Welcome back to the Cubs Beat newsletter. Jordan Bastian has covered baseball for MLB.com since 2005, including the Cubs since the 2019 season. With Jordan off this week, MLB.com's Ben Weinrib filled in for this edition. |
Triple-A Iowa has perhaps the most loaded team in the Minors, at times featuring six Top 100 prospects and 11 players from the Cubs’ Top 30 list. However, the most productive player this year has a relatively unheralded background. After signing for $179,400 as a ninth-round pick in 2023, Jonathon Long has developed into one of the best hitters in Chicago's system and is on the brink of helping the big league team. Through 46 games this season, Long, the team’s No. 13 prospect, leads all Cubs Minor Leaguers in average (.355), slugging (.541), runs (30) and RBIs (37) while ranking second in on-base percentage (.420) and tied for fourth in homers (six). This kind of production isn’t totally surprising. In three years at Long Beach State, he finished four shy of the Dirtbags’ career home run mark after slashing .321/.408./548 across 135 games. Still, there are countless players who starred in college but weren’t able to translate that to higher levels of competition. “He's doing a lot of things that he did when he was a college player and even earlier in his Minor League career; it's just that he's continued to be able to do them through the higher Minors,” Cubs director of player development Jason Kanzler said. “He's been able to keep pace with and even outpace his level progressions, in terms of his development, and that's excellent to see." |
One key to Long’s success? He hits the ball extremely hard. He is second among all Triple-A hitters (with at least 100 batted balls) with a 58.9 percent hard-hit rate and third with a 93.4 mph average exit velocity. Among Major Leaguers, only the Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani and the Pirates' Oneil Cruz have a better hard-hit rate. While the 23-year-old isn't particularly tall at 5-foot-11, he has plenty of strength and bat speed to produce plus raw power from the right side. The California native flexed that power last season when he led the farm system with an .888 OPS and slugged 23 home runs between three levels. Long’s bat speed really emerged in the Arizona Fall League, where he hit multiple balls over 110 mph and ranked second on the circuit with six homers in 18 games. He’s only built on that loud contact in 2025. “This year he is putting up the best exit velocities of his career by a pretty substantial margin,” Kanzler said. “The second best was in [High-A] South Bend in the first half of the year last year. He is definitely impacting the baseball better than he ever has, including in college with metal bats. So this is a great thing to see.” |
Iowa’s loaded roster does mean heavy competition for earning a callup. The Cubs briefly promoted catcher Moisés Ballesteros (Cubs No. 4, MLB No. 61) in May and gave outfielder Kevin Alcántara (No. 5, MLB No. 74) a cup of coffee last September. They could also call upon outfielder Owen Caissie (No. 3, MLB No. 49) or infielder Ben Cowles (No. 22), both of whom are already on the 40-man roster -- or versatile James Triantos (No. 7). Adding Long to the 40-man would be a big decision, but it wouldn’t stop the Cubs from selecting his contract if the fit is right. Long’s bat -- amplified by his levelheaded approach -- will clearly carry his profile, but he’s working to make himself versatile on defense and more well-rounded overall. Most of his reps have come at first base, where the team sees him fitting best, although he continues to get reps at third base and left field. “He's been working really hard at it,” Kanzler said. “He's got some pretty specific things he's working on. He's embraced them. He's improving throughout this season on them. ... It's always good to have positional versatility and, just in a pinch, the ability to play more than just one position. Given how impressive his bat is, I think that only benefits him.” |
MLB MORNING LINEUP PODCAST |
|
|
The Cubs played at the notoriously hitter-friendly Great American Ball Park this past weekend. Which pitcher (min. five starts) has the lowest ERA with the North Siders at GABP?
A. Ryan Dempster
B. Kyle Hendricks
C. Jon Lester
D. Carlos Zambrano
|
|
|
• Pete Crow-Armstrong became the first Cubs player with a pair of six-RBI games in a calendar month since RBIs became official in 1920. Read more » • The Cubs' most pleasant surprise on the farm is a pitcher who was recently promoted to Double-A. Read more » • Here's how 40-year-old infielder Justin Turner has been key to the Cubs' success. Read more » • Cubs No. 2 prospect Cade Horton displayed his high ceiling in his third big league start. Read more » |
“I'm very pleased with this season. He's really young, he's highly touted. If we look at Christian as if he was a Draft-eligible college junior, which is the age he is right now, people would be talking about him in the first round.” -- Kanzler, on Cubs No. 11 prospect Cristian Hernandez, who is posting career-best hard-hit rates as a 21-year-old at High-A South Bend |
|
|
A. Ryan Dempster
Only eight Cubs pitchers have made at least five career starts at Great American Ball Park since its opening in 2003. Dempster ranks first with a 3.18 ERA, followed by Zambrano (3.31), Lester (3.39), Travis Wood (3.89), Kerry Wood (3.89), Jake Arrieta (4.70), Jeff Samardzija (5.40) and Kyle Hendricks (5.79). |
|
|
FORWARDED FROM A FRIEND? SUBSCRIBE NOW |
To subscribe to Cubs Beat, visit this page and mark "Cubs Beat" from our newsletter list. Make sure you're following the Cubs or that they're checked as your favorite team. |
|
|
|
