Still Gotta Come Through Chicago
Prospect Rankings and Pat Bev
Good morning Chicagoans!
On today’s docket: the end of February in Chicago, the Bulls’ Pat Beverley signing, and a breakdown of the Cubs’ and Sox’ top prospects, some of which could make your summer a bit brighter!
If you’re reading this, you are officially five days away from escaping yet another Chicago February.
February is a knock-down-drag-out fight, and you’ve persevered through it. It’ll hit you hard on the first week, even harder on that post-Super Bowl Monday and spit in your face once or twice more before the calendar turns. But like most things, it, too, passes.
The best way to combat February blues, in my experience, is to treat it as a war. Or preparation for a war. For all intents and purposes, it is one.
That is why this month was a bit easier for me than previous Februarys in my life. It’s not just St. Patrick’s Day and the NCAA tournament on the other side, but also Creed 3, which has a release date of March 3.
I just secured my tickets. I was a bit worried that I was too late to the opening night party, but that worry converted to a bit of embarrassment when I had my pick of the litter for seats in the theatre as I went through the check-out process.
There’s not much I’m more committed to in life than the Rocky franchise. Rocky 4 taught me more about life than any parent or mentor could have. And I know this because my dad still foolishly thinks the original is better, proving he doesn’t know much at all. Rocky 4, while being generally superior, also blessed us with the greatest soundtrack in movie history.
And that’s where we get back to training. I’ve been exercising muscles and exorcising demons all month at the gym to that beautiful soundtrack, waiting for March to arrive.
While the incel to my right wearing the RUN FAST/LIFT HEAVY/GET FADED shirt is trying to be an amateur body builder and the moron to my left is just trying to sweat out his work day and enjoy a better life, I am actively training for the next Cold War against Russia as if it’s imminent.
I’m getting that extra pull up, that extra push up, that extra quarter mile on the stationary cardio machine just waiting for Biden to call for able-bodied young men to join America’s cause. Does the crowd understand? Is it East vs. West? Or man against man? is blaring through my headphones as that nerd Steve Jobs is alerting me that my headphone volume is at hazardous levels.
You’re at the gym gussying up the courage to ruin a girl’s day who just wants to work out without being harassed. I’m at the gym ready to ex-communicate my family and fly to Russia to train in a log cabin and take over the country.
Anyone who says that you don’t take a war to Russia in the winter hasn’t been to Chicago in February. I’d rather be fighting a war on foreign soil than be walking home with paper bags from the grocery story covered in sleet.
And that’s why, while you were waiting for the NBA All-Star Weekend’s East vs. West matchup, I was readying myself for another East vs. West matchup, one of the geopolitical variety.
If I had been Biden, on my way to Kyiv this past week, I would have been bumping that soundtrack on the AF1, and making my cabinet members cosplay as different characters from Sylvester Stallone’s Mona Lisa while I shadow boxed them.
Alright, just rubbed my face with some cold water. I don’t know what I just wrote but I’m going to leave it. Did I at least mention that I’m happy February in Chicago is coming to a close?
Before we get down to the brass tacks, we need to first discuss the Bulls’ signing of Chicago’s own, Patrick Beverley.
This is a SGCTC signing if I’ve ever seen one. Beverley, the pride of Marshall High School, is returning home. He’s been on a one-man hype tour since he signed the contract.
His game is a lot like mine, too.
He regularly refers to himself as “Mr. 94 feet,” which is an ode to his full-court defense. I, too, am “Mr. 94 feet” in recreation league basketball. The one qualifier is that I generally only earn that moniker after I badly miss a shot or make a turnover and am so pissed off that I start guarding some poor kid under the opposing team’s basket.
“I run through a wall for any team that I play for but it’s even more when it’s for the city you are from.”
“Woke up in the city. Dream come true. #kidfromChicago.”
“I'm going to be on Zach LaVine's ass, I'm going to give him all the energy he needs. Destroy people. Me and DeMar DeRozan, we're good. I got a popping 5 in Nikola Vucevic, I'm excited man. I'm really excited.”
These are just a few of the quotes from Beverley over the last week. And I appreciate the enthusiasm, I really do. My biggest gripe is not with the enthusiasm, but with the fact that I myself cannot match it.
I vied heavily for Beverley during his free agency period a few years back. He’s a good defender, a decent shooter, from Chicago and undoubtedly gives teams an edge — an edge these Bulls definitely do not have.
But it’s the wrong place, wrong time, as Nate Oats would say.
The Bulls are seven games below .500 and in 11th place in the Eastern Conference. If they were seven games over .500 and in 6th place, do you know how fired up I would be for these last 20+ games reading those above quotes?
But, the reality is that we’re not in that situation. The Bulls were disappointing before the trade deadline. Then they made no moves. Then they lost six games in a row.
It’s just hard for me to conjure that spirit right now.
The situation feels like when you’re meeting your buddies for a few beers after work on a Thursday to watch your alma mater play a meaningless in-conference basketball game, and one of your other buddies arrives at 8 p.m. with some cocaine asking where the party is off to next.
All you kind of want to do then is shake your head, pat that fellow on the shoulder and tell him to go home, that it’s not that kind of party right now. Nor will it be the next day, or the day after that, for that matter.
He may not have known what he was walking into, and nor does Beverley, seemingly.
A lot of Bulls fans think that Pat Beverley makes the Bulls better. He probably will, just based on two things: they don’t have a point guard, and he is one. And they don’t have a spiritual leader, and he is one.
Generally, the Bulls rolling out the basketball is enough for me to get going. I’m headed to the UC tomorrow, and I have to say I’m more excited for the Ranallis’ pie before the game than for the ball itself.
And because of that, I have placed a responsible wager on the Bulls to make the playoffs at +450. The Bulls have a lot to lose, namely a better chance at keeping their own pick in this year’s draft.
But the players have nothing to do but try to win the rest of the way. Pat Bev will help that, and it may be fun to watch. I’m hoping so, because what else do we have at the moment?
P.S. Zach LaVine also said that he was excited that the Bulls got Beverley, and that they hadn’t had a vocal team leader since Thad Young left. Shhhh. You’re telling on yourself, kid. You just got a $215 million contract.
The players have reported to Spring Training. That is, for some, an indicator that the winter is almost through. I assure you it is not.
Nevertheless, it is a sign that another sport is on the way. And if you’re in sports hell, keep going, because there’s something on the other end.
Yes, there is something on the other end. Whether it’s an exit from hell, or just an entrance into a deeper level of it, we do not yet know.
For starters, here is where each Chicago teams stand according to the various projection models ahead of 2023.
White Sox: PECOTA 78-84; ZiPS 74-88; DraftKings Over/Under Win Total 83.5 +100
Cubs: PECOTA: 77-85; ZiPS 78-84; DraftKings Over/Under Win Total 77.5 -110
There are a lot that go into these projections, and I’d say they are accounting a lot of the bad that has been baked into White Sox baseball over the past couple of years, and less the potential. And, to be fair, the Sox ceiling has always been based on What Ifs: what if every one of our players didn’t get hurt running to first base, what if we re-signed Rodon, what if our manager wasn’t an idiot. At least one of those will be fixed — for sure — this season.
If the Sox do come near the ZiPS or PECOTA projections, that would obviously be a massive disappointment. I tend to believe their win total will be closer to the DraftKings total, but after last season, I’m not willing to make a hard bet on anything.
Jose Abreu is a massive loss. For one, he was that spiritual leader for the Sox, if there ever was one. But, more importantly, he was by far the most consistent hitter over the last few years — in terms of both production and playing in the actual games. Then again, his absence will allow for a much better and more comfortable infield and outfield.
Unfortunately, much of the spring chatter out of White Sox camp has been over Mike Clevinger and his pending domestic abuse case. Like with most of these cases, I tend to believe that he is probably a pretty massive scum bag, but also understand there’s a lot of logistics going on behind the scenes that make this a pretty tough thing to deal with from the team side. With that said, I don’t think I’ll put forward some grandiose take on what the Sox should have done/ should be doing. As we’ve learned in pro sports time and again, being a piece of shit is not a disqualifier.
I wrote a pretty detailed breakdown of what I thought about the Cubs offseason the other week. That’s here.
Today, though, we’re going to delve into a rosier topic, and a familiar one in Chicago sports these days: the future. Specifically, the prospects in the Chicago teams’ organizations that could make a positive impact in the near-term future.
To do this, I went through the top prospect rankings from three sites: The Athletic, ESPN.com, and FanGraphs.
The great thing about being a decent team — which the Cubs and Sox are both projected to be, to some extent — and thinking about prospects simultaneously, is that one guy could make a difference. If you’re terrible, you’re betting on multiple guys being next up. If you are an already somewhat-established team, it’s much more exciting to peak around the corner.
And, the best part about prospect rankings is that they vary so much. It is very easy (and quite fun) to call a writer or site (that have seen way more of these players than you) a moron or bunch of morons if they leave out certain players or rank them lower than you believe they should have.
Let’s get into it.
Colson Montgomery, White Sox
Montgomery was only semi on my radar prior to this exercise. But outside of Pete Crow-Armstrong, he is by far the consensus best White Sox prospect. A shortstop who could eventually move to third, ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel wrote that “Montgomery will be knocking on the door of the big leagues at the end of 2023 with All-Star upside.”
Rankings: ESPN, 15; Athletic, 25; FanGraphs, 35
Bryan Ramos, White Sox
A third baseman/second baseman, Ramos slashed .275/.350/.471 in 99 games in Winston Salem last year. The Sox seem to have help on the way to fix some of their injury/ Leury Garcia problems.
Rankings: ESPN, 48; Athletic, N/A; FanGraphs, 60
Pete Crow-Armstrong, Cubs
Crow-Armstrong is by far the most exciting Cub prospect to follow from afar. Nearly every night last year, he was turning a double into a triple, making a diving catch in the outfield or hitting a bullet home run.
I would love to see him up in the majors this year. It’s even better that the Cubs got him for a half season of Javy Baez that didn’t yield the Mets a playoff run.
Rankings: ESPN, 26; Athletic, 26; FanGraphs, 14
Jordan Wicks, Cubs
Wicks is the left-hander from Kansas State that the Cubs took in the 2021 draft. He seems, to me at least, like a high-ceiling, lower-floor type of guy. ESPN did report, however, that his fastball notched up a bit last year — closer to 94 MPH.
Rankings: ESPN, 51; Athletic, N/A; FanGraphs, N/A
Kevin Alcantara, Cubs
Alcantara is a 6’6 outfielder and the prize of the Anthony Rizzo trade a few years back. He probably won’t be up this year, but the rankings love him. He appeared in all three lists, and much higher in The Athletic’s.
“In 2022, he moved to full-season ball at 19, hitting .273/.360/.451 for Myrtle Beach, historically a bad place for power hitters, finishing eighth in the Carolina League in slugging and 16th in OBP. (He hit .306/.368/.508 on the road, which would have led the league in slugging and put him 10th in OBP),” Keith Law wrote.
Rankings: ESPN, 79; Athletic, 29; FanGraphs, 73
Brennen Davis, Cubs
Before the Cubs moved on from all of their best players, Brennen Davis was the name you heard of the most. There was even talk of him coming up last year, but a bad injury knocked him off that course — and apparently off of some top prospects lists.
He had a very rough 2022 post-injury, but most lists outside of the ones we’re referencing here are still relatively high on him. He — at one point — was considered the Cubs next center fielder.
Rankings: ESPN, N/A, Athletic, 50; FanGraphs, N/A
Hayden Wesneski, Cubs
Wesneski has already pitched for the Cubs. And very well for the Cubs. In fact, he was one of the only reasons to watch late last season, posting a 2.18 ERA and sub-1 WHIP in six games pitched up in the big leagues. The Cubs got him in the Scott Effross trade at last year’s deadline.
Here’s what I wrote at the time: The Cubs traded a great reliever in Scott Effross to the Yankees for Hayden Wesneski, a 24-year old pitching prospect. Effross is not only good, he has five years left of team control, which left some people scratching their heads. But they also, in a vacuum, got four years younger. Furthermore, the Cubs have proven to be very good at identifying talent for their bullpen in the past few years. Wesneski has good numbers this year — mid 3s ERA and a WHIP hovering over 1 — but you have to watch him pitch, and strike people out, to really understand the Cubs’ intrigue. He’ll likely contribute soon, and bring a level of swing-and-miss prowess to the Cubs that they had notoriously lacked in recent years.
Rankings: ESPN, N/A; Athletic, N/A; FanGraphs, 88
Cristian Hernandez, Cubs
Hernandez is a 19-year-old shortstop who has barely any experience under his belt. Nonetheless, he has cracked the top 100 over at FanGraphs.
Rankings: ESPN, N/A; Athletic, N/A; FanGraphs, 100
There are obviously others that did not make this list. Others who could even contribute this year for the Cubs and the Sox.
For instance, Oscar Colas, who has Sox fans all hot and bothered and will likely be playing a lot of right field this year for the team. Colas slashed .314/ .371/ .524 in three different leagues last year. The Cubs’ Matt Mervis will also likely contribute this year at the big league level. He slashed .309/ .379/.606 last year, also with three different teams.
I don’t know about you, but that just got me a tad more excited for baseball season in Chicago.
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Love the Pat Bev move simply because what disgusted me about this team was a lack of caring by seemingly everybody but Caruso. No fire. No one trying to pump the team up when they start losing their 23 point lead. I think Pat Bev can do that. Plus, if they hadn't added him, I am not so sure I would have watched any more this year.
The Pat Bev/kid with cocaine analogy is perfect. I have been wayyy too optimistic and defensive about the Bulls all year. Watched every single game with the exception of one (due to my girlfriends cousins christmas party in the "suburbs"). After the 3 game losing streak, I took a couple off, only to watch the Bucks game where Giannis got hurt but still lost to cap off a 6 game skid.
'In AK we trust' is what the kids say. I understand the move I guess just for the sake of making a move and being able to say they tried to shake things up. But at this point I'd rather lay down and die and coast into the off season.
That is, unless they win tonight. Don't let the Bulls get hot and get the 10 seed!!!!!!!!!!!