Developed Teams 2011: Chicago Cubs

Because my post about the Red Sox's developed lineup was such a success (judged only by my own standards), I'll continue right away with their opponents in last weekend's interleague series: The Chicago Cubs.

To continue the tradition, let's look at the players developed by the Cubs who are still currently with the Cubs: for the record there are 11. Four of those 11 are starting pitchers - Zambrano, Wells, and Cashner were projected to start in the rotation, but the latter two have managed only one game apiece so far in 2011; the fourth, Coleman (listed as LR), has been making (rather poor) starts in their stead. Three more are relievers - current star closer (Marmol), returning former starter (Wood), and returning ever-solid setup man (Marshall).

For batters, they have former All-Star catcher Geovany Soto and future All-Star shortstop Starlin Castro. Outfielder Tyler Colvin is trying to bounce back from a puncture wound from a broken bat that ended his 2010 season. He hasn't done a good job of it so far, but I think he shows a lot of promise. The 11th player on this list, Kosuke Fukudome, brings up an issue that I could have addressed with Boston's Daisuke Matsuzaka and Hideki Okajima: players "developed" by a foreign country's baseball league. While it's not really proper to lump these foreign stars in with legitimate homegrown talent, I find it better than the alternative, which is to just leave them out of the project altogether.

As far as stars that Chicago let get away, the list is pretty thin. Casey McGehee has shown some offensive firepower, but he's got some world class lineup protection with Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder. Who knows if he has what it takes to anchor an offense all by himself. Corey Patterson and Ryan Theriot both have had careers alternating between acceptable and awful. And Eric Hinske isn't even a starter for his current team (Braves). The bench is a mish-mash of also-rans and defensive replacements.

Ricky Nolasco has blossomed into a pretty great starter, but their rotation could still be in trouble considering Sergio Mitre has moved exclusively to the bullpen following his trade to the Brewers. The rest of the relievers have been very effective, some of them very surprisingly (I'm looking at you Kyle Farnsworth, in his first season closing full-time, at age 35). Downs and Wuertz: for pitchers who can only manage 1 IP per game and don't rack up a lot of saves, I suppose they're about as good as you can get.

Honorable Mentions: Darwin Barney won the starting 2B job out of Spring Training, and his .315 avg would totally earn him a spot if we were going by 2011 stats alone. Sam Fuld wowed some peeps in the early days of the season with some timely hitting and a couple of great defensive plays, but he's slowed down a bit (all except for his 12 SB). Jeff Samardzija and Juan Cruz are threatening to put together very solid seasons in middle relief. And if Jamie Moyer comes out of retirement, I'm gonna have to find a spot for him on this roster somewhere...