146. MLB Owners Draft Proposal is ABSURD, Cubs Draft Preview, and Jaxon Wiggins is Back

Let's start off with some stuff that's a little bit more fun, a little bit more entertaining, and that is some news and notes about the system as it stands right now.

So the first thing I want to hit on is I think maybe the most notable thing that's happened in the system over the past week, week and a half or so, is Jackson Wiggins being back to throwing in game action, right? We've seen him.

He has now made one start down in the Arizona Complex League, and this past week on the sunday he made a right sunday on sunday he made a rehab appearance in south bend and so obviously that was the first time we got to see him actually live because we weren't able to watch the complex the game but how fun was it to see jackson wiggins back out on the bump

i i was kind of holding my breath that there wasn't going to be like a rain rain out right yeah yeah you know like get this guy ramped up and then all of a sudden there's a rain out and then you know the story after that just gets messy and I mean, things were inconsistent, but the...

I don't really care about the results.

He was getting some whiffs.

The VLO was back kind of showed flashes.

That's huge.

It's really huge.

It's huge.

And it, and also a quick note there, it's not like they just had him for one inning.

I mean, I think they are actually getting him multiple ups in that game.

So, you know, with that, we're kind of saying like multiple innings, multiple times he's getting up, you know, and that's, that's really huge.

It's kind of given you a sign that, yeah, they're, they think that he can do multi-inning roles for the rest of the year.

I think that's a big sign.

Yeah, I think it's going to be important moving forward for him to log as many innings as possible to kind of save the season a little bit.

That sounds dramatic, but you need some innings out of Jackson Wiggins to kind of build them up for whatever the major league workload is in 2027.

I'm still at the point sitting here now that I'm not expecting any type of major league appearances from Jackson Wiggins here in 2026.

If that does happen, it's going to be out of the bullpen.

And if it is out of the bullpen, it's going to be shocking and I will love every second of it, but I'm not putting that expectation on Jackson this season.

So yeah, we saw, we saw him go two and two thirds innings on Sunday.

He, uh gave up one hit it was a home run that was the only earned run he gave up he walked a couple he struck out a few and uh i think the notable thing was that in that third inning of work when he was out there in the third inning he was still touching 97 on the gun which was which was encouraging pretty spotty all over the place a little bit with the fastball control but he did rip off a couple really good sliders so yeah i good to see him healthy good to see him probably i imagine that like I don't know if it's in South Bend or it's in Knoxville.

I don't imagine a scenario where his next start is up in AAA Iowa.

I think he'll still work some rehab outings in order to get up there and be ready for AAA action.

Yeah, I could actually see him going to AAA at some point.

Let's start off with some stuff that's a little bit more fun, a little bit more entertaining, and that is some news and notes about the system as it stands right now.

So the first thing I want to hit on is I think maybe the most notable thing that's happened in the system over the past week, week and a half or so, is Jackson Wiggins being back to throwing in game action, right? We've seen him.

He has now made one start down in the Arizona Complex League, and this past week on the sunday he made a right sunday on sunday he made a rehab appearance in south bend and so obviously that was the first time we got to see him actually live because we weren't able to watch the complex the game but how fun was it to see jackson wiggins back out on the bump

i i was kind of holding my breath that there wasn't going to be like a rain rain out right yeah yeah you know like get this guy ramped up and then all of a sudden there's a rain out and then you know the story after that just gets messy and I mean, things were inconsistent, but the...

I don't really care about the results.

He was getting some whiffs.

The VLO was back kind of showed flashes.

That's huge.

It's really huge.

It's huge.

And it, and also a quick note there, it's not like they just had him for one inning.

I mean, I think they are actually getting him multiple ups in that game.

So, you know, with that, we're kind of saying like multiple innings, multiple times he's getting up, you know, and that's, that's really huge.

It's kind of given you a sign that, yeah, they're, they think that he can do multi-inning roles for the rest of the year.

I think that's a big sign.

Yeah, I think it's going to be important moving forward for him to log as many innings as possible to kind of save the season a little bit.

That sounds dramatic, but you need some innings out of Jackson Wiggins to kind of build them up for whatever the major league workload is in 2027.

I'm still at the point sitting here now that I'm not expecting any type of major league appearances from Jackson Wiggins here in 2026.

If that does happen, it's going to be out of the bullpen.

And if it is out of the bullpen, it's going to be shocking and I will love every second of it, but I'm not putting that expectation on Jackson this season.

So yeah, we saw, we saw him go two and two thirds innings on Sunday.

He, uh gave up one hit it was a home run that was the only earned run he gave up he walked a couple he struck out a few and uh i think the notable thing was that in that third inning of work when he was out there in the third inning he was still touching 97 on the gun which was which was encouraging pretty spotty all over the place a little bit with the fastball control but he did rip off a couple really good sliders so yeah i good to see him healthy good to see him probably i imagine that like I don't know if it's in South Bend or it's in Knoxville.

I don't imagine a scenario where his next start is up in AAA Iowa.

I think he'll still work some rehab outings in order to get up there and be ready for AAA action.

Yeah, I could actually see him going to AAA at some point.