Cleveland Baseball Insider's 2023 End Of Season Top 50 Prospects: No. 42 RHP Cade Smith

As we close out the 2023 season and players prepare for a new year and spring training to begin, there’s no better time to bring you an up-to-date look at Cleveland Baseball Insiders' top 50 prospects heading into the off-season.

Rankings are based on seeing the players live, watching videos, and having conversations with evaluators within and outside of the organization, as well as other writers.

While prospect lists are fun and entertaining for fans, they are not an end-all-be-all in terms of who makes it eventually to the major leagues. Remember, Jose Ramirez was never a top-100 prospect nationally and players like Steven Kwan and Will Brennan weren't considered top-20 prospects in the Guardians organization by many outside publications.

The ultimate goal here is to inform our readers and give you information on some of the young talent in the organization that they can follow and look forward to seeing in the future at the MLB level.

Cade Smith - RHP

Smith who was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, played his college baseball at the University of Hawaii before the Guardians signed him as an undrafted free agent on June 18th, 2020. 

Smith would have been a lock to be drafted in 2020 if the MLB Draft was not reduced to just five rounds due to the Covid pandemic.

Cade made his pro-debut in 2021 pitching in 33 games between Low-A Lynchburg and High-A Lake County. Smith held batters to a .164 AVG while striking out 68 batters over 43.0 innings out of the bullpen posting a 3.98 ERA and a 3.52 FIP.

In 2022 Smith started his season back in the pen with High-A Lake County but earned a promotion to Double-A Akron in late June. He posted a 2.93 ERA and 2.53 FIP over 44 games holding batters to a .175 AVG. Smith struck out 99 batters over just 61.1 innings pitched posting an impressive 14.53 SO/9 inning rate. 

Scouting Grades

The 6'5" 230lbs Smith is well put together and gets great extension with his long and lanky arms and legs. His 3/4 delivery enables him to hide the ball well giving him a deceptive delivery.

Smith showed increased velocity on his fastball from 96 mph while sitting at 93-95 mph in 2022 to now topping out at 98 mph and sitting around 95-96 mph in 2023. That fastball velo has increased almost six mph since his last season in college with Hawaii and is a plus pitch with a good late arm side run.

Smith also features a cutter and a slider that grade out currently as average pitches but have shown improvement since being drafted. Both pitches still need continued development with the slider being a slightly better offering than his cutter to date. The slider shows a nice late break and could potentially be a difference-maker for him.

While Smith's control improved in 2023 lowering his walk rate percentage from 13.5% in 2022 to 10.4% last year, he needs to be better if he wants to be considered a back-end option of the bullpen at the MLB level. 

2023 Stats

Smith's overall numbers especially ERA don't reflect how good he was in 2023 while splitting time between Double-A Akron and Triple-A Columbus thanks in part to a bit of a rough last month in September.

Smith finished with a 4.02 ERA over 47 games, but that number is a little misleading as his FIP (fielding independent pitching) was much lower at 3.42 indicating he was the recipient of some shotty defense at times behind him.

Over 62.2 innings he struck out 95 batters while collecting a farm system best 15 saves. He did post a career-best 10.4% walk percentage but finished with a career-high 1.31 WHIP allowing more hits in 2023. That number cannot remain that high for a backend option in the pen at the MLB level.

Over his first two seasons' batters hit only .171 against him but in 2023 that number increased to a .227 mark. This could be in part due to facing more advanced hitting at the higher levels of the minors or Smith's attempt to cut down on his walks and throw more strikes.