard?

I’m not too worried about his D. If he can hit we have a possible 3B, LF, or 1B. He’s got alot of potential obviously. His last ten games he’s hit .400 with a .387 OBP lol. He’s also got a .767 SLG with 7 XBH in 30 ABs. He’s only K’d 3 times but hasn’t walked once.

Graham Hicks- Was excited to see him for the first time, but very dissapointing results. A bean pole in stature at 6.5 170, I had heard that he might be a sleeper prospect. He ended up leaving the game early with a injury. I couldn’t tell what the injury was. The trainer came out early in the 3rd inning and they talked for a couple minutes. I didn’t see him pointing at anything and I didn’t notice him favoring anything. He stayed in the game, faced a couple more batters before calling the trainer back out and exiting. Blister maybe? I didn’t see any significant dropoff in stuff between the 1st and 3rd innings so he may have been trying to pitch through whatever the injury was the whole game. That said, the stuff he showed was not impressive. He topped out at about 87, and the off speed stuff all seem to just roll up to the plate on a tee. He also didn’t pitch like he was 6.5. I was seated behind home plate and I never got the sense that he was right on top of the hitter the way other tall pitchers can seem to appear. Also lacked any deception in his delivery, with a frame like his I expected to see a lot of knees and elbows, but instead he was very smooth in his motion. I’ll withhold any judgement on him because I don’t know the injury affected his entire outing.

Yohan Gonzalez – Non prospect. No plus stuff. Seen him a couple of times now, same impression each time.

Larry Suarez – A little intriguing. Sleeper MR prospect. He is old for the league and it is his second year with Peoria so you can’t get too excited, but he is a big guy (6.4 245) with a good fastball, and he featured it almost exclusively. 4 seamer sat 93-94 with late life. 2 seamer(89-90) had good late movement and none of the hitters could square it up and he induced a lot of groundballs. Even the hits he gave up were grounders. The changeup needs work. His arm action and speed was slightly off that of his fastball, and if I could tell when it was coming most of the time, I know the hitters could. Still, they never did much damage off it, so it must have had some decent movement. Only threw a couple of sliders in two innings of work, and I never got a good look at it, but the fact that he threw it so infrequently indicates that it may need work. He pitched in three different innings and was not as consistent in the third, so probably not much potential as a long man, especially since he Will need to work on those secondary pitches as he progresses.

Casey Harman – First time I’ve seen him, didn’t know anything about him, and now find myself wanting to see more. The only way to describe this lefty reliever is ‘short’. Short in stature (listed at 6.1, but I doubt it), takes a very short stride towards the plate and then short arms the ball at the hitter. He didn’t throw a single pitch above 85 and only hit that number twice, but his 2 seamer had very good downward movement and also good fade from right handed hitters. Great command and control in the game. I don’t think he threw a single pitch above the top of the knee caps. Everything was down, with downward movement, and hitters were literally pounding the ball into the dirt in front of home plate. Worked fast and just took it to the hitters. Hard to get too excited about a guy his age in Low-A and a guy who never got above the mid eighties on the gun, but with the unorthodox delivery and good movement and command, I’m willing to give him a chance. You can’t argue with the results so far either (0.37 ERA in 24.1 innings, only 12 H with a 27/4 SO/BB ratio). I think he could be a guy that might get a chance to skip Daytona and go straight to Tenn sometime soon.

Outside of Szczur, there is not another legitimate prospect among the other Peoria position players. They are a very small team and have very limited talent. I shudder to think how bad that team is going to be once they promote him, but they need to get Szczur off the team. I imagine he will be promoted after the all-star break this week and none too soon. The Chiefs are definitely a ‘low energy’ team, and I don’t want that kind of thing rubbing off on him. Micah Gibbs and Arismendy Alcantara are the only other guys on the team that will even see any significant time in Double-A.

Kyung-Min Na – Big disappointment. He received a decent bonus a few years ago, but I just don’t see any potential. Physically, he looks like he should be in high school, though he is maybe a little bigger than Tony Campana. And like Campana he is a slap hitter, but unlike him he isn’t very fast. Can’t be that kind of player without plus speed. I don’t see any future for him.

Richard Jones – Needs to be released. He is the only guy that is above average in size on the team, but his approach to the game is terrible. After a couple of bad offensive seasons, he is actually showing some decent power this year, but he is everything this organization doesn’t need. He is a hacker (57/8 SO/BB), an embarrasment defensively, and appears to do everything in slow motion and nonchalant. Lethargic would be too nice a word to describe him. Fans that give Aramis a hard time would have a field day with this guy. He is the type of player that this team needs to rid itself of at every level.

Gibbs – Not a fan. Part of the ‘low energy’contingent in Peoria. I actually liked him coming out of college, but it turns out he was a metal bat power guy. And speaking of bats, I didn’t notice it during his previous at bats, but during his last time up, the trademark on the bat was staring me right in the face at my seat behind home plate every time he swung. Please tell me that the guy understands how to hold a wood bat, he has been in the pros for a year now. He does have a couple of positives. His plate discipline is good, and he is smooth behind the plate. But there is no pop to his game. His throwing arm is average and offers little power at the plate. He does seem to generate a little more power from the right side of the plate and also has more of an uppercut from that side, but as a lefty the ball just doesn’t carry at all. He is a borderline prospect with a Koyie Hill type ceiling, so he is worth having around, but don’t get excited.

At this point, I wouldn’t be opposed to a Baker/Flaherty platoon situation, where Baker also gets some ABs against LHPs at 2B/1B/COF.

But I do agree that it didn’t make a ton of sense to promote him.