Things look worse than ever for this recently released former Cubs top prospect

When Chicago Cubs fans hear the name ' Eloy Jimenez', only one thing comes to mind: the infamous 2017 trade that sent Jimenez and Dylan Cease to the Chicago White Sox in exchange for left-hander Jose Quintana.

Quintana was solid, but unspectacular, during his time on the North Side and soon after, it looked like Cease and Jimenez would be at the center of a budding dynasty on the South Side. That's not how things played out, with the Sox' plan quickly unraveling, Cease getting traded to San Diego in 2024 and Jimenez heading to Baltimore.

Last winter, Jimenez signed a minor-league deal with the Tampa Bay Rays in hopes of getting his career back on track in his age-28 season. He never cracked the team's big-league roster, instead spending the last few months with their Triple-A affiliate in Durham, showcasing a troubling lack of power and production that culminated in the Rays cutting him loose this week.

Eloy Jimenez looks like a shell of what he was as a top Cubs prospect

Jimenez slashed .278/.335/.397 across 167 plate appearances with the Bulls. The average and OBP aren't terrible, but a sub-.400 slug from a guy who was once one of the most highly-touted power-hitting prospects in the game isn't going to cut it. It's been a staggering fall for the Dominican native since hitting his peak as a rookie back in 2018.

That season, Jimenez finished fourth in American League Rookie of the Year voting after blasting 31 home runs and driving in 79 runs for the White Sox. He followed it up by bringing home a Silver Slugger Award in the shortened 2020 campaign, posting a career-high .891 OPS in 55 games. Since then, he's appeared in more than 100 games only once and has just 24 home runs to his name since the start of the 2023 season.

Given his age, he'll probably land on his feet on a minor league deal somewhere, but his future is very much uncertain given his last of power in recent years. As for the Cubs, the Quintana deal has to be easier to look back on now than it was five years ago, with Jimenez a non-factor at the big-league level. Despite struggles this year, though, Cease still feels like the one that got away given his workhorse production and pair of top-5 Cy Young finishes in the last three years.