Luis Verdugo – Picture by Todd Johnson

Tonight was a lot of fun! My wife and I watched “The Road to Wrigley on the Marquee Sports Network. Hosted by Elise Menaker, she was joined by Jim Callis of MLB Pipeline and Marquee’s very own MiLB expert, Lance Brozdowski. It was a lot of fun watching them switch back-and-forth between games as they talked about certain players including Kohl Franklin, PCA, Alexander Canario, Jake Slaughter and James Triantos, to name a few. That is pretty much what I do on a nightly basis except I don’t have people in a studio to talk with. I do it on Twitter, group chats, and Slack with my North Side Bound mates along with a few other friends.

Jim Callis did let slip a couple of things about MLB ‘Pipelines upcoming prospect list. The first one is that PCA will be number one on the Cubs list and slotted in at number 31 in the top 100. As well, Alexander Canario is going to be ranked number seven on the Cubs’ list which is pretty close to where I have him at six.

But let’s get to our awards for the day.

Clutch Hit of the Day

Darius Hill of the Iowa Cubs hit a three-run go ahead home run in the bottom of the eighth inning today to give Iowa a lead over Louisville.  For the day, Hill went 2-for-5 and raised his batting average to .337 at Iowa. Yeah, he’s knocking really loudly for Chicago.

Dinger of the Day

A grand slam will win every time and this one was cranked by Alexander Canario, his 20th as a Smokie!

Starting Pitcher of the Day

At the start of the night, this look like it was gonna be tough to pick just one pitcher. But as the night wore on, one-by-one players fell to the side and left one man standing and that was Javier Assad. He was extremely efficient as he went six innings tonight for Iowa. He also struck out five and did not walk a single batter while scattering five hits and giving up just one run. 

Reliever of the Day

For most of the night, this was an “OOF” kind of night as most relievers struggled to maintain leads throughout the system. The Cubs had all four affiliates winning at one point and only Iowa and South Bend came out on top.

And then Zac Leigh came on for South Bend in the ninth inning. He struck out the first two guys including the Timber Rattlers top prospect Jackson Chourio on this nasty slider. I don’t expect Zac didn’t stay too long in South Bend anymore. He’s ready for Tennessee.

The Hitter of the Day

This award took a long time to figure out because I had to wait to see how the Tennessee game wound up.

There were several good performances today from Narciso Crook in Iowa who went 2-for-4 with two RBI. Parker Chavers went 2-for-5 with two runs scored for Myrtle Beach (PS, love Chavers!). James Triantos looks to be off the schnide a little bit as he also went 2-for-4. Jordan Nwogu went 2-for-5 with two stolen bases. South Bend’s Pablo Aliendo went 3-for-6  with one RBI while BJ Murray, also of South Bend, put up a 4-for-4 night  with one RBI and two walks.

It’s hard to believe that none of those guys are going to get hitter of the day. I’m almost out of breath dictating this because I still have three more to go.

That award came down to Luis Verdugo of South Bend who went 3-for-5 with two runs scored, a home run, and five runs batted in on the night. I had to wait to see whether Jake Slaughter would improve on his 4-for-5 night with two home runs and four RBIs and how Alexander Canario finished up his 2-for-4 night that included a grand slam home run. Slaughter grounded out to end the game but he had a hell of a night, as did Canario,

The award goes to none other than Luis Verdugo who is legit getting very close to prospect list territory, especially with his glove.

I will be back in the morning with a profile of draft pick Nick Hull.