The Legend of Luke

LUKE LITTLE, THE CUBS GIANT LEFTHANDED PITCHING PROSPECT, IS BLOWING AWAY THE OPPOSITION

By Max Thoma

The Guinness World Record for fastest pitch thrown is 105.8 mph. It was near the end of the season, on September 24, 2010 and you probably have a pretty good idea of who threw it: Aroldis Chapman.

The fastest pitch ever thrown in college baseball history was actually just last year. Tennessee Volunteers flamethrowing Ben Joyce chucked a fastball versus Auburn that clocked in at 105.5. Ben Joyce wound up being chosen by the Los Angeles Angels in the third round of the 2022 MLB Draft and actually skipped rookie ball, Low-A, and High-A and started his pro career last year in AA-Rocket City.

Those two fastballs are simply incredible and nearly unhittable, though in fairness Joyce’s actually missed the zone for a ball. And for reference sake the hardest thrown pitch in the MLB last season was 104.2, coming from the arm of Saint Louis Cardinals reliever Ryan Helsley.

In the spring of 2020 there were no baseball games being played at the professional or collegiate level. Covid-19 had ended college seasons short and stopped many professional ones before they even began.

On March 6, MLB and the MLBPA agreed to shorten the 2020 MLB Draft to five rounds. So naturally, it became difficult to showcase your potential to scouts.

So for guys like pitcher Luke Little, a junior college hard-throwing lefty, they had to get a bit creative.

In May of 2020 a video surfaced that took the baseball world on social media a bit by storm.

Little, in an indoor bullpen session, had hurled a 105 mph fastball. You can just picture the eyes of front office baseball ops personnel and farm directors widening as they watch a 6-foot-8 lefty sit 101-102 and top out at 105.

I’m sure most people immediately conjured up an image of Chapman and all the years he’d locked down saves in the ninth inning with his vicious heater.

The video of Little I’m talking about is still one of the first things that comes up when you Google his name. It’s a video posted by Pitching Ninja on YouTube, Pitching Ninja is big in the baseball ranks for posting clips of the nastiest pitches and pitchers in the game, and the video as of the moment I’m writing this has nearly 1.5 million views.

Little had been ranked just outside of the top 150 MLB Draft eligible prospects by MLB. com, so it’s not like he wasn’t on the radar for MLB teams, but you had to imagine this type

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It seems fitting that so many people saw Little and their brains conjured up an image of Chapman, because four years after Chapman helped the Chicago Cubs end their 108-year World Series drought, Luke Little was taken by the Cubs with the 117th overall pick in the 2022 MLB Draft.

Little was born in Charlotte, North Carolina and went to play college ball at San Jacinto College, a junior college in Houston, Texas. The Gators baseball program is tremendous and the team has won five National Championships and appeared in 27 JUCO World Series. San Jacinto has a long list of alumni that have made it to the big leagues and had tremendous careers. Incredible MLB starters like Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte were both Gators.

As a freshman the big lefty went 3-1 with a 2.04 ERA in 17 appearances, six of which were starts. His stuff, when his control was on, dominated the opposition. In 35.1 innings he allowed a mere 18 hits and only one home run, while striking out a completely ludicrous 69 batters. The only thing holding him back at all was the walks, which piled up to 36 by the end of the season.

Before the 2020 season was cut short, Little made five more collegiate appearances as the Gators closer. He tallied three saves on the year and did still make one start on the hill. In nine total innings he allowed three hits, two runs, and punched out 17.

That means in 44.1 collegiate innings, the lefty struck out 86 opposing hitters, nearly two per inning.

However, with the 2020 Minor League Baseball season cancelled, Little, like many others, lost valuable in-game experience throughout the entire year and he didn’t make his debut until August 28, 2021 with the rookie affiliate of the Cubs in Arizona.

His 2021 season on paper looks rather insignificant in the grand scheme of a young players development. He made four appearances, three starts, struck out 15 and went 0-1 with a 4.50 ERA. It was a usage that mirrored his covid-shortened final college season in terms of the in-game experience.

But 2022 was totally different. After nearly a year-anda-half in the Cubs system, working on his development, Little was ready to showcase his talents for the entirety of a professional baseballseason.

So he did.

Little broke camp on time and began the season in Low-A Myrtle Beach with the Pelicans. The lefty with the highest velocity fastball in the 2020 draft shoved in the Carolina League, breezing through lineups to the tune of a 2.91 ERA in 20 appearances, 19

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By midsummer the 21-year-old was in rare form. In July he amassed 25 strikeouts in 15.2 innings while allowing just two runs, good enough for a 1.15 ERA for the entire month. He finished the month with 13.2 straight scoreless innings and was names the Chicago Cubs Minor League Pitcher of the Month.

On August 12 Little was promoted to High-A South Bend. He finished the year making three starts with the Cubs and allowing just one run in 10.2 innings.

After an incredible season, one in which opposing hitters batted just .180 against him,

Arizona, throwing on the back fields and working in the pitching lab, working on continuing to develop his secondary pitches and working on his endurance and longevity. The slider seems to have really improved and now he features a nasty splitter to complete his three-pitch mix.

Many prognosticators see Little as a future bullpen arm, a lefty who could come his hard work was paid off not just with the midseason promotion, but with a Midwest League Championship.

It wasn’t long before Little was back in in during high leverage situations and strand runners with his swing-and-miss stuff, like a Chapman or Andrew Miller. even better than before. Now as a 22-year-old, Little’s first three starts of the season combined for 10.2 innings of work and just one earned run allowed.

On July 22 of last year Little threw four full innings for the first time in his pro career. He matched that in his final home start of the year on August 30 when he tossed four perfect innings, striking out five, including the side in order in the third inning.

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If it was five or six years ago, Little would probably find himself among the Cubs top 30 prospects on MLB Pipeline, probably even top 20 or top 15.

But the Cubs farm system is as loaded as it’s been with starting pitching in a long time.

Chicago's plethora of arms includes many drafted and internally developed guys like Jordan Wicks, DJ Herz, Cade Horton, Jackson Ferris, Kohl Franklin, Porter Hodge, and Luke Little.

But in recent years what has helped springboard this group is through trades.

The likes of Ben Brown, Caleb Killian, and Hayden Wesneski have come over in big deadline deals with the likes of the Phillies, Giants, and Yankees respectively.

The ERA stands at 0.84 as we enter the final week of April and his strikeouts-pernine-innings has blossomed to 10.1. The slider looks nasty this year and paired with the lethal fastball he may just continue to dominate the Midwest League.

So here’s a 6-foot-8 southpaw with a cannon of an arm, slowly increasing how deep he can work into games and hanging just outside many writers list of top Cubs prospects.

He’s simply a fascinating player to keep an eye on, competitive, fiery, and built like a stretch four in the NBA.

But what makes Little different is the rareness of his ability and arm strength when combined with his size.

As of writing this article, five players have appeared in an MLB game this year that are listed at 6-foot-8 or taller. All five of them are pitchers, and all right-handed arms. Finding a left-hander, as tall as Little, with the raw arm strength he possesses is truly rare.

Plus so far in his 2023 season, he looks

Little certainly has that breakout potential, another full year like last year, but with fewer walks and beginning to touch the fifth inning of games could see him shoot up prospect rankings; the potential is there.

The fastball is huge, the slider is devastating, the personality is large, and the dude is massive. So in reality there really is nothing little about him, except his name.