Speed Central: Reds, Brewers threatening to run past Cubs

The future of the NL Central was on display in Milwaukee last week.

The entire baseball world was buzzing about Reds rookie Elly De La Cruz stealing second, third and home within a few pitches on Saturday against the Brewers.

Also significant was the Brewers piling up 9 stolen bases in the four game series against the Cubs. Milwaukee finished the series 9-for-10 on the bases and out-stole the Cubs 9-3.

This division has become Speed Central. Cincinnati leads all of MLB in stolen bases with 112. The Pirates rank fifth, the Brewers eighth.

The Cubs are doing OK in this category. They are 14th in MLB with 67 stolen bases, but their pace has slowed. The Cubs stole 25 bases in April, but just 16 in June.

Among individuals, Nico Hoerner is tied for fifth in the NL with 20 stolen bases. He's one behind Milwaukee's Christian Yelich, tied with Pittsburgh's Ji Hwan Bae. Atlanta's Ronald Acuna is way out in front with 41.

After the Cubs wrapped up Day 3 of the MLB Draft on Tuesday, vice president of scouting Dan Kantrovitz was asked if speed was on his radar more this year than in the past. The Cubs took 11 position players and 9 pitchers.

"Probably on the radar would be a fair way to say it, but in terms of a focus in the draft, no," he said.

When the Cubs called up Miles Mastrobuoni to replace the injured Dansby Swanson over the weekend, it brought to mind an interesting tidbit.

Mastrobuoni is the fastest Cubs player, based on Statcast's sprint speed measurement. He ranks just 62nd in MLB, however. Hoerner is next at No. 97, followed by Jared Young at 100, Seiya Suzuki 102, Christopher Morel 103 and Swanson 110.

With six players in the top 110 of the speed rankings, that puts them slightly above average, which is what their stolen base total suggests.

But the Cubs should be aware the Reds and Brewers each have five players in the top 60, all ahead of the fastest Cubs player. De La Cruz is the fastest player in MLB, according to this metric. The division rivals are loading up on speed and threatening to leave the Cubs in the dust.

It would be interesting to see where the Cubs' top prospect Pete Crow-Armstrong ranks on the speed scale. He has 23 stolen bases in 61 games at Double A Tennessee, so nothing outrageous. But he projects as a leadoff batter who will be a pest on the bases.

The Cubs seem to have the most success when they're aggressive on the bases. That goes beyond steals, but also getting from first and third on singles. One example is when Mike Tauchman hustled out a double last week in the ninth inning at Milwaukee, allowing him to score the winning run on an error.

Of course, the Cubs are also in dire need of more power too. At the all-star break, they rank 21st in home runs and 22nd in slugging.

"I don't think power by itself was necessarily a focus (in the draft)," Kantrovitz said. "When we're looking at hitters, some of the pillars that we look for that intrigue us and get us excited is the ability to hit with some damage, which gets to the power aspect.

"If there's a player that has that as well as maybe the ability to make consistent contact and make good decisions, then it looks like a pretty good package."

Last year, 16 of the Cubs' 20 picks were pitchers, so it made sense to take more position players this year. Another interesting change was selecting just three high school players this year. In 2022, the Cubs chose seven high schoolers and signed six.

Kantrovitz said that had a lot to do with the Cubs' bonus pool, used to sign draft picks, ranked in the bottom third of MLB.

"I'm pretty happy with the way it unfolded and pleasantly surprised it looks like we are able to get some young players into the fold, which is uncharacteristic of having a pool in the bottom-third," he said. "Usually you have to have a little more spending power to have that kind of focus on the high school crop."

Kantrovitz expressed confidence the Cubs can sign all three high school picks, which includes outfielder Kyhir Hope, a North Carolina commit from Colonial Forge HS in Virginia. He was the Cubs' 11th-round pick on Monday.

The most interesting final-day selection might be left-handed pitcher Daniel Brown from Campbell. He made just four appearances this spring, hit 102 miles per hour, but barely pitched because he walked 9 of the 12 batters he faced and uncorked 4 wild pitches. The Cubs figured there's plenty to work with, so they took a chance.

Twitter: @McGrawDHSports

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