Just one day after it was announced that expected Opening Day third baseman Matt Shaw would likely not be making the trip with the team to Tokyo, the Chicago Cubs will now be without another player in Japan. MLB’s Jesse Rogers reported Thursday morning that Gold Glove-winning second baseman Nico Hoerner will not join the Cubs on their overseas trip. He will stay back to rehab and work toward being ready for Chicago’s Opening Day series against the Arizona Diamondbacks back in the United States. The 27-year-old underwent flexor tendon surgery in the offseason, and he is still trying to regain full health and strength to help the Cubs as much as possible this season.<\/p>\n
Hoerner not traveling opens up a massive opportunity for a couple of players who were already fighting for a roster spot. Gage Workman and Vidal Brujan will benefit the most, as they now have a clear pathway to being the second baseman for the Tokyo Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Another name to watch, which has not been mentioned much, is James Triantos. Triantos is MLB’s No. 73 ranked prospect, and a solid performance the rest of the way in Spring Training could propel him to a roster spot for at least the first two games of the season.<\/p>\n
Chicago will monitor all these players more closely to determine which has the best chance of going to Tokyo and knocking off the defending World Series champions.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Just one day after it was announced that expected Opening Day third baseman Matt Shaw would likely not be making the trip with the team to Tokyo,… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":37442,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37441","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb"],"yoast_head":"\n