How Cubs No. 13 prospect became lethal at the plate

This story was excerpted from Jordan Bastian’s Cubs Beat newsletter. With Jordan off this week, MLB.com’s Ben Weinrib handled this edition. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

Triple-A Iowa has perhaps the most loaded team in the Minors, at times featuring six Top 100 prospects and 11 players from the Cubs’ Top 30 list.

However, the most productive player this year has a relatively unheralded background. After signing for $179,400 as a ninth-round pick in 2023, Jonathon Long has developed into one of the best hitters in Chicago's system and is on the brink of helping the big league team.

Through 46 games this season, Long, the team’s No. 13 prospect, leads all Cubs Minor Leaguers in average (.355), slugging (.541), runs (30) and RBIs (37) while ranking second in on-base percentage (.420) and tied for fourth in homers (six).

This kind of production isn’t totally surprising. In three years at Long Beach State, he finished four shy of the Dirtbags’ career home run mark after slashing .321/.408./548 across 135 games. Still, there are countless players who starred in college but weren’t able to translate that to higher levels of competition.

“He's doing a lot of things that he did when he was a college player and even earlier in his Minor League career; it's just that he's continued to be able to do them through the higher Minors,” Cubs director of player development Jason Kanzler said. “He's been able to keep pace with and even outpace his level progressions, in terms of his development, and that's excellent to see."

One key to Long’s success? He hits the ball extremely hard. He is second among all Triple-A hitters (with at least 100 batted balls) with a 58.9 percent hard-hit rate and third with a 93.4 mph average exit velocity. Among Major Leaguers, only the Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani and the Pirates' Oneil Cruz have a better hard-hit rate. While the 23-year-old isn't particularly tall at 5-foot-11, he has plenty of strength and bat speed to produce plus raw power from the right side.

The California native flexed that power last season when he led the farm system with an .888 OPS and slugged 23 home runs between three levels. Long’s bat speed really emerged in the Arizona Fall League, where he hit multiple balls over 110 mph and ranked second on the circuit with six homers in 18 games. He’s only built on that loud contact in 2025.

“This year he is putting up the best exit velocities of his career by a pretty substantial margin,” Kanzler said. “The second best was in [High-A] South Bend in the first half of the year last year. He is definitely impacting the baseball better than he ever has, including in college with metal bats. So this is a great thing to see.”

Iowa’s loaded roster does mean heavy competition for earning a callup. The Cubs briefly promoted catcher Moisés Ballesteros (Cubs No. 4, MLB No. 61) in May and gave outfielder Kevin Alcántara (No. 5, MLB No. 74) a cup of coffee last September. They could also call upon outfielder Owen Caissie (No. 3, MLB No. 49) or infielder Ben Cowles (No. 22), both of whom are already on the 40-man roster -- or versatile James Triantos (No. 7).

Adding Long to the 40-man would be a big decision, but it wouldn’t stop the Cubs from selecting his contract if the fit is right. Long’s bat -- amplified by his levelheaded approach -- will clearly carry his profile, but he’s working to make himself versatile on defense and more well-rounded overall. Most of his reps have come at first base, where the team sees him fitting best, although he continues to get reps at third base and left field.

“He's been working really hard at it,” Kanzler said. “He's got some pretty specific things he's working on. He's embraced them. He's improving throughout this season on them. ... It's always good to have positional versatility and, just in a pinch, the ability to play more than just one position. Given how impressive his bat is, I think that only benefits him.”