The Chicago Cubs have signed shortstop prospect Alex Madera, and the 25-year-old North Carolina Tar Heel will make his professional debut sometime this season.
Madera played two seasons at UNC after parts of four years at Arcadia, hence him being quite a bit older than your typical undrafted free agent signing. He will potentially show a lot of polish on the defensive side for that reason – you’d hope, anyway – but the extent to which he emerges as a legitimate prospect in the system will probably rest on how quickly the bat adjusts to professional baseball. The runway, realistically, is just a little shorter for older prospects first entering pro ball.
The Cubs recently signed infielder @_amad99 as an undrafted free agent. He's already been in action on the back fields. #Cubs #ST2026 pic.twitter.com/9cTwKP1HZd
— Rich Biesterfeld (@biest22) March 2, 2026As a senior Cubs past year at UNC, Alex Madera hit .332/.432/.403/101 wRC+ with more walks than strikeouts, but was not drafted in the summer of 2025. The Cubs have pretty significant holes down at the lowest levels in the middle infield, so there certainly could be a real opportunity for Madera to move quickly if he hits. If he doesn’t, then it might be a matter of betting on the defensive ability as a contributor up the farm ladder, and then you see where he is as a possible defense-first utility-man in a few years.
With Madera having played at UNC this past season, he would’ve been a teammate of Cubs 2nd rounder, Kane Kepley, and Cubs 8th rounder, Jake Knapp. In other words, the Cubs probably got a whole lot of looks at Madera, and also some behind-the-scenes character chatter from Kepley and Knapp (and maybe a sales pitch by them, too, if Madera were choosing among offers).
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