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A few years ago, the Cubs made a concerted organizational strategy to aggressively pursue young talent from the Pacific Rim. In particular, they have scooped up pretty much every good Korean, as well as some Taiwanese players. It's a calculated move that suggests the Cubs front office believes Asian players are undervalued, or at least that Latin American prospects are overvalued (Starlin Castro wasn`t considered a star when he signed).

The Cubs did it again by signing 18-year old Korean RHP Kim Jin-yeong to a $1.2 million contract. That's 1st round money, so you figure he`s got a ton of upside. Really long stride, throws hard. He joins a huge cadre of Asian prospects. Most of you know the big ones, but there`s a lot of lesser known names you could be hearing about in a couple years.


Hak-Ju Lee
Dae-Eun Rhee

Na Kyung-min (fastest player in Korea)
Wang Yao-lin
Wang Tsu-en
Chen Pin-chieh
Kim Dong-yeop
Su Min-yung
Jae Hoon-ha
Hung Wen Chen

Bottom line, the Cubs have a Korean-Taiwanese pipeline going on and it just keeps flowing. If even a couple of the other guys pan out, the Pacific investments will have been well worth it. In a time when a lot of people (myself included) are questioning the current major league team, the minor league system offers hope. Last year we were ranked 26th. Now we`re 8th (by BP) and are actually using our money to buy a ton of talent in the international market. At least that part of the organization has really improved lately.

Can't be any worse than throwing money at good college football players.

Excellent post GYBE. It will be very interesting to see how all of these players end up doing at higher levels of ball. I think Hak-Ju Lee has a lot of potential with his speed and ability to get on base.

I weep for Len Kasper if he's still with us and some of these guys are in the big leagues.

Posey H8er wrote:Excellent post GYBE. It will be very interesting to see how all of these players end up doing at higher levels of ball. I think Hak-Ju Lee has a lot of potential with his speed and ability to get on base.

I think he's going to force Castro to move to 2nd base at some point. From what I've heard, Lee is a defensive wizard.

Having good prospects like Lee and Castro who play the same position isn't a problem at all. Prospects are worth a lot in today's game. We can add a nice piece in the future if we choose to. Or we can play both of them as suggested above. Seems like a win/win in my book.