Stephen Strasburg 3.5.09
by yoda1 on Mar 5, 2009 9:55 PM EST
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It took me a while to find the stadium but thankfully I made it in time for the National Anthem. USD, for some reason, had a bunch of relievers going the entire game. No one went more than 2 IP. Denault, the starter for USD, threw some wicked breaking balls (side arm) and held SDSU in check in the first. I thought he was pretty impressive but he didn't last too long.
Strasburg looked intimidating on the mound. He was tall but not scrawny and looked like his entire body was coming at you as he pitched. Strasburg works VERY quickly. I mean VERY quickly. He looked like he was having trouble warming up as his first two warm up pitches missed the plate by about 4 feet and reached the backstop. He settled down and retired the first 3 batters rather easily by recording 2 Ks and most importantly, hitting 101 MPH, his top speed for the outing (I was sitting next to the gun dude).
The next inning, he gave up a long double and a single immediately following it. It looked as if he was frustrated with himself and he showed it as he walked the next batter. USD's coach kept trying to slow him down and advised his hitters to do the same.
Third inning was key for USD, getting their last run on a HR by their catcher, McCoy. Stras was clearly not happy and settled down after this. If I recall correctly, he retired every batter and recorded at least 2 Ks each IP for the rest of the outing.
The gun hit 95+ for every fastball he threw, reaching 100 a few times. However, I was more impressed with his breaking ball. He was throwing a 80-84 MPH slider that even fooled the umpire multiple times. He had excellent command of the pitch and it seemed like every slider wound up on the same spot. USD hitters were sitting on his fastball and had zero chance to hit the slider.
The most impressive thing was how he worked McCoy, who hit a HR off him in his previous AB. He threw him nothing but sliders, basically saying "go ahead and sit on my fastball". I got a good chuckle as McCoy didn't even lift the bat off his shoulder and K'd looking.
Stras got stronger as the game went on. Working quickly and making it look easy. I don't think each subsequent inning he pitched lasted more than 10 minutes. Hopefully he can keep his head on his shoulders and stay healthy because he looks like he could be the real deal.
Side note: I saw a glimpse of tony Gwynn as he walked through the dugout. He is big and you can't miss him but he kept in the shadows the entire game. :-D
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Thanks for the writeup.
And the picture at the bottom isn’t working.
Question: On McCoy’s homer, where’d he hit it, how far did it go, etc.? It was his first collegiate homer, and I was wondering what sort of aid Strasburg’s velocity gave him on punching it out.
Now does he have a changeup
If not, he won’t be an ace.
Hahahahaha!
That’s silly and also not true. He has an 80 fastball and a 65 curve with plus command. He can still be an ace regardless of his third pitch.
Tools Whore
i think he was kidding
there are multiple guys who throw just two pitches 95% of the time and are still aces.
Santana and Webb come to mind right away.
Santana?
He uses a 3 pitch mix (fastball, slider, change). Webb also relies on 3 pitches (sinker, change, curve).
also..
maddux in the mid 1990’s was pretty much just a two seamer/changeup
if you have two plus plus pitches you can just show a 3rd pitch
I'm sure
That people said the same thing about Lincecum. His change up is so good now that he used it more than his curve in 08.
Lincecum's change
Has become a helluva swing and miss pitch. And it’s actually a splitter, but everyone refers to it as a changeup. Scary if the slider Lincecum added last year gets better too. It was more of a show-me grounball type pitch in ’08.
Matt Cain throws a high % of fastballs too. Don’t have the numbers in fron tof me, but its probably near 75%…he seems to be throwing his curve and change less and less.
According to Fangraphs...
Cain throws the heat about 65% of the time. They have the slider listed at about 13, and then his curve and change at about 10 each.
"My mom always taught me it's better to laugh at yourself than to laugh at others. She was so wrong. ;)" -Pedrophile
Exactly
Maddux had a plus curve that he flat didn’t need and that two seamer was really about 5 different pitches.
"We can't expect the American People to jump from Capitalism to Communism,
but we can assist their elected leaders in giving them small doses of Socialism,
until they awaken one day to find that they have Communism." --Nikita Khrushchev
by jeg on Mar 8, 2009 3:13 AM EST up reply actions
Rich Harden
Rich Harden jumps out at me as an example of this. Last year (for the A’s at least) he stopped throwing his slider in an effort to stay healthy and relied on his fastball and changeup and the results were pretty good.
Grip
I am pretty sure he mixed a few in there but he stuck mostly with his FB/Slider combo.
His command is ridiculous. He only walked 1 but only because the ump was fooled on a few pitches.
Actually looking again
that frame may not show what Im talking about… point was, he doesnt tuck his arm in right
yoda1
Just wondering if you had any objection to a reposting of these great photos/videos elsewhere on the web. You’d be properly attributed (however you wanted), of course. If it’s cool, you can let me know here or through the email in my profile. If not, it’s all good – thanks for putting these up in the first place.
Not at all
I am all about sharing. I posted this on several websites already including Youtube. I am hoping to attend many more games and posting updates. :)
Since this a Strasburg related thread
I am wondering what people think on his velocity translating to pro ball. I really find it hard to believe he it is not going to be easy hitting the same numbers pitching every 5/6 days instead of every weekend. Many college pitchers see a downgrade in velocity after transitioning to pro ball, is there any reason to think Strasburg will not?
Also, I am surprised to see no questions surrounding the possibility that he reverts to his high school work ethic and picks up considerable weight. This could destroy his potential impact if it ever occurrs, not to mention what kind of injuries it could lead to.
by tdot mariner fan on Mar 6, 2009 12:44 PM EST reply actions
That's...
looking for flaws where there really aren’t any there. He can lose a few ticks on his fastball and still be an overpowering pitcher. Nobody expects him to work at 100 consistently.
Worrying that his work ethic will revert is foolish – it’s armchair psychology, and it’s a bizarre hypothetical that exists for any player out there. What if Matt Weiters falls in love with crab cakes once he gets to Baltimore and gains 50 pounds? What if David Price gets too cocky because he thinks he’s a sure thing to make the rotation and his conditioning slips?
Make predictions based on things you know, not things that might potentially happen if something goes horribly, horribly wrong. Stephen Strasburg has stuff and pitchability not seen since Mark Prior. Barring anything unforeseen, he’s going to be very, very good.
People are allowed to worry.
And it’s not like highly-regarded pitchers don’t flame out. Things happen, including things ballplayers do wrong, not just bad circumstances. So there’s still a possibility his work ethic slips (though low). Even though I don’t like to use this example, all it took was some injuries to lead to a drug addiction for Josh Hamilton, something no one expected.
You can’t just throw away any evidence of things in his past creeping up again. Players have weaknesses, even the great ones.
They were just questions
I am just exploring different avenues. I am not trying to say he is not the #1 pick.
On the velocity, I was wondering if he would drop from working at 94-96mph to something like 91-94mph. I am not saying he is, I am just asking is there reasons to indicate this might occurr.
by tdot mariner fan on Mar 6, 2009 1:58 PM EST up reply actions
Sure
There are dozens of things that could go wrong. With anybody. With a prospect, however, you should be more interested in what is already there, though you’re absolutely right that there are huge caveats, from loss of velocity to loss of control (a la Rick Ankiel) to loss of confidence (a la Zack Greinke) to injury (Brien Taylor) to a thousand other things that could happen
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Strasburg..
struck out the side in the 6th, 7th, and 8th innings.
Damn, this kid is good.
So I've always wondered
Was Strasburg not that highly thought of as a prep or something, or was he a late bloomer? Seems like he didn’t get much attention out of high school (although I could be mistaken).
Hello.
There have been a couple articles about that.
His stuff was draftable, but no where near where it is today. He was fat (like 260+lbs), touched 90 and scouts hated his make-up. He apparently had terrible mound presence. The example given in the article I read said an example of this would be him throwing a no hitter into the 5th inning and a guy would get a hit on a dribbler to third and he would get frustrated, lose his composure and give up a couple runs.
The story goes, he got to SDSU and his pitching coach told him what the scouts were saying behind his back, that he was fat, weak minded, didn’t have what it takes and it got him extremely motivated. He lost 30+lbs and picked up 10mph on his fastball and the rest is history.
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