4/12 GDT: Nats game 2 - need a win

I’m sorry, but unless there is a record or season on the line, this is where the HP umpire needs to widen the strike zone by about two inches. Enough is enough.
 
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FTR no one would dare throw at our backstop if Freeman the enforcer was still manning 1B. That move already negatively affecting the team imo.
 
I know there's a huge stigma there but Ozuna looks really good. He's known for hot-and-cold streaks but he's on top of it right now, punishing pitches all over the place. It's really nice to see. And Oly is an on-base machine.
 
Once that winter league clip of Ozuna came out and we saw how trim he looked I felt good about the season.

Braves will have a top 5 offense/bullpen.

Need to figure out the rotation but there are so many options it will naturally work itself out. Concerned about Ian though.
 
Enscheff said:
He seems to have a sinker at 92 with nice run, a cutter at 90 that seems pretty bad, a change at 87 that looked ok, and some sort of breaking ball at 82 that he didn't command.

That's only after seeing him throw like 10 pitches though. I missed the first inning.
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Turns out the eye test was mostly right. Statcast confirms his 4 pitch mix (85 thrown in total) was CH (25), FC (24), SI (19), and SL (17).

Starting with the SI because it appeared to be his best fastball, it was 90.9 with 7.2" of arm-side run and 5.1" of rise (almost all pitches "rise" compared to a theoretical ball thrown with no spin). That's a bit below average velocity, below average arm-side run, and roughly average sink.

The cutter was thrown at 88.8 with 0.4" glove-side movement, and 5.8" of rise. That's a bit below average velocity, and below average movement in both directions.

The slider had a velocity of 81.8, moved to the glove-side 0.2", and had 2.9" of sink (breaking balls tend to have some top spin and truly sink). That's a pretty slow slider with poor glove-side movement, but the sink is very good.

The change was thrown 2.6 mph slower than the cutter, and 4.7 mph slower than the sinker, both of which are below average. The 6.8" of arm-side run is below average, but the 1.7" of rise is very good.

Add all that up, and you get a pitcher with very mediocre stuff. His best strategy will be to use the good downward movement on the sinker, slider and change to induce as much contact on the ground as possible. He's definitely nothing to get excited about, but as a cheap crafty innings eater he definitely has a spot. I think I would pencil him in as the 5th SP for a while and let him face 18-20 batters per game, making the rotation Fried/Morton/Anderson/Wright/Elder.
 
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Enscheff said:
Turns out the eye test was mostly right. Statcast confirms his 4 pitch mix (85 thrown in total) was CH (25), FC (24), SI (19), and SL (17).

Starting with the SI because it appeared to be his best fastball, it was 90.9 with 7.2" of arm-side run and 5.1" of rise (almost all pitches "rise" compared to a theoretical ball thrown with no spin). That's a bit below average velocity, below average arm-side run, and roughly average sink.

The cutter was thrown at 88.8 with 0.4" glove-side movement, and 5.8" of rise. That's a bit below average velocity, and below average movement in both directions.

The slider had a velocity of 81.8, moved to the glove-side 0.2", and had 2.9" of sink (breaking balls tend to have some top spin and truly sink). That's a pretty slow slider with poor glove-side movement, but the sink is very good.

The change was thrown 2.6 mph slower than the cutter, and 4.7 mph slower than the sinker, both of which are below average. The 6.8" of arm-side run is below average, but the 1.7" of rise is very good.

Add all that up, and you get a pitcher with very mediocre stuff. His best strategy will be to use the good downward movement on the sinker, slider and change to induce as much contact on the ground as possible. He's definitely nothing to get excited about, but as a cheap crafty innings eater he definitely has a spot. I think I would pencil him in as the 5th SP for a while and let him face 18-20 batters per game, making the rotation Fried/Morton/Anderson/Wright/Elder. Other rotation pretenders like Strider and Ynoa move to the multi-inning relief role.
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You like elder better than strider?
 
Enscheff said:
Turns out the eye test was mostly right. Statcast confirms his 4 pitch mix (85 thrown in total) was CH (25), FC (24), SI (19), and SL (17).

Starting with the SI because it appeared to be his best fastball, it was 90.9 with 7.2" of arm-side run and 5.1" of rise (almost all pitches "rise" compared to a theoretical ball thrown with no spin). That's a bit below average velocity, below average arm-side run, and roughly average sink.

The cutter was thrown at 88.8 with 0.4" glove-side movement, and 5.8" of rise. That's a bit below average velocity, and below average movement in both directions.

The slider had a velocity of 81.8, moved to the glove-side 0.2", and had 2.9" of sink (breaking balls tend to have some top spin and truly sink). That's a pretty slow slider with poor glove-side movement, but the sink is very good.

The change was thrown 2.6 mph slower than the cutter, and 4.7 mph slower than the sinker, both of which are below average. The 6.8" of arm-side run is below average, but the 1.7" of rise is very good.

Add all that up, and you get a pitcher with very mediocre stuff. His best strategy will be to use the good downward movement on the sinker, slider and change to induce as much contact on the ground as possible. He's definitely nothing to get excited about, but as a cheap crafty innings eater he definitely has a spot. I think I would pencil him in as the 5th SP for a while and let him face 18-20 batters per game, making the rotation Fried/Morton/Anderson/Wright/Elder. Other rotation pretenders like Strider and Ynoa move to the multi-inning relief role.
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You're right that it matched the eye test. Nothing really special about his stuff but he mixes his pitches well and seems to have a good idea of how to get the most out of his stuff. He kind of reminded me of a right handed Dallas Keuchel. Not the excellent one from several years ago. More the one from the last few years.

Low ceiling, high floor kind of guy.
 
Seemed to get a lot of swings up in the zone. Looked like a decent piece.

He no hit the TB rays spring squad last Tuesday for 4ip.
 
Small sample size warning:

Austin Riley has reduced his K rate by 42% while increasing his BB rate by 134%.

Might be time to get him a 10 year deal....
 
msstate7 said:
You like elder better than strider?
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Just based on what I've seen, Strider appears to lose effectiveness after ~50-60 pitches. Coupled with the fact he's a 2-pitch guy tells me he will be best suited facing 3-10 batters over 1-3 innings, or a lock down 1 inning guy.

I think Strider coming in after someone like Elder could be very effective since they are so different.
 
Assuming Ozuna continues to hit well, I'd prefer we try to use it as a means to offload him. I know with his 'stigma' and contract it still may be difficult to do that, but I'd rather just be free of him and look for something else. I hate that in rooting for the Braves to succeed, it also basically means I'm rooting for him to succeed, too. It genuinely makes it more difficult for me to get excited for the Braves.
 
smootness said:
Assuming Ozuna continues to hit well, I'd prefer we try to use it as a means to offload him. I know with his 'stigma' and contract it still may be difficult to do that, but I'd rather just be free of him and look for something else. I hate that in rooting for the Braves to succeed, it also basically means I'm rooting for him to succeed, too. It genuinely makes it more difficult for me to get excited for the Braves.
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I am not a huge Ozuna fan.. never have been, but I don't think much of the DV case. The video I saw was fairly inconclusive that he was hitting his wife and might have been more defending himself from her attacks. At this point, I am just moving on from it and feel it was handled by our judicial system and that is enough for me.
 
smootness said:
Assuming Ozuna continues to hit well, I'd prefer we try to use it as a means to offload him. I know with his 'stigma' and contract it still may be difficult to do that, but I'd rather just be free of him and look for something else. I hate that in rooting for the Braves to succeed, it also basically means I'm rooting for him to succeed, too. It genuinely makes it more difficult for me to get excited for the Braves.
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Would you have been taken Jeffrey Simmons back his senior year at state? I would've.

I think both deals are terrible, but neither rose to the level of jail time in court. I think people deserve second chances. Much like I'd like a 2nd chance on giving up on the braves in game 5 (haha - only this sentence... rest of it, I'm serious)
 
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