Where Did These Guys Come From?

With the recent cuts from the roster, the minor league camp consists of 40 players. I thought it might be fun to take a look at where each of those guys came from. Did we draft them, trade for them, or sign them via free agency. For the sake of clarification, I will count any players non-drafted but signed by the Cubs as amateur free agents as drafted.

Catchers
Geovany Soto – Drafted in the 11th round of the 2001 draft
Koyie Hill – Signed as a free agent in 2006
Welington Castillo – Signed as an amateur free agent in 2004 out of the Dominican Republic
Max Ramirez – Claimed off waivers from the Red Sox in January of 2011

Infielders
Carlos Pena – Signed as a Free Agent in December of 2010
Jeff Baker – Acquired via trade from the Colorado Rockies in July 2009
Blake DeWitt – Acquired via trade from the Los Angeles Dodgers in July 2010
Starlin Castro – Signed as an amateur free agent in 2006 out of the Dominican Republic
Darwin Barney – Drafted in the 4th round of the 2007 draft
Aramis Ramirez – Acquired via trade from the Pittsburgh Pirates in July 2003
Matt Camp – Drafted in the 13th round of the 2006 draft
Scott Moore - Originally acquired via trade from the Tigers in February 2005, but then traded to the Orioles in 2007. Signed via free agency in November 2010.
Augie Ojeda - Originally acquired via trade in 1999 from the Orioles, but claimed by the Twins off waivers in 2003. Re-signed in 2006 as a free agent, and then again in January 2011.
Bobby Scales – Signed as a free agent in 2007

Outfielders
Alfonso Soriano – Signed as a free agent in 2006
Tyler Colvin – Drafted in the 1st round of the 2006 draft
Marlon Byrd - Signed as a free agent in 2009
Fernando Perez - Acquired via trade from the Tampa Bay Rays in January 2011
Kosuke Fukudome - Signed as a free agent in 2007
Reed Johnson - Signed as a free agent in 2008 and then again in January 2011

Pitchers
Carlos Zambrano – Signed as an amateur free agent in 1997 out of Venezuela
Ryan Dempster – Signed as a free agent in 2004
Randy Wells – Drafted in the 38th round of the 2002 draft
Matt Garza – Acquired via trade from the Tampa Bay Rays in January 2011
Carlos Silva – Acquired via trade from the Seattle Mariners in 2009
Andrew Cashner – Drafted in the 1st round of the 2008 draft
Braden Looper – Signed as a free agent in January 2011
Todd Wellemeyer – Originally drafted by the Cubs in the 4th round of the 2000 draft. Re-signed via free agency in January 2011
Angel Guzman – Signed as an amateur free agent in 1999 out of Venezuela
Casey Coleman – Drafted in the 15th round of the 2008 draft
James Russell – Drafted in the 14th round of the 2007 draft
Kerry Wood – Originally drafted in the 1st round of the 1995 draft and then re-signed via free agency in December 2010
Carlos Marmol – Signed as an amateur free agent in 1999 out of the Dominican Republic
Sean Marshall – Drafted in the 6th round of the 2003 draft
John Grabow – Acquired via trade from the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2009
Jeff Samardzija – Drafted in the 5th round of the 2006 draft
Scott Maine – Acquired via trade from the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2009
Jeff Stevens – Acquired via trade from the Cleveland Indians 2008
Justin Berg -Acquired via trade from the New York Yankees in 2005
Marcos Mateo – Acquired via trade from the Cincinnati Reds in 2007

Summary

Free Agents - 30%

Trades – 30%

Home Grown – 40%

Thoughts on that?

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Danny B

Interesting break down, Joe. They seem to reap a lot of talent from Central and South American countries since the late 90s. The homegrown core is solid, too. Hopefully a couple more of the recent draft picks start to hit the bigs and produce while these big-time contracts are entering their final years.
Chuck

I would prefer to get players by either growing them or aquiring them via trade. You always wind up overpaying free agents in either years, money or both.
Dr van Nostrand

I used to be in a band called Home Grown. Don’t ask.
Doc Raker

I must say I am a little disappointed. I thought we were going to get a little info on where they grew up, some baby pictures, some dirt from there high school girlfriends and what there favorite food and hobbies are. I am heading off to spring training today, I will stop by Fitch Park and try and get some real info for us. Let me know if there is anything specific you would like to know about anyone specific. I have dinner plans with the Easter European minor leaguers so any questions for them please forward. They all come out of the Cubs development camp in Kosovo, the new hot bed for prospects.
http://swantron.com jswanson

Maybe you could collect and publish some of their favorite traditional lamb dish recipies, Doc.
Seymour O’Butts

Top ‘o the mornin to ya!
Interesting mix Joe, is it difficult to ascertain what the average ML club has for it’s player mix? We could use that for yet another proxy of Jim Hendry’s relative worth. We do a little too much Hendry bashing in these parts.
Me friend Raker is off to the promised land. If you want to actually have dinner with some ball players, feel free to tell them you know me.
Chuck

I think Hendry has done a pretty good job considering some of the pressures he was reported to be under during the last days of the Tribune regime. He has made some pretty good moves lately considering the budgetary constraints the team is under. Is he 100% right all the time? No. But nobody is in sports. I will reserve judgement until after this upcoming draft and next winter when a ton of money comes off the books.
If management (Hendry and Rickitts) decides not to go after the high-end prospects in the draft because of money (to a reasonble degree) and they do not trade for/sign good players in the offseason and just pocket the money I will have to reconsider my team loyalty.
Chet

I find it funny and sad that we have re-acquired Augie Ojeda three times, yet he has done nothing of note at the big league level for us. Does somebody in the front office have a crush on him? I don’t get it.
Chet

check that, we a acquired him once and then re-acquired him twice.
Doc Raker

I was scheduled to have dinner with Woody and then I dropped Seymour’s name and I was led over to the Kosovo prospects table. It was like the scene in Animal House when the geeks showed up at the big frat party and when they tried to leave the geek corner the frat boy host just led them back into the geek corner and reintroduced the geek to the other geeks. “Oh, you know Seymour, over hear, have a nice evening”
Doc Raker

Along with some variations of hummus and babba ganoosh, jswanson.
http://twitter.com/moondogkp MoondogKP

To me, the lack of amateur free agent signings is telling. It tells me that maybe the Cubs are not as big as others in places like the Dominican and other areas, which is possible. Before passing more judgment, I’d love to know what other teams’ ratios like this are. It seems that the smaller market teams with success did it with homegrown. And the Angels’ run started with homegrown.
cap’n obvious

Colvin, Soto, Wood (forever ago), Wells, and Marshall are the only Cub draftees worth 2 shits on the Major League roster. Yeah, Hendry is getting bashed too much. The scouting department is a joke. You could argue the FA signings of Castro and Marmol were lik draft picks, but then you also have to face the fact that every MLB team has plucked a couple of diamonds in the rough out of the Dominican. All you Hendry lovers keep right on drinking the eclair flavored kool-aid….it’ll be another hundred years with guys like him making decisions.
Buddy

I don’t care how the Cubs get players, as long as they are useful players.
lizzie

@Doc don’t laugh, I really DID think it was going to be about their hometowns when I spotted the title of the post. Definitely a girlie’s view for ya!
BuckeyeLakerCub

Do you consider players like Zambrano FA or homegrown? And what about undrafted American players that we get?
http://twitter.com/moondogkp MoondogKP

Zambrano is homegrown, as he signed as a amateur. Anyone else who signed their first deal with the Cubs, either drafted or as a amateur free agent, would be considered homegrown.
BuckeyeLakerCub

@Chuck – What if Ricketts is using that money to improve the stadium or pay off his loans from the purchase of the team? Because he has said that every penny will either go towards stadium improvements, loan payments, or payroll
BuckeyeLakerCub

I’m with Buddy, I don’t care either. Because it’s not like you can draft every single player in your organization. What I want is better drafting. As Billy Beane said in Moneyball “The draft is nothing but a [freaking] crapshoot. We take 50 players and celebrate if 2 of them make it. In what other business is 2 for 50 a success? If you did that in the stock market, you’d be broke.” The number of homegrown players does seem a little bit low though.
Chuck

Rickitts has been pretty consistant in saying that the Cubs payroll will remain steady and within the top few in baseball for the next few years. They have been investing more in the minors and maintaining the MLB payroll so I am happy on that end. While in reaity if your MLB player salaries stay the same from one year to the next you are losing ground due to inflation. I am fine with that in the short term as long as we don’t suddenly have a Marlins/Pirates payroll situation.
BuckeyeLakerCub

I think it will be at least 100 years before their payrolls reach 9 figures and the Yankees payroll reaches a billion.
mastrick

What it says to me is we’re not growing enough players. I watch the Nashville Predators a lot; they are the quintessential “grow from within” team and they regularly make the playoffs. Fifteen of the twenty one guys on the current active roster were drafted by the Preds.

Where Did These Guys Come From?

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