aaron btw wut do u want to be GM cuz im goin in to HS and i want to be a GM preffrably cubs

Good insights on the minors, Nate, and on the Korean connections +, Aaron. Asian and Latin American players have been getting a lot of attention in recent years (Asia) and the for many years (Latin America). The Dominican Republic dominance has taken a hit with the disclosure that the PED's trainer there (Sosa et.al.) had a sizeable operation.

With the Boise Hawks and the AZ Cubs now playing for real, it's great to see some results for guys I saw and/or visited with at Fitch Park in March. I did say, "Welcome" to Hak-Ju Lee and he nodded and smiled. I think I posted in March that he is very thin in the upper body, and that he reminded me body-wise of Don Kessinger. Reports are that Lee could be as good or better. We can hope!

My wife and I sat one row behind the catchers Sosa and Cerda as we and 20 or so lower level players watched a AAA level game in progress. They are both at Boise, and the amazing thing is that both are smaller than Craig Biggio. Sosa stands 6' on his toes and is listed at 180. Cerda is only 5'9" and 165.

I know that Yogi was only 5'7" (can you believe it), but I'm guessing that Cerda may need another positon. Anyway, with the short-season teams underway, my minor league talent watch is now complete.

I wrote something about the second baseman on community blog, you should look at it.

Good to see that Lou has finally awoken from his nap and has started playing Jake Fox and Blanco, instead of the great Aaron Miles and Fontenot.

Now can we get him to sit down Soriano to get rest for his knee and put Hoffy or Reed in LF ?? Or better yet, let's put himn on DL once for all. The guy is now down to .224. That's pitiful.

And I really like Blanco. I know a lot of people on here have labeled him as a all-glove, no hit guy, BUT he was hitting over .300 at AAA before he was brought up. I don't think alot of people realize that. I'm not saying he's going to hit .300 with the Cubs, but he does have some skills. God knows, I'd rather see him than Miles. Duh.

Actually, I know this will never happen, but they would be better off in the long run moving Riot to 2B and putting Blanco at SS. That would shore up the middle of the field, where I believe we are below average.

Go Cubs

the cubs do have A LOT of korean players they are very good too i hope a few of them pan out

Neil,

I just have to commend you for doing a fantastic job with the recaps. I was out of town the last four days in the middle of nowhere, without internet service on my phone, and I was able to come back, and find out what happened through your recaps, and it was like I didn't miss anything, so I wanted to say I appreciate all you do.

Also, Nate, good job with the minor league recaps. I like the fact Colvin seems to be coming on. Hopefully he's turned the corner. I found an article that said the Cubs have only signed 18 of 50 picks. Have they signed more? I've been reading other teams signing nearly their entire draft classes, so this is disappointing.

I have read that the Cubs are the biggest threat to professional baseball in Korea. Apparently during a high school tournament, after the Cubs announced the signings of Jae Hoon-Ha, Ming, and Lee, they tore up the grandstand behind homeplate, so our scouts couldn't sit there, and blocked off the area directly behind the plate, allowing access only to Korean professional scouts.

Anyway, so maybe we haven't signed part of our draft, because we know we can get better talent abroad, and have a higher rate of success. It was also rumored that Ha, Lee, and Ming were the top 3 amateur players in the world at the time of their signings. I guess the way you can look at it is we nabbed 3 first round draft picks.

Before those guys, we also had Rhee, who had TJ surgery, along with Lee last year. He's a hard-thrower that was phenomenal at Peoria before going down. So, our 4 Koreans right there seem to be the real deal. Lee and Ha have already had good debuts in Peoria, and earlier in EXST...so it'll be interesting to see what happens. Apparently we signed another power hitting outfielder from Korea as well.

here's a few articles:

http://chicago.cubs.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090131&content_id=3789288&vkey=news_chc&fext=.jsp&c_id=chc

***talks about the new Korean players we have***

http://archives.chicagotribune.com/2009/mar/20/sports/chi-20-cubs-scout-chicagomar20

***talks about awesome job Steve Wilson has done over there...good read***

http://www.npbtracker.com/2009/03/cubs-sign-korean-amateur-outfielder/#content

***talks about the new outfielder the Cubs signed back in March (I don't know why I never heard of this before)***

http://www.cubscast.com/podcasts/cubscast503.mp3

***at about the 6 minute part of the podcast, it talks about this scout in Korea, and his thoughts on the outfielder the Cubs signed***

Aaron,

Thanks for the good job giving us overview operations of the Pacific

Rim operations.

You do an excellent job at research...oftentimes in areas few others

seem willing to do the research in....I really hope you do land that position in pro ball you are seeking.

Re: Wilson...I remmeber him as a not overly talented player...that had a lot of heart and warrior spirit....It was interesting getting a glimpse into a different life-style.

It also will be interesting following the Koreans and seeing who reaches

"the show" first.

Thanks Suzy for the kind words. I do hope I get something on the player development side. The sales side at least got my foot in the door in professional baseball, but with my boss recently being laid off, along with half our office, I most surely am next. I've made good contacts as a result, but there's no job security in sales...I realize it's the case with any job right now, but more so with sales.

Anyway...it was nice to see the Cubs rip off 4 in a row. I think the next few days will be telling whether or not they can keep this up. So far they've struggled on the road, so with games against the Braves, Tigers, and White Sox on the road....I just don't know what will happen. That being said, winning 3 games in a row in walk-off fashion certainly helped the team. I said it Thursday against the White Sox that it could be a turning point. Because unlike blow-out victories, like we've had at other times during the season, hard fought blow-out games take much more moxie to pull off than those games that we thought they'd turned the corner in before.

On Thursday, it looked like the Cubs were out of it, and they pulled it off late with Soriano taking it the other way (a rarity). On Friday, the Cubs came back, and scored a bunch of runs with two outs (which is a key sign to breaking out of any funk) and down huge...a 2nd straight comeback when down big (another good sign), then following that with another walk-off in extras after Patton blew it shows that they can overcome the mental aspect of being down...as they've showed all year they couldn't overcome that...so that's a good sign, then following up with a 6-2 win in a great game by Wells, shows they were able to hold a lead, which also helps prepare them mentally.

I think if you were to point out a few weaknesses, it might still be Fukudome in CF (though he had the 4-for-5 game, I'm not convinced at all that he's not the 2008 Fukudome), Soriano's bat recently (and glove), Bradley's lack of power, and Fontenot's regression.

I think if you were to look at the positives, it'd be Wells continued dominance, Lee's sudden power surge which equals out Soriano's power outage, and Soto's recent power, which equals out Bradley's power outage, along with Jake Fox...I think we have something to look forward to.

My only hope is that they can get Jake Fox in the everyday lineup, putting Mike Fontenot in his former reserve role that he excelled in, splitting time with Blanco at 2B, and Hoffpauir in LF for Soriano...I think we'll be a lot better off when ARAM returns, because both he and Soriano will be well rested for the stretch run. We can bring up a bat like Deeds, Scales, Colvin, or Fuld to replace Soriano while he's on the DL, having a more than capable Hoffpauir or Fox playing everyday in LF while he recovers. It makes so much more sense than continually running him out there when he's not even 50% right now.

Aaron, re sales, I was in sales, sales management and marketing for over 25 years....it is a "what have you done for me lately career"...just like baseball...but no guaranteed contracts....(which is what is wrong with baseball)...but that's another discussion...keep pounding and it'll happen.

Nate,

In addition to Hak Su Lee, on June 17th,

the Cubs signed 2 other Pacific Rim players...Su-Min Jung and Jae-Hoon Lee.

Can you tell us anything about them?

Thanks Suzy S.

Is Josh Vitters still hitting the crap out of the ball?

Nate S:

Thanks, good job.