BREAKING
Allan Henry - USA Today Sports
Allan Henry - USA Today Sports

Cubs trade Mark Leiter Jr. to Yankees for prospects


by - Senior Editor -

The Chicago Cubs have traded reliever Mark Leiter Jr. to the New York Yankees in exchange for infielder Ben Cowles and right-handed reliever Jack Neely.

Cowles is a 24-year-old middle infielder who is currently playing for Double-A for the Yankees.

He hit .294 with nine homers in 378 at-bats this season and is rated as the Yankees' No. 29 overall prospect.

He is a versatile player who can play second base, shortstop, and third base.

His 141 wRC+ was the 12th-best mark in all of Double-A this season.

He was drafted out of Maryland in the 2021 draft, and he was a college teammate of Cubs standout prospect Matt Shaw.

Also, he was teammates with James Triantos and Kevin Alcantara for the Mesa Solar Sox in the Arizona Fall League in 2023.

Basically, the Cubs have scouted him and know what they are getting out of Cowles as a prospect.

Neely is also 24 years old and is rated No. 20 on Baseball America's top Yankee prospects. He is a 6-8 reliever who throws over 95 MPH and has a nasty slider.

He has a 3.38 ERA in nine relief appearances for the Yankees in Triple-A this season. Overall, across Double-A and Triple-A, he had a 2.81 ERA in 31 games, including a 36 percent strikeout rate.

Watch for Neely to get a shot with the big league club at some point this season.

The Cubs currently have a surplus of arms in the bullpen once they get healthy with Keegan Thompson, Jordan Wicks, Ben Brown, Adbert Alzolay, and others so I understand why they made this move.

Leiter had two more years of control via arbitration, so the Cubs must have thought he couldn't keep up his impressive stats this season over the next two years.

He is also 33 years old, so that might have been a reason to get younger in the bullpen.

In the last 7.2 innings since coming off the IL, he had not given up a run.

More to come on this breaking news story.

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