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2014 Chicago Cubs Consensus Top 51 Prospects

What is the consensus ranking for each of the Cubs' top prospects? Included is an interactive chart, where you can filter by hand and position.

USA TODAY Sports

Where no counsel is, the people fall: but in the multitude of counsellers there is safety.

-Proverbs 11:14, King James Version

Prospect lists are a tricky animal. Every prospect guru has his or her own biases, favorite prospects, sources, and philosophy, leading to quite a variety in the placement of specific players on his or her list. I like making lists and I like prospects, but I'm no scout and I have no inside connections, so my list wouldn't hold any particular weight. Instead of spending loads of time ranking the players with my own biases, I decided a few years ago to instead assemble a consensus list for each team (View last year's rankings). Hopefully this will bring safety from a multitude of counselors.

How do I do this? Each time a prospect appears on a list, he gets a number of points (32 minus his ranking). The prospect with the largest amount of points is ranked first.

This year, I made a few changes to the list. First off, I included as many lists as I could possibly find. This includes list from team-specific sites, not just from sites that post a list for every team. Second, I created a separate list for fantasy rankings. Fantasy baseball sites rank their prospects with a different flavor and so there are two rankings: one for real baseball and one for fantasy. Finally, I've included an interactive graphic to manipulate the list in various ways. Enjoy!

You can also view the 2013 Chicago Cubs top prospect list.

Sources

Regular Lists

Baseball America

Baseball Instinct

Baseball Prospectus

Bleacher Report

Bleed Cubbie Blue

Bullpen Banter

Chicago Cubs Prospects

Cubs Den

Cubs Prospect Watch

Fangraphs

Grading on the Curve

Keith Law (ESPN)

Minor League Ball (John Sickels)

MLB Draft Insider

MLB Prospect Portal

Prospect Digest

Rant (Aravena)

Rant (Schmelzer)

Top Prospect Alert

Fantasy Lists

Dynasty Sports Empire

Fake Teams

Prospect 361

Razzball

The List

The "Change" column describes how the prospect’s status changed from 2013. A positive number means the prospect moved up in the list, while a negative number means he moved down.

Rank FRank Player Change
1 1 Javier Baez -
2 2 Kris Bryant 1st Round
3 5 Albert Almora -1
4 3 Jorge Soler -1
5 6 C.J. Edwards Matt Garza trade, Rangers
6 4 Arismendy Alcantara 8
7 8 Pierce Johnson -
8 7 Dan Vogelbach -3
9 10 Jeimer Candelario 2
10 11 Arodys Vizcaino -6
11 8 Mike Olt Matt Garza trade, Rangers
12 NA Christian Villanueva -4
13 NA Kyle Hendricks Unranked last year
14 NA Rob Zastryzny 2nd Round
15 NA Paul Blackburn 2
16 NA Eloy Jimenez Dominican IFA
17 NA Matt Szczur -8
18 NA Neil Ramirez Matt Garza trade, Rangers
19 NA Corey Black Alfonso Soriano trade, Yankees
20 NA Duane Underwood -9
21 NA Alberto Cabrera 7
21 NA Dillon Maples -11
23 NA Ivan Pineyro Scott Hairston trade, Nationals
24 NA Tyler Skulina 4th Round
25 NA Gioskar Amaya -9
26 NA Scott Frazier 6th Round
27 NA Trey Masek 5th Round
28 NA Josh Vitters -13
28 NA Jacob Hanneman 3rd Round
30 NA Brett Jackson -24
31 NA Dallas Beeler Unranked last year
32 NA Jen-Ho Tseng Taiwanese IFA
33 NA Daury Torrez Unranked last year
34 NA Erick Leal Tony Campana trade, Dbacks
34 NA Shawon Dunston Jr. Unranked last year
34 NA Gleybar Torres Venezuelan IFA
37 NA Marco Hernandez -19
38 NA Kevin Encarnacion Unranked last year
39 NA Rubi Silva Unranked last year
39 NA Kyuji Fujikawa -21
41 NA Yasiel Balaguert Unranked last year
42 NA Armando Rivero Cuban IFA
42 NA Barret Loux -21
42 NA Juan Carlos Paniagua -22
45 NA Willson Contreras Unranked last year
46 NA Zach Cates Unranked last year
46 NA John Andreoli Unranked last year
48 NA Zach Rosscup Unranked last year
48 NA Ben Wells -21
50 NA Danny Lockhart Unranked last year
51 NA Dustin Geiger Unranked last year

Here is a spreadsheet that contains all of the 2014 Chicago Cubs top prospect rankings in one place. I have removed Keith Law's as his lists require a subscription.

2013 prospects not on 2014 list

Graduated:

Junior Lake, #13

Claimed off waivers:

Robert Whitenack, #23

Dropped off:

Jae-Hoon Ha, #22

Trey McNutt, #24

Luis Acosta, #24

Trey Martin, #24

Jeffery Baez, #29

Tim Saunders, #30

The vizualization

Enjoy!

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Chris St. John is a writer at Beyond The Box Score. You can follow him on Twitter at @stealofhome.