Cade Horton – Picture by Todd Johnson

It was a good night to be an upper round draft pick in the Cubs system. There were two outstanding performance in Cade Horton, and Drew Gray.

Let’s get right to it.

Starting Pitcher of the Night

It was a pretty muggy night in Beloit, and there was no wind to speak of. For Cade Horton, it did not take him long to get loosened up in that kind of humidity, which he said he’s used to in Oklahoma. But on the night, Horton went 5.2 innings. struck out seven, and sat 97 or 98 most of the night. And the sixth inning, that slipped a little bit to 95 and 96 but he came out after 78 pitches, and over 50 of them or strikes. He got pinched a little bit in the fifth and sixth as he walked three, but it was a very impressive start and his changeup looked amazing; fall off the table. Amazing!

I would not be surprised if he heads to Tennessee next week or the week after. He’s ready.

As for the rest of the Cubs, they got off to an amazing start tonight. He scored four runs in the first and one in the second and then cruised behind Horton and Ed Nunez who is touching 102 on the gun.

Walker of the Night

Kevin Alcantara is turning into a walk machine. Tonight, he showed that patience again, walking twice and hitting an exciting triple. Now I wish I would have kept in my top 5 because he is such a freak athlete, but that patience is paying dividends quickly.

The Cubs won 6 to 0.

Pictures of the Night

Debut of the Night

In Myrtle Beach, Drew Gray made his Low Class-A debut, and, like his former teammate in Jackson Ferris, Gray, put up donuts in his debut in three innings of work with 4K‘s. He was relieved by Koen Moreno, who went four innings, and gave up one run while only walking one, which is getting to be par for the course for him. His walk rate is dropping every week. I’m going to go back and rewatch this later tomorrow because I want the full affect of Drew Gray.

The Pelicans use some timely hitting and a Parker Chavers home run to do most of their damage. Chavers and Miguel Pabon both had two hits apiece as did Jefferson Rojas. I’m beginning to think I’ve put Rojas too low in my rankings. I had him at 13, he might be top 10 but by November. The big hitter on the night, though, was Andy Garriola who went 3-for-4 with 2 runs.

In Tennessee, the Smokies beat Chattanooga 8-3. They had plenty of hits and Walker pal did a fine job starting going five with 7 Ks. But they just could not push the runs across tonight. Both Pedro Armstrong in Owen Caissie had two hits. Andy Weber, Jordan Nwogu, and Haydn McGeary.

As for the Iowa Cubs, Riley Thompson did not have his best outing in a while. He gave up three runs in four innings. Iowa only managed 3 runs tonight as they lost 8-3. Jake Slaughter hit a dinger to take the system lead at 15. Getting only 3 hits was very un-Iowa like.