The Cubs announced Tuesday that they’ve designated infielder Luis Vazquez for assignment. His spot on the 40-man roster will go to veteran utilityman Jon Berti, whose previously reported one-year deal with the Cubs is now official.
Vazquez, 25, was a 17th-round pick out of Puerto Rico who made his MLB debut with Chicago in 2024. He appeared in 11 games and went 1-for-12 in a total of 14 trips to the plate. The rest of Vazquez’s season was spent in Triple-A, where he slashed .263/.347/.432 (104 wRC+) with the Cubs’ top affiliate in Des Moines. Vazquez has drawn walks at a stout 11.6% clip and fanned at a roughly average 22.5% rate over the past two seasons in Iowa. He’s shown off a bit of pop, swatting 17 homers in 543 plate appearances, and chipped in seven steals in 12 attempts.
Vazquez has played the overwhelming majority of his professional games at shortstop, logging 4929 innings at the position compared to just 268 at second base, 186 at third base, two in right field and one at first base. Baseball America ranked him 16th among Cubs farmhands last winter and praised him as the best defensive shortstop in the system while also lauding an offensive breakout he’d shown in 2023. He didn’t quite sustain his ’23 production this past year but did post slightly better-than-average offensive output in Iowa.
With a quality glove at shortstop, a pair of minor league options remaining and a couple above-average seasons of production in the upper minors in 2023-24, Vazquez could well hold appeal to another club. Chicago will have five days to trade him. If there’s no taker, he’ll be placed on waivers, at which point any other team could claim him. Waivers are a 48-hour process, so within the next week, there’ll be some resolution on the outcome of the slick-fielding shortstop’s DFA.
I’ll take Berti over another year of Masterbuoni. Hopefully he stays healthy this year…
Aloha folks, I wish Vasquez well. Now we see if more moves are made or is this it? There’s chatter about King going to Wrigley, possibly Suarez too. Mahalo
Cubs only have 15 SS’s left in the system. So Vasquez wouldn’t be the guy I would lose, In the end it really didn’t make much difference.
Aloha Uncle, I hear you. Kind of a toss up there. I always want to wish them all well. And hopefully in these releases we never make a big mistake on a player. Take care now! Stay warm! Mahalo
Pick him up, Scott Harris, and let Ryan Kreidler go bye-bye!
Trade Baez for him.
Not a loss. He’s a plus defender but he hits like Mick Kelleher.
Man this is a little disappointing. To DFA Luis Vazquez over Brujan or Workman or even Benjamin Cowles. The latter two probably don’t make the team.
If you slice together parts of the names Brujan and Workman you get surprisingly close to Bregman.
I honestly don’t want Bregman. Takes away what potentially what Matt Shaw is gonna do. He has all the making of an elite superstar player.
Explain your comment.
He can’t
Log
If they signed Bregman, it is Nico who would get shafted, not Shaw.
I was just noting how the other two names combined.
I think Shaw will be exceptional. That is why I was ok with dealing Cam Smith. If I was not confident in Shaw, I would have hated trading Smith for a likely rental, even of someone elite like Tucker.
I also really like Nico, underrated in my book.
I am mostly ok with the Cubs’ off-season. Jed did not gut the farm, and the team still improved enough to successfully compete with Milwaukee and others for the division.
empty head
Signing Bregman would once again prove that Hoyer has no plan and makes up crap as he goes along. He’s like my mom with 20 bucks at the Flea Market. Keeps picking stuff up and putting it down and in the end goes home with nothing. Right on Jammer.
They’ll work out a trade with the Tigers so they can keep Workman and give the Tigers Vasquez.
Workman is barely worth a 1971 Ford Pinto. Tigers can have him back for a Little Caesars hot and ready pepperoni pizza. Half eaten and undercooked.
Hoyer on track for 40 man roster consisting of 30 pitchers and 10 position players with the 10 being required to play multiple positions.
Just a weird comment.
Too bad. I hoped his stick came around. Maybe we have a potential trade lined up already?
This is just dumb. Delete your account now.
Buckle up Cubs nation gonna be a fun summer and October.
Van Halen. Also probably the best Cubs team since WWII other than the 2016 squad. Had to beat San Diego in a five game series to go to the WS. Won the first two before dropping three in a row. Steve Garvey for the Padres was the difference. 1984 the Cubs and the Van Halen album.
Why are the cubs concentrating solely on pitching when by my count, there are like 16 total positional players on the roster which means if anyone goes down for any time, they’d have serious shortage of depth. Plus If any young kidss which are several end up being bench warmers that would not be good for their development because otherwise all positions pretty much set.