Since 2010 the Chicago Cubs haven’t used a whole lot of their first round draft capital on pitchers. But when they have, though, the front office has typically come up empty.
The 2010 draft class added Southern Arkansas University right-hander Hayden Simpson with the 16th overall pick. He would finish his minor league career two years later, sporting a hellacious 6.42 ERA. In 2012, the Cubbies snagged Pierce Johnson and Paul Blackburn as part of the supplemental first round. Johnson’s been mostly a well-paid league average replacement reliever and Blackburn, in spite of his All-Star appearance last year, owns a career 5.09 ERA at the big league level.
Southpaw Brendon Little, the 27th overall pick in 2017, was converted to a fulltime reliever four years later and has appeared in just one disastrous big league game. Three picks later Chicago selected LSU right-hander Alex Lange, who also was eventually converted into a fulltime – albeit solid – bullpen arm with the Tigers.
Four years ago the organization drafted Ryan Jensen with the 27th overall pick and handed him a $2 million deal. He’s now in his third stint in Double-A. In 2021 they – finally – added a potential quality starter in southpaw Jordan Wicks.
Needless to say, Chicago’s selection of Oklahoma flame-thrower Cade Horton with the seventh overall pick was a bit of surprise. Well, for a couple of reasons: #1 the franchise hadn’t drafted a pitcher that early since Mark Prior all the way back in 2001 (and before that it was Kerry Wood six years earlier), #2 Horton tossed just 53.2 innings during his collegiate career, and #3 that’s because he was recovering from Tommy John surgery.
Here’s what I wrote about Horton heading into the 2022 draft:
“The lack of a consistent third option and the recent Tommy John surgery are the only things keeping him away from being the first pitcher chosen in the 2022 draft. ELECTRIC.”
And he’s been ELECTRIC during his debut.
The former two-way star, who tallied nearly 170 trips to the plate during his only college season, has thrown just 25.0 innings thus far in his debut. But he’s managed to strikeout out 36 and surrender just eight free passes between the Carolina and Midwest Leagues. I scouted his most recent start, a rock solid 4-inning appearance against the Dayton Dragons on May 24th. And here’s what I saw:
| 05/24/23 | CS | SW | Foul | Ball | Contact | Total | % | CSW | Strike % | Velocity | Grade |
| FB | 7 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 27 | 50.00% | 40.74% | 81.48% | 96, 97, 98 | 70 |
| CB | 0; | 6 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 11 | 20.37% | 54.55% | 72.73% | 60 | |
| SL | 3 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 11 | 20.37% | 63.64% | 81.82% | | 70 |
| CH | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 1 | 5 | 9.26% | 0.00% | 20.00% | 50 |
The well-built 6-foot-1, 211-pound right-hander’s fastball is explosive. There’s noticeable hop at the end of the offering, often sitting in the 97-mph range. It was, simply, overpowering against the Dragons that day. His slider is on the short, short list for best breaking ball in all of the minor leagues. It’s almost unhittable. And he’s also showing a third plus pitch: a filthy 12-6, straight-over-the-top curveball that left-handers could do nothing but flail at. He also mixed in a very rare, very ordinarily mundane changeup that will like be scrapped within a year.
He’s more of a strike-thrower than command guy, but the repertoire is so overpowering that he doesn’t need to be precise. He just needs to find the zone, and he’s been doing that with surprising regularity this year.
There’s legitimate ace material here – as long as he can stay healthy. And the Cubs, who have limited him to 65 or fewer pitches in each of his seven starts are certainly taking the cautious approach.
