After overcoming physical and mental hurdles, Chicago Cubs prospect Ben Brown sets his sights on greatness: ‘I’m not looking to just skate by’

Ben Brown knows it might sound crazy.

The 6-foot-6 right-hander is earnest, though, in his belief that Tommy John surgery was the best thing for his career— beyond the physical necessity to repair his ulnar collateral ligament in 2019. The procedure transformed him. Brown took it as an opportunity to make everything he did competitive, from his diet to his workout routine, all before he could starting throwing a baseball again.

His mantra through the rehab grind, from his dad, Jody: Nothing extraordinary comes out of ordinary effort.

Brown was determined to not let the lengthy recovery derail him.

“I put everything I could have into that rehab,” he told the Tribune. “And it took a while, but I think eventually I started to reap the benefits of that.”

Brown’s maturation and breakout season in the Philadelphia Phillies organization put him on the Chicago Cubs’ radar ahead of the trade deadline. The Cubs acquired him Aug. 2 for veteran reliever David Robertson, adding another promising young pitcher to their minor-league system. After joining the Cubs, Brown, who turned 23 on Sept. 9, finished with a 4.06 ERA, 32.1 K%, 9.5 BB% and 31 innings in seven starts at Double-A Tennessee, his first time pitching at that level.

Brown, ranked the Cubs’ No. 7 prospect by MLB.com and No. 11 from Baseball America, started his career by being drafted in a round that no longer exists.

“I prepared myself to make the most out of every opportunity I was given,” Brown said. “I was very lucky to be given a lot of opportunities from the Phillies and once I started showing them that I had pretty good stuff I kind of ran with it. I was no longer a 33rd rounder. I became a guy who can pitch a little bit.”

Between losing most of 2019 to Tommy John surgery and the pandemic canceling the 2020 minor-league year, Brown entered this season looking to gain valuable experience. Between the Phillies and Cubs, he threw 104 innings in 2022, more than his first five pro seasons combined (99 ⅔). Brown jokes that coming into this season, he estimated he had more innings in the instructional league than at affiliates, calling himself an “instructional-league veteran.”

For the first time in his career, Brown has learned what it takes to get through a full six-month minor-league season. He incorporated important between-start bullpen work and worked to grind without his best stuff, something Brown wasn’t challenged by in shorter instructional-league or spring starts. He credits Brad Bergesen, his former High-A pitching coach with the Phillies, who endured injuries in his career and made it to the big leagues, for his “huge” role in monitoring his workload. That level of management carried over to the Cubs.

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“It’s almost like I’ve got to remind myself every once in a while, this isn’t a three-week season anymore,” Brown said. “Like, this is a long haul. … It’s been a very collaborative group effort keeping me on the field.”

However, to get to this point ― including allowing one earned run over four innings Wednesday night in the decisive final game for the Smokies’ Southern League championship series — Brown needed to address the mental side of the game. It hit him after grinding through the pain, sadness and struggles of not being on the field because of Tommy John surgery and then losing another season to the pandemic.

“Oh, my gosh, I don’t know how to pitch.”

Brown recalled plenty of times in spring training and early this season when was a self-described “bonehead.”

“Like, I wouldn’t know what I’m doing, and I wouldn’t have the right approach,” Brown said. “And it was pretty embarrassing, honestly, to think I had some pretty good stuff, but I really didn’t know what I was doing mentally on the mound.”

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In mid-May, an hour-and-a-half conversation with Phillies minor-league mental performance coach Brea Hapken and a 45-minute bullpen session with Bergesen got him on track. His season took off from there. Brown recorded a 2.93 ERA over his next 11 starts, allowing one run or less in eight of the outings until he was traded to the Cubs.

Heading into the season, Brown hadn’t considered whether he would be used as a trade chip by the Phillies. But as the August deadline approached, the right-hander understood the situation and realized he soon might be pitching for another organization.

“As I started to emerge in the Phillies system and knowing that a lot of our top prospects are first-rounders who are pretty unmovable, it looked like I was the odd man out sometimes,” Brown said. “Not in a bad way. I mean, I’m kind of getting later in my minor-league career. And so I was thinking about it and obviously hear things online and stuff like that. But when it happened, it definitely felt like I wasn’t expecting it.”

Since the trade, the Cubs have avoided implementing many changes, preferring to get eyes on Brown, build a relationship and figure out what works best for him. They let Brown focus on competing and working with Double-A pitching coach Jamie Vermilyea, who took him under his wing and made this an easy transition.

Beyond his overall numbers, Brown has thrived in tough spots. He has limited opposing hitters to a .190/.291/.261 slash line with runners on base compared with .241/.294/.405 splits with the bases empty. During the regular season, he allowed only one multirun homer in 179 plate appearances. Brown felt he struggled in that area early in the season, seemingly loading the bases in every start, “so I guess I just got pretty comfortable with it,” he joked.

“The mindset when a runner gets on second base or third base is it’s crunchtime and it doesn’t matter if it’s the first inning or the sixth inning — that guy’s not scoring,” Brown said. “I’m going to do whatever I can do to get some strikeouts here, and that’s really helped me out this year.”

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Brown, who utilizes a fastball, curveball and slider, has been working on a changeup, though he limits its usage to between-start bullpen sessions.

“I have a lot of trust behind those three and it took me a very long time to have that kind of trust,” Brown said. “The slider itself was like something I really battled with in-season as far as pitch usage-wise. I was mostly fastball-curveball, and it took me months to really figure out the slider when I was with the Phillies. I don’t even think it’s where it needs to be right now.”

Casey Jacobson, Cubs coordinator of pitching development, is encouraged by the data and video on Brown’s changeup. He expects the organization will take a closer look at the pitch in the fall, but Jacobson believes the changeup is in a better place than previous seasons. Jacobson also expects the Cubs to tinker with Brown’s slider to try to add more glove-side movement.

“The one thing we’ll obviously want to be mindful of is he does have the ability to throw the slider for strikes at a pretty high rate and he does have pretty solid performance numbers with that,” Jacobson told the Tribune. “So it’s that risk-reward. We don’t want to take a step backward, but if we can make it slightly better and maybe give it a little bit better chance to be a true put-away to a right-handed hitter, we would explore that for sure.”

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Brown plans to spend as much time as he can in the offseason in Arizona where he can use the Cubs’ resources at their complex in Mesa. He knows he must improve against left-handed hitters and wants to solidify a third pitch. To dominant in the big leagues, Brown understands that means taking the next step in his development.

He has already welcomed the first step of taking the Cubs’ suggestions.

“I do believe my stuff right now plays at the next level, but also I’m not looking to just skate by,” Brown said. “I want to make sure I have the best opportunity to do as well as I’m capable of doing.”