Chicago Cubs prospect Cam Smith is less than four months removed from playing in the College World Series. He spent only two seasons at Florida State, where his year-over-year improvements vaulted him into the first round of Major League Baseball’s 2024 Draft. At the age of 21, he already talks about his development in the same terms as the people who run the Cubs.
Smith framed it in a way that sounded like an answer from president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer or manager Craig Counsell. It’s the mantra of the established players who collectively went through a two-month slump and grew frustrated with the unpredictable hitting conditions this year on the North Side.
“Remember to be process-oriented as opposed to result-oriented,” Smith said during a visit to Wrigley Field on the last weekend of the season. “That’s one of the biggest challenges I’ve had thus far — not really looking at the results right after the game. Did I stick to my plan? Did I do my routine before the game? It’s just looking at small wins. That’s how you can kind of grade your day on if it’s a win or not. Not by, ‘Am I 4-for-4 or 0-for-4?’”
Balancing the present and the future is a constant challenge for any organization. The Cubs are at a moment when that tension is particularly acute. The front office is on the hot seat after four consecutive seasons without a playoff appearance. The manager is pushing for more changes and higher expectations. The roster is good for 83 wins and a scramble to stay in the race for the third wild card. The farm system is promising, which doesn’t guarantee that it will be overpowering.
If Cody Bellinger opts out of his contract, would the Cubs allocate more at-bats for Owen Caissie and spend more on their pitching staff? If Matt Shaw is almost ready, would it make sense to trade Gold Glove second baseman Nico Hoerner? Where does Moises Ballesteros fit in next year’s catching rotation? How aggressive does ownership want to be this winter? And how patient can the Cubs afford to be with their young talent?
All those questions can’t be answered in the middle of October, but the Cubs will be running through all kinds of scenarios. Smith was recently added to MLB.com’s rankings of the sport’s best prospects, giving the Cubs eight in the top 100. Besides Shaw (No. 22), Caissie (No. 34), Ballesteros (No. 44) and Smith (No. 73), the Cubs also landed pitching prospect Cade Horton (No. 42), Triple-A second baseman James Triantos (No. 55), September call-up Kevin Alcántara (No. 67) and A-ball shortstop Jefferson Rojas (No. 100) on the list.
“There’s really two currencies when you think about a front office,” Hoyer said during his end-of-season briefing with the Chicago media. “You’ve got financial flexibility, and you’ve got young players. Young players, in today’s game, are certainly the most valuable currency there is. We’re really healthy on both sides. When you look at our books long-term, they’re incredibly clean. We have really good contracts on the books. The players that are on deals played really well. We’ve graduated a lot of guys and we still have (eight) top-100 prospects.
“When it comes to trading young players, of course, those are things you have to consider. But it has to make sense for the long term. It’s making sure that we’re not doing it just for a short-term gain. Young players have upside. Young players stay healthier. The last thing we want to do is get away from building through young players.”
Hoyer pointed to the contributions from first baseman Michael Busch (2.8 WAR, per Baseball-Reference) and center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong (2.4 WAR) during their rookie seasons. Combined, those two players on minimum salaries produced at a rate worth nearly $40 million, according to the dollars metrics on FanGraphs, and they remain under club control for the rest of the decade.
“We don’t want to run away from that,” Hoyer said. “We’ll consider deals that do make sense organizationally. But I’m excited about our young players and think a lot of those guys are going to have a huge impact on the Cubs for a long time.”
Alcántara, a 6-foot-6 center fielder, may not have much of an opportunity to play that position at Wrigley Field since Crow-Armstrong already looks like a Gold Glove-caliber defender. There may be some overlap among Shaw, Triantos and Smith, particularly when the Cubs could have their infield set with Busch, Hoerner, Dansby Swanson and Isaac Paredes. There is also a cluster of intriguing young pitchers between Horton, Ben Brown, Jordan Wicks and Hayden Wesneski.
Then again, those pitchers spent too much time on the injured list this year to be counted on for the 2025 Opening Day rotation (and only Wesneski finished the season healthy and pitching in the majors). Setting aside the multiple players with no-trade clauses in their contracts, there can’t be any untouchables on a team that had the same 83-79 record the last two seasons under two different managers (Counsell and David Ross). Trading for Busch (last winter) and Paredes (at the deadline) showed that Hoyer’s group will pursue various types of deals.
“There’s a balance there, but we should never underestimate the value of depth,” Hoyer said. “It took a while to get there. When we made some of the trades at the end of ’21, we got some guys that were in the low minors. We’ve drafted guys and gotten to this place where our best prospects are either breaking into the big leagues or they’re in Triple A.
“That provides real depth. And a lot of that depth is off the 40-man roster, which is even more valuable. We’ll obviously think about all sorts of different opportunities, but that’s a really enviable position. With an injury or poor performance, the kind of guy that’s coming up to the roster is a top-100 prospect. I don’t want to lose sight of that.”
Players always talk about controlling what they can control. Prospects will still hear their names in trade rumors this winter. In a year-end awards column, The Athletic’s Keith Law recognized Smith in the category of “Best Pro Debut.” Smith hit seven home runs in 27 games at two A-ball affiliates and reached Double-A Tennessee, generating a 1.004 overall OPS. The Cubs have a strong track record with first-round college hitters who excelled in the Cape Cod League and a history of aggressively moving those players through the farm system and promoting them to the majors.
“This is a whole new world of baseball,” Smith said. “I can’t wait to keep going.”
(Top photo of Owen Caissie: Lily Smith / The Register / USA Today Network)
