When the American League Division Series begins on Tuesday, the Seattle Mariners will take on the Houston Astros as the ultimate underdogs. The Mariners are in the midst of their first postseason run in over 20 years, while the Astros have made their way to the ALCS in each of the past six seasons. No matter how you slice it, the Astros are the overwhelming favorites.

In fact, this might be the most winnable ALDS matchup the Astros have had over their seven-year run. Never before has the gulf between the Astros and their opponent been this wide:

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Two summers ago, I asked Greg Mroz — then a radio broadcaster for the Clinton Lumber Kings — which of their players I should interview and write about. He recommended Zack Littell. I proceeded to do so for a Sunday Notes column, despite never having heard of him. Not too many people had. At the time, Seattle’s selection in the 11th round of the 2013 draft barely registered a blip on prospect radar.

Mroz deserves some props, because Littell is now living large. Playing for two different organizations, at two different levels and for three different teams, Littell finished this season with a record of 20-1. The most recent of his victories came on Wednesday with Minnesota’s Double-A affiliate, the Chattanooga Lookouts, in the Southern League playoffs.

No one saw it coming — you can’t predict 20-1 — and the same could probably be said of his multiple changes of address. Seattle swapped Littell for James Pazos last November, and the Yankees subsequently traded him to the Twins as part of July’s Jaime Garcia deal.

“The first one was out of nowhere,” Littell told me. “I was at home, hanging out in the offseason, and got a call — one minute I was a Mariner, and the next minute I was a Yankee. Coming to the Twins… I got scratched from a start the night before, so I kind of knew something was up, but I thought I was going to the A’s because of all the Sonny-Gray-to-the-Yankees rumors. But when I got the call from (New York GM Brian) Cashman, he told me I was going to the Twins.”

The 21-year-old North Carolina native is smart enough to know that W-L records are to be taken with a grain of salt. Read the rest of this entry »

When Seattle selected JP Sears 333rd overall in this year’s draft, they knew they were getting a pitcher with a propensity for punch outs. In his junior season at The Citadel, the 21-year-old left-hander fanned 142 batters — the most in Division I baseball — in 95.1 innings. What they couldn’t possibly have known was that his strikeout rate would rise once he got to pro ball.

In 17 relief appearances between short-season Everett and Low-A Clinton, the 11th-round pick struck out — drum roll, please — a staggering 51 batters in 27.2 innings. He also allowed just 13 hits and two earned runs.

You can’t hit what you can’t see, and according to Clinton Lumber Kings pitching coach Doug Mathis, that’s the secret to the southpaw’s success.

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Four years ago, Manny Margot was 18 years old and playing against older competition in short-season ball. He was more than holding his own. Equal parts precocious and promising, he was one of the highest-ceiling prospects in the Red Sox system. Intrigued by the parallels, I wrote an article titled Manuel Margot: Boston’s Next Bogaerts?

That never came to fruition. Following the 2015 season, Margot was sent to the Padres as part of the package that delivered Craig Kimbrel to the AL East. The change of scenery has been to his liking. One year removed from a stellar season in Triple-A, the native of San Cristobal, Dominican Republic is now San Diego’s starting centerfielder.

While some things have changed, others remain the same. In 2013, Margot told me the game is “all enthusiasm” for him, and that he “never wants to leave this dream.” He echoed those thoughts when I caught up to him earlier this week.

“You always have to play happy,” Margot told me with the help of Padres translator (and Baseball Operations assistant) David Longley. “That doesn’t change as you go through baseball. You’re going to go through some bad streaks, but you put on a good face and those bad times are going to get better. Always play happy.” Read the rest of this entry »

Daniel Norris has no illusions of being Clayton Kershaw, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to emulate him. Who wouldn’t? Kershaw is arguably baseball’s best pitcher, and — according to the Detroit Tigers southpaw — they share important characteristics. For those reasons, Norris watches “almost all of Kershaw’s starts,” and has for some time.

“I like watching him pitch,” Norris told me on Friday. “And because we’re similar, I can learn from him. He’s the best in the world — he’s Kershaw — but he’s a lefty, he’s typically 93-95, he’s got a slider that’s 88-90, he’s got a curveball that’s 73-76, and he’s started throwing a changeup. That’s four pitches that I throw, as well. If I can pick up something from the way he maybe throws his slider down-and-in more often than he goes backdoor… stuff like that. I like how he attacks hitters.”

Norris also likes how Kershaw, despite being elite, continues to evolve. He pointed to how the Dodgers ace has not only started throwing more changeups, he’s also “kind of dropping down from time to time, to give hitters different angles.” Norris has noticed subtle “delivery adjustments” over the years, where Kershaw appeared to be “working on mechanical rhythms and tempos.”

Norris is currently doing exactly that. Consistency and command have been issues for the 24-year-old former Toronto Blue Jay, and he feels that a work-in-progress tweak may help solve those woes. He described it as “kind of a higher leg kick, and getting a stronger front side.” One of the goals is a freer and easier delivery. Rather than being out there “trying not to walk guys,” he feels he needs to “not think about anything, just let it go and trust my stuff.” Read the rest of this entry »

Manny Acta was managing the Cleveland Indians when I first interviewed him, in 2010. He’s now the third base coach for the Seattle Mariners, and while many things change over the course of seven years, others will stay the same. Acta continues to embrace analytics as much as anyone who wears a baseball uniform to work.

When the Mariners visited Fenway Park last week, I asked Acta what he’s been observing as the club hopscotches across the league.

“Everybody has the same access to all the analytics,” answered Acta. “It’s about who has the courage to actually use it to their advantage, and to push the envelope. Some teams are still a little bit more old-school than others. You can notice the difference when teams come through town. Some are more aggressive with shifting, and some do different things against different players. Everybody in the league knows which teams are the more proactive with how they use analytics.”

Playing devil’s advocate, I proposed that in some cases it may not be a lack of courage, but rather a belief that traditional strategies are more sound. His response suggested that while that may be true, it isn’t particularly smart. Read the rest of this entry »

The terms “two-seamer” and “sinker” are synonymous. Or are they? It depends on who you ask — and even then, there’s ambiguity in the answer. If an exercise in semantics is what you’re after, pursuing this subject with a cross section of pitchers and pitching coaches might be a good place to start.

I learned that over the past week. Prompted in part by Alex Stumpf’s article, The Death of the Sinker , I solicited the opinions of 12 — four from each team — members of the Boston Red Sox, Seattle Mariners, and Texas Rangers. Here’s what they had to say.

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Brian Bannister, Red Sox assistant pitching coach: “It’s basically the same grip, but for some power pitchers, it’s kind of a variation on the four-seamer with a little more arm-side movement; it’s really a derivative of their four-seamer. For other guys, it’s their bread-and-butter pitch where they’re trying to get the hitter to hit the top half of the ball. For some guys it misses more bats, and for other guys the purpose is to get ground balls.

“It depends on how your arm works and how your hand works through the ball. For some, it’s really more of a two-plane fastball. For others, it really goes down. Guys like Jake Arrieta, Noah Syndergaard, and Michael Fulmer throw two-seamers that end up above barrel, whereas with your Trevor Cahills and Dallas Keuchels, it ends up below barrel.”

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Triston McKenzie has a big arm. He’s also charismatic with a big heart, which helps make him a natural fit for the team that drafted him 42nd overall in 2015. As much as any organization in baseball, the pitching-rich Cleveland Indians value character and makeup.

McKenzie has all the makings of a role model, but at 19 years old, he is hesitant to set it as a goal. He would nonetheless embrace that sort of reputation.

“I wouldn’t try to put myself in that position, but if that’s what happens, that’s what happens,” said McKenzie, who has a 2.84 ERA this year with high-A Lynchburg. “I always try to set a good example for my younger (16 year old) brother, and I guess it would stem from there.”

McKenzie pays attention to players he can look up to, and model his game after. He feels that athletes who set good examples are not only “good for the culture of baseball,” they also “open eyes for a lot of people outside the game.”

His father isn’t a pitching professional — McKenzie’s parents are both physical therapist assistants — but he does have insights on the craft. Pitchability is considered one of the youngster’s strengths, and paternal advice is part of the reason. Read the rest of this entry »

Gareth Morgan’s BABIP went down on Tuesday. On the balls in play that he recorded, the Seattle Mariners outfield prospect grounded out, flew out, and singled. He had other at-bats, as well. In one of them, he fanned for the 46th time on the season. In the other two, he homered.

Morgan’s stat sheet is… intriguing. The 2014 second-round pick is slashing a solid .291/.352/.473, with four long balls, in 122 trips to the plate. He’s put up those robust numbers despite a 39.3% strikeout rate.

And then there’s his ball-in-play fortune. Prior to the aforementioned dip, it stood at .491, the highest mark in professional baseball. (He now ranks third, at .475, having been leapfrogged by Clinton Lumber Kings teammate Anthony Jimenez and Blue Jays prospect Bo Bichette.)

The 21-year-old native of Toronto, Ontario, wasn’t aware of that statistical factoid when I spoke to him after Tuesday’s game. Nor could he offer an easy explanation for the mix of whiffs and safe landings.

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The first words out of Casey Kelly’s mouth surprised me. When I asked the former top prospect how he’d describe his career, I expected something along the lines of, “It’s been frustrating.”

He said “It’s been fun.”

That’s a glass-is-half-full attitude if there ever was one. Since being taken in the first round of the 2008 draft by the Red Sox, the 27-year-old right-hander has thrown just 640 professional innings, 62 of which have come at the highest level. They haven’t been pretty innings. Kelly’s big-league ERA is an unattractive 6.39.

His future look especially bright after he was acquired by San Diego in the Anthony Rizzo–Adrian Gonzalez trade. Heading into the 2011 season, Kelly was ranked by Baseball America as the Padres top prospect (Rizzo was right behind him). Displaying a power arsenal, he went on to hurl 142 quality frames as a 21-year-old in Double-A.

Clouds were looming on the horizon. Read the rest of this entry »