Joe Musgrove came into the season viewed by many as a breakout candidate, and it’s easy to see why. The 28-year-old Pirate-turned-Padre possesses plus stuff, and the change of scenery — from Pittsburgh to his hometown of San Diego, no less — portends more success…. particularly in the won-loss column. Musgrove went a paltry 1-5 with the N.L. Central cellar-dwellers in 2020, while his new club is poised to win, per our projections, 94 games in the current campaign.

By and large, the breakout has already happened, and not solely because the 6-foot-5, 235-pound right-hander hurled the year’s first no-hitter on Friday night. His 2020 peripherals were those of a pitcher who’d turned the corner. With the caveat that it was a pandemic-shortened season, Mugrove set career-bests in ERA, FIP, and strikeout rate, and more importantly, he did so with improved pitch profiles. Per StatCast, the spin and movement of his offerings were better than they’d ever been.

I asked the righty about that in a spring-training Zoom session.

“I’m not really a big analytical guy; I’m not big on the Rapsodo numbers,” responded Musgrove. “I look at that information more as a benchmark. When I have real strong outings, or I have real poor outings, I look at the numbers to see where they’re at when I’m good, or when I’m poor. But by no means am I going home and saying, ‘I need to get 200 more RPM on my curveball,’ or ‘I need to change the spin axis on this pitch.’ I kind of just let our analytical guys coach me up a little bit on that, and offer suggestions where they can.” Read the rest of this entry »

Hunter Brown has helium. Under the radar until recently, the 22-year-old right-hander raised eyebrows during Fall Instructional League, and he continued to do so this spring with the Astros. A power arsenal is the reason why. Houston’s No. 3 prospect according to MLB Pipeline (our own rankings are forthcoming; he was ninth on last year’s list), Brown features a four-pitch mix that includes an explosive mid-90s heater and a hammer curveball.

His background befits the low profile he brought with him to pro ball. A Detroit native, Brown played collegiately at Division II Wayne State University, and he lasted until the penultimate pick of the fifth round of the 2019 draft. That he didn’t hear his name called earlier is yet another part of his underdog story.

Brown — currently at Houston’s alternate site awaiting the start of the minor-league campaign — addressed the path he’s taken, and the plus pitches that promise to take him to the top, shortly before the Astros broke camp to start the major-league season.

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Laurila: You played at Wayne State. How did that come to be?

Hunter Brown: “I had the opportunity to do a little bit of catching, and hopefully pitch, at Eastern Michigan as well. But I was told by coach Ryan Kelley, over at Wayne State, that I’d be able to come in and play as a freshman. I knew I wasn’t going to get that opportunity at Eastern Michigan — I’d probably be catching bullpens and redshirting my freshman year — and I kind of wanted to go somewhere and play right away. I also probably would have gone to Wayne State for academics if I wasn’t going to end up playing college baseball, so it all worked out. I really liked downtown Detroit, so it was a great fit for me.”

Laurila: When did you start realizing you had a legitimate shot to play pro ball?

Brown: “Well, I wanted to play pro ball from as young as I can remember, but probably my sophomore-year summer when I was with the Bethesda Big Train in the Cal Ripken Summer League. That’s when I started really believing, because I played with some guys from the SEC, and power-five schools, and had a pretty good summer. That’s where I thought I made that jump and would be able to play pro ball someday.”

Laurila: What clicked for you? Read the rest of this entry »

It’s appropriate to begin this post with a caveat: Today is April 6, and the Detroit Tigers have played all of four games. As such, any statistical snapshot is of the small-sample-size variety and should be taken with a large grain of salt.

With that out of the way, let’s take a look at what Nomar Mazara has done over four games — or more specifically, what he hasn’t done. Through his first 13 plate appearances, the perennial breakout candidate has a .538 slugging percentage, and only one of his six ball-in-play outs has come on a groundball. In his last eight times up, Mazara has gone 1B, 1B, 1B, HR, F-8, F-6, F-8, F-8. Moreover, the penultimate of those fly-outs, per StatCast, travelled 421 feet to the deepest reaches of Comerica Park.

Again, a small sample, tiny even. Still, might these early results portend the breakout that people have been waiting for? Is the 6-foot-4, 215-pound outfielder finally going to bid farewell to a high groundball rate — Mazara’s career mark is a worm-killing 49.4% — and begin driving balls into the air with some semblance of consistency?

With the caveat (there’s that word again) that we’ve been fooled before, Mazara might be on his way to doing just that. And contrary to what you might think, a swing change isn’t one of the reasons. I learned as much a few weeks ago when I asked the left-handed hitter about his longstanding groundball issues. Read the rest of this entry »

Collin McHugh is cerebral both on and away from the diamond, and that attribute was on full display in a recent Zoom call with reporters. The Tampa Bay Rays right-hander fielded questions on multiple topics, most notably his craft and the possibility of MLB’s moving this summer’s All-Star Game from Atlanta to another locale. I asked McHugh how his new team compares to one of his old ones in terms of pitching analytics.

“The behind-the-scenes things are a little different,” responded McHugh, referring to his tenure with the Houston Astros from 2014-2019. “I think they probably have a more well-versed staff over here, in total, of being able to communicate the advanced information to guys. I worked a lot with [Brent Strom] in Houston, and Strommy and I got to know each other really well. He was kind of my guru, or whatever you want to call it. If I had questions, I went to him.

“Here, it feels, at least to this point, like there is a more holistic approach,” continued McHugh. “From [pitching coach] Kyle Snyder — starting with him — and the pitchers, to Stan [Borowski] in the bullpen, all the way through the data-analytics system, then all the way up the ladder. I’ve had conversations with [General Manager] Eric Neander about these things, and have since we were in negotiations. So it feels like a very top-to-bottom system over here.”

McHugh signed a free-agent contract with the Rays in late February. Asked if he was approached about the possibility of tweaking any facet of his game, he said that wasn’t the case at all. Read the rest of this entry »

A.J. Hinch’s first Opening Day as a player was on April 1, 1998. There were butterflies, and not for that reason alone. Catching and batting seventh in the Oakland A’s lineup, Hinch was making his big-league debut. I asked him about it during a recent Zoom call.

“I remember going into the game nervous on both ends,” admitted Hinch, who was 23 years old at the time. “I had to face Pedro Martinez in his first American League start, with the Red Sox, and I had to catch Tom Candiotti, who was a knuckleballer. I knew that the catching was going to be easier than the hitting.”

That proved to be the case… despite his best intentions. Hinch professes to having had designs — if not expectations — on getting his first hit against the Hall of Famer. He imagined himself standing on first base, asking for the ball to be tossed into the dugout for safekeeping. Martinez’s name would then be etched upon it, along with the date, and it would find a home on Hinch’s mantle. No longer just a baseball, it would henceforth be a cherished memento. Read the rest of this entry »

Simeon Woods Richardson has big-time potential. Blessed with an impressive combination of power, finesse, and command, the 6-foot-3, 222-pound right-hander is No. 3 on our Toronto Blue Jays Top Prospects list, and No. 72 on our 2021 Top 100 Prospects list. Just 20 years old, Woods Richardson fashions himself — stylistically speaking — as a modern-day Satchel Paige.

More on that later.

Born and raised in Sugar Land, Texas, Woods Richardson was taken 48th-overall in the 2018 draft by the New York Mets, only to be traded a year later, along with Anthony Kay, to the Blue Jays in exchange for Marcus Stroman. The approach he brought to Toronto was one of a burgeoning craftsman. I learned as much when I asked — in a twist on a question I often ask hitters — if he views pitching as more of an art or a science.

“Both,” responded Woods Richardson. “With pitching you need some feel, and then you have the analytics of it. It’s, ‘Okay, you’re doing this and you’re doing that, you have this break and you have that break.’ So I think it’s a mesh of both worlds. But I like the art side of pitching, where you’re hitting a spot three, four times in a row. You’re keeping them off balance. That’s what I like.”

A self-described visual learner, Woods Richardson prefers video over number-crunching, although he does pay heed to the spin efficiency of his four-seamer — an impressive 98% that he aspires to improve. Delivered at 92-94 mph, it’s one of five pitches in his arsenal. He also throws a two-seamer, a curveball, a slider, and a circle changeup, the last of which he’s diligently honed. ”Shaky” when he broke into pro ball, it’s now considered by many to be his best weapon. Read the rest of this entry »

Addressing one of his pitchers in a mid-month Zoom session, Colorado Rockies manager Bud Black said that his velocity was “good for this point of the spring.” (That may not be an exact quote, but it’s close.) The statement prompted me to ask a question that elicited an expansive response. In a nutshell, I wanted to know how often Black is seeing guys who, having trained for velocity over the offseason, come into camp already throwing gas. Moreover, does he find that concerning?

“I could get longwinded here,” Black began. “As you can imagine, when we talk about velocity and what pitchers have done, really over the last five years… maybe it started about 10 years ago with programs to truly increase velocity. We’ve seen that over the years, with many pitchers pumping their velocity.

“Coming into camp, I think there are certain pitchers, on certain clubs, that are trying to make the team. They have to show their stuff right away, from Day One, whether it’s in bullpens, batting-practice games, or B-games, trying to impress coaching staffs [and] front offices of their ability. They want to show that they can make a big-league roster. Other guys have trained in the offseason, and they want to see if those training methods have resulted in increased velocity in games. They might turn it loose right from the get-go. Read the rest of this entry »

Positional versatility has become increasingly important now that teams are carrying 13 or 14 pitchers on their rosters. That leaves benches bereft of depth, meaning that an ability to move around the diamond makes a player especially valuable — if not essential. One-dimensional non-regulars are marginal assets unless they excel in a specific area.

In the opinion of A.J. Hinch, the term “utility player” is anything but a pejorative. Moreover, everyday players who display versatility make a manager’s job easier.

“I don’t want “utility” to be explained as a negative thing,” the Tigers’ skipper told reporters recently. “A utility player has traditionally been defined as a guy who can’t play every day. And that’s not true. Some guys it is, some guys it isn’t. I caution everybody that it’s not a slight.

“When you have an everyday guy that is elite at that position, absolutely, you’re going to leave him at that position,” continued Hinch, who circled back to his Astros days and cited Alex Bregman having played short when Carlos Correa was hurt. “That’s a multiple position for an elite player.”

Hinch’s Detroit team clearly lacks the top-end talent that he had at his disposal during his Houston tenure, which suggests mixing-and-matching might be common in Motown this summer. If spring training is any indication, it might even be the M.O. Hinch has done no shortage of shuffling, and come the regular season, the likes of Jeimer Candelario, Niko Goodrum, Jonathan Schoop, and Harold Castro will be utilized as moving pieces in hopes of optimizing the lineup. Ditto Isaac Paredes, once he’s called up from the alternate site. Read the rest of this entry »

The Detroit Tigers have a number of promising young pitchers, as well as a handful of veteran arms who retain upside. The bulk of them will have to thrive if the club hopes to compete in the AL Central anytime soon. But while there’s little doubt that Detroit’s rebuild is moving steadily in the right direction, the franchise’s fortunes will largely be determined by how soon and to what extent the pitching staff blossoms. Now under the watchful eye of Chris Fetter, Tigers pitchers head into the 2021 season with a plethora of potential, but also no shortage of question marks.

Here are conversational snapshots from, and about, six Detroit hurlers.

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Tyler Alexander has the most-varied mix on the Tigers’ staff. The 26-year-old left-hander has five pitches in his arsenal, and last season he threw each of them between 103 and 140 times (per Statcast). His second-most-frequent offering was a slider that yielded middling-at-best results. Despite an improved movement profile and a 31% whiff rate, opposing hitters logged a .333 batting average and a .606 slugging percentage when they put the pitch in play.

I mentioned that lack of success to Alexander, pointing out that he got, on average, nine more inches of drop, and slightly more horizontal, compared to the previous year. Why the lack of results?

“Well, I throw good sliders and I throw bad sliders,” was his reasoned response. “And I would assume the bad ones got hit. You know, I’ve worked a lot on that pitch. I’ve worked really hard on on finding the consistency with it. For instance, I thought I was really good yesterday. The outing before that, I thought it was terrible. It’s a feel pitch for me, and I’m slowly starting to get there. I’ve had issues getting it down in the zone; I’ve had issues getting it backdoor. In every interview I’ve ever had, I’ve said, ‘I’m working on my slider, I’m working on my slider.’ I’m always going to be working on it. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes it’s bad.” Read the rest of this entry »

I asked Baltimore Orioles hitting coach Don Long a question on Monday morning, and he responded with a lengthy answer. I wanted to know, relative to years past, how much more frequently players are approaching him with ideas of changing their swing, and what he tends to tell them when that happens.

“Honestly, I’m not a believer in changing swings,” the veteran hitting instructor responded. “I operate under the thought that [for] every hitter, their best swing, they already possess. The thing that gets in the way of them being able to access their best swing, consistently, usually has to do with their thinking, their timing, their position, or their ability to be really good with their eyes.

“You’ve probably heard the old Michelangelo story, right? Supposedly, he carved this statue of David out of this block of granite, and they said, ‘How did you carve such a beautiful statue out of a block of stone?’ He said, ‘I simply chipped away at the stone until the statue revealed itself.’ That’s how I look at a hitter’s swing. You already possess your best swing — it’s already there — so let’s not spend time chasing a good swing, or chasing something that you already know how to do. Let’s chip away at the thing that’s getting in the way of that. And for most guys, the thing that interrupts the physical part of their game is the mental part of the game.

“I can give you an example. I had a guy come to me a couple days ago in the cage with an exasperated, ‘Man, what’s going on? I don’t know what to do.’ I said, ‘Let me ask you a question.’ I picked a ball up out of the basket and said, ‘What’s this pitch going to be?’ He looked at me and said, ‘I don’t know.’ I said, ‘Yeah, you do.’ Read the rest of this entry »