Minor League Thread Part Deux

seanyates said:
I wonder why they felt the need to promote him so quickly. What's the rush?
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Braves philosophy and promoting some of the pitchers has been puzzling to say the least. I think 50 and myself said the exact same thing when we talked about AJSS and it still took him 2 years to find footing. My train of thought and these are just my observations.:

The pitchers that they have promoted were very young for their classification. All are very cerebral. They make adjustments fairly easily and even though they may get hit hit around, they do hold their own. AJ showed resilience and Didier will too. At least I hope.

The next train of thought, even though I think it should be done later on in season, is to give them exposure to more advanced hitters. That’s a blessing and a curse because I personally think you can shatter the confidence of someone who is not made up to deal with adversity. The braves have been lucky because AJ did show the propensity to deal with adversity.

As for Didier, he's a confident kid and when you watch him you don't know if he's throwing a no hitter or giving up runs. No one's mentioned him more than me...but this is...interesting. I'd lump Ritchie in there as well. Caminiti should show success in Augusta. But the way the Braves are moving their talented arms..who knows....
 
Deester11 said:
Braves philosophy and promoting some of the pitchers has been puzzling to say the least. I think 50 and myself said the exact same thing when we talked about AJSS and it still took him 2 years to find footing. My train of thought and these are just my observations.:

The pitchers that they have promoted were very young for their classification. All are very cerebral. They make adjustments fairly easily and even though they may get hit hit around, they do hold their own. AJ showed resilience and Didier will too. At least I hope.

The next train of thought, even though I think it should be done later on in season, is to give them exposure to more advanced hitters. That’s a blessing and a curse because I personally think you can shatter the confidence of someone who is not made up to deal with adversity. The braves have been lucky because AJ did show the propensity to deal with adversity.

As for Didier, he's a confident kid and when you watch him you don't know if he's throwing a no hitter or giving up runs. No one's mentioned him more than me...but this is...interesting. I'd lump Ritchie in there as well. Caminiti should show success in Augusta. But the way the Braves are moving their talented arms..who knows....
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I think there is some benefit in letting some pitchers get hit around a bit in the minors and letting them find their way through it without them putting too much pressure on themselves.

We have seen the spotlight be too big for some "finished" prospects when they get to the bigs. They struggle, put too much pressure on themselves, and because their team is trying to compete, those kids never really get a chance to work through those struggles at this level. I know Glavine and Smoltz credit a lot of their success to being allowed to work through their early career struggles at this level, rather than being demoted back to AAA constantly.
 
Carp said:
I think there is some benefit in letting some pitchers get hit around a bit in the minors and letting them find their way through it without them putting too much pressure on themselves.

We have seen the spotlight be too big for some "finished" prospects when they get to the bigs. They struggle, put too much pressure on themselves, and because their team is trying to compete, those kids never really get a chance to work through those struggles at this level. I know Glavine and Smoltz credit a lot of their success to being allowed to work through their early career struggles at this level, rather than being demoted back to AAA constantly.
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I definitely agree with that to a certain point. The problem is when you bring pitchers up that young and they pitch in the major leagues, you run the risk of yo-yoing them if you’re a club that is a perennial playoff team. If your team is much more of a developmental team than it makes sense for a pitcher that’s close to developed to learn in the major leagues. Smoltz(1988) and Glavine (1987) had the benefit of some Braves teams that were not very good when they first started their run so they could develop without fear of being yo-yo'ed back-and-forth. They blossomed in 1989.
 
Hudson2 said:
What is Didier's repertoire?
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Fastball...slider...split something. He's a almost 3 pitch pitcher considering he's grown each year. From a 90-93 FB...UP to 98 now. I say sit comfortably at 93-94. He varies his speed which I love. It plays because typically his command of it is pretty good. His strikeouts are all over the zone but when elevated it seems harder than it is. His slider is deadly and darts away from RH hitters. I love that pitch. His splitter has good bite but I think it hangs too much when he's not on. When all of those pitches are working, he's IT.
 
Deester11 said:
Fastball...slider...split something. He's an almost 3 pitch pitcher considering he's grown each year. From a 90-93 FB...UP to 98 now. I say sit comfortably at 93-94. He varies his speed which I love. It plays because typically his command of it is pretty good. His strikeouts are all over the zone but when elevated it seems harder than it is. His slider is deadly and darts away from RH hitters. I love that pitch. His splitter has good bite but I think it hangs too much when he's not on. When all of those pitches are working, he's IT.
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Awesome job as usual brother! Got me excited about Didier now.
 
Just for some context. The first pic for Fuentes is a high FB the batter missed.Screenshot 2025-06-13 at 6.04.16 PM.png

The next pic is his slider that the batter missed.
 

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Tornes is 2 for 3. Exit velocity on both were 106 according to Gaurav. Our 16 year old pitching phenom (Reyes) say 96-100 in his last start. Dare I get excited? Will be down next week to see em.
 

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Hudson2 said:
That man looks 36 😂. Ritchie was having a good game last night until the rain came.
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Lmao...he's big af too. He grew like crazy from 15 to 16 though. At 20...he's gonna be a beast. Lol. I will say he has easy mechanics. He's not always trying to throw 100...but it's crazy at 16 to be doing that.
 
Hudson2 said:
Yeah he's a big dude. How's his command?
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Surprisingly not as bad as I would think a 16 year old throwing that hard would be. He doesn't miss wildly and he's working hard on secondary pitches. Gonna be fun to see if he can harness the power.
 
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