Different Paths of Prospects

There have been many prospects called up this year across the majors. Clubs are always shuffling their teams to give them the best chance to win, but prospects come up in many different ways.

The first and loudest way is the top-tier prospect coming up. In the majors this year, we have seen this a couple of times with Bryce Harper and Mike Trout. Cubs fans saw this when Starlin Castro was first called up. The two most hyped prospects in recent memory would have to be Bryce Harper and Stephen Strasburg. These two players had circuses following them from the moment they came up. This can be a really bad thing for young kids coming up. The kids are hyped because they have the talent, but when they have huge expectations it can be very hard for these players to develop in the majors.

The next way is the call up of the replacement player to the majors. This happened with Tony Campana this year when Marlon Byrd was traded. These players can all still have talent and they may have an easier time getting acclimated to the majors because there aren’t huge expectations placed on them. Tony Campana has been a great example of exactly this happening. This situation also arises when a major league player gets injures and placed on the DL.

The last one is the career minor leaguer getting a chance. This was seen a couple of years ago with Bobby Scales and it is now being seen with Bryan Lahair. This is the strangest situation of all because no one knows what to expect. Lahair came up and has been huge for the Cubs, but he just as easily could have failed. The difference between majors and minors is huge and players might not be able to make that adjustment their whole careers.

The Cubs are likely to call up Brett Jackson and Anthony Rizzo at some point this season and they will likely be hyped prospects, just not to the extent of Harper or Strasburg. There will be many other players called up that are just as important to the team, but they won’t get the attention. These players are intricate to the success of any team and should never be forgotten.