Throughout the final decade, the Cubs went 4-for-4 with the school hitters they chose within the first spherical of the MLB Draft.
Kris Bryant and Kyle Schwarber helped finish a 108-year championship drought with their performances within the 2016 World Sequence. Ian Happ and Nico Hoerner already signed contract extensions that ought to maintain them in Chicago by means of a minimum of the 2026 season. If the Cubs are proper once more, Matt Shaw can be on a quick monitor to Wrigley Discipline.
With the No. 13 choose on Sunday evening, the Cubs guess on Shaw’s future, selecting a Maryland infielder who was named the Large Ten participant of the yr and the Cape Cod League MVP within the final 12 months.
Shaw, 21, posted a .341 batting common with 24 homers, 69 RBIs and a 1.142 OPS in 62 video games with the Terps this yr. That sturdy monitor file boosted Shaw, who was largely ignored whereas popping out of Worcester Academy in Massachusetts, the place his solely critical school presents have been from Maryland and Northeastern.
Rising up as a Red Sox fan in New England, Shaw modeled his sport after Dustin Pedroia, one other undersized infielder who received 4 Gold Gloves as a second baseman and retired with 1,805 profession hits. Shaw, a shortstop, is listed as 5-foot-11 and 185 kilos, but it surely’s uncertain that can turn into his long-term place.
The Cubs have a Gold Glove shortstop who’s within the first season of a seven-year, $177 million contract. Even earlier than Shaw joined a video convention with Chicago reporters, Dansby Swanson had already despatched him a congratulatory textual content message. So long as they’re wholesome, Hoerner is entrenched at second base as Swanson’s double-play accomplice for the foreseeable future.
“Truthfully, I haven’t considered that in any respect,” Shaw stated. “That’s one thing that basically doesn’t fear me in anyway. Not that I’m going to say I’m going to go play shortstop proper now with the Cubs. It’s to say, wherever I find yourself is wherever I find yourself. My purpose is to play within the huge leagues and be actually good there. So no matter occurs — no matter my path is to get there — I’m going to do one of the best I can to make that the proper path. I’m simply excited to have that chance.”
Matt Shaw posted a .341 batting common with 24 homers as shortstop for Maryland this season. (Gail Burton / Related Press)
Within the coming years, the Cubs will want much more offensive firepower to go from perhaps not a vendor on the commerce deadline to a legit World Sequence contender.
Shaw isn’t the sort of generational prospect the Cubs acquired after they drafted Bryant with the No. 2 choose within the 2013 draft. It is a vastly totally different baseball operations division than the one which enabled Hoerner to turn into the primary participant from the 2018 draft class to make his major-league debut. Each Schwarber and Happ have been demoted again to Triple-A Iowa after preliminary success within the majors. However traditionally this is a company that is aware of the way to establish school hitters on the prime of the draft and push them towards the following degree.
“I wished to be on a group that I believed would transfer me up and provides me the chance to sort of fail early and learn to get my footing by means of enjoying in opposition to actually good competitors,” Shaw stated. “I feel the Cubs will do job with that.”
Cubs vice chairman of scouting Dan Kantrovitz — who was employed as a part of a broader shakeup inside the group after the 2019 season — introduced new concepts and a distinct perspective from his time with the Cardinals and A’s. Over the past three drafts overseen by Kantrovitz, the Cubs used first-round picks on a highschool shortstop (Ed Howard) and two school pitchers (Jordan Wicks and Cade Horton). Shaw was really helpful by space scout Billy Swoope, who has spent many years protecting the Mid-Atlantic area for the Cubs.
“On this case, clearly the power of the draft was a college-position-heavy group,” Kantrovitz stated. “You don’t wish to simply go to the power of the draft if all these gamers are taken forward of you. However we had a reasonably good concept that there could be a minimum of one — with Matt included — in that group of faculty hitters that we actually valued extremely that could be accessible to us. Previously, there might need been a pitching-heavy draft, in order that’s sort of the place we leaned. It’s extra simply kind of enjoying the strengths of the draft versus having a method getting into that focused one demographic over one other.”
The slot worth of the No. 13 choose is $4.85 million. The Cubs have a bonus pool price roughly $9 million. With the compensation choose (No. 68) for Willson Contreras signing with the Cardinals, the Cubs chosen Arkansas pitcher Jaxon Wiggins, a 6-foot-6 right-hander who missed the 2023 season after present process Tommy John surgical procedure.
“It’s necessary to needless to say there’s nonetheless a signing course of that must be accomplished with him,” Kantrovitz stated. “It’s powerful to handicap what the percentages are, however Jaxon was any person coming into the yr that was projected to in all probability go pretty excessive. Sadly, he had his harm within the fall and we didn’t get an opportunity to see that. However we have been actually impressed with how he appeared previous to that within the fall after which how he appeared in Omaha the identical yr that Cade Horton was pitching (within the Faculty World Sequence). Jaxon has a mid-to-upper 90s energy fastball with good experience up within the zone. He’s bought an influence slider. One thing that basically stood out to our scouts was the event of his curveball. Speaking to our guys in pitching improvement, we expect there could be one thing untapped to discover there doubtlessly.”
(Prime picture of Matt Shaw operating the bases for Maryland in June: Ben McKeown / Related Press)
