Cubs Invite Matt Murton, Ryan Williams, Edgar Olmos To Spring Training

The Cubs recently invited 18 non-roster players to major-league spring-training camp.

Tuesday, they added three more.

Matt Murton, the former Cubs outfielder who's played the last six seasons in Japan, is in camp trying to win a reserve outfield spot. Most likely, if he stays in the organization, Murton will head to Triple-A Iowa and be an injury replacement player.

Ryan Williams was the Cubs' 10th-round pick out of East Carolina in 2014. He had a very good year in 2015 split between Low-A Daytona and Double-A Tennessee: a 14-3 W/L record with a 2.16 ERA, an Arrieta-like WHIP of 0.896, and only 18 walks in 141 innings. He's probably headed to Iowa, too, this year.

Edgar Olmos has been on and off the Cubs' 40-man roster several times this winter. He was claimed from the Mariners December 4. Six days later the Orioles claimed him from the Cubs, three days after that the Cubs claimed him back, and four days ago the Cubs designated him for assignment to make room for lefthander C.J. Riefenhauser.

Olmos cleared waivers and has been invited to camp. He's likely also headed to Iowa for the season.

For those interested, here are the uniform numbers they'll wear:

Murton: 21
Riefenhauser: 60
Olmos: 62
Williams: 87

The rest of the non-roster invitee list is in this post; this makes 21 non-roster players in camp, or 61 players overall. I've also added these players to the 2016 Cubs By The Numbers roster list posted a couple of weeks ago.