Promotions are funny. There are players who seemingly teeter on the edge of the majors for years, passed over time and time again. Think Jorge Mateo, Grant Holmes, or ugh… Brent Honeywell (pre-elbow injuries). Some players sit there on the bench waiting years for their first taste of the bright light, city life of the big leagues. Former University of Florida star and 2018 first rounder Brady Singer was more fortunate. The Royals, thin for options at the top of their rotation, rolled out the righty in their second game of the 2020 season despite only 148.1 professional innings under his belt. It had always been anticipated that Singer would be quick to the majors, if only due to his relative polish.
The thing with Singer is he’s never lacked skills or pedigree. But his long-term projectability left something to be desired. What does that mean? Simply put, he’s as close to his ceiling now as he’s likely to get. He’s heavily reliant on two pitches, working fastball+slider 97.5% of the time, which is an incredibly difficult tightrope to walk as the league gets a second look. Throughout his MiLB career he’s relied more heavily on driving weak contact (>50 GB%) as opposed to missing bats (10 SwStr%). That wasn’t the case on Saturday, as he retired six by ground ball outs, striking out seven, backed by 14 swinging strikes and 18 looking. An excellent start for Singer, and I’d be lying if I told you his fastball wasn’t flashing more velocity than previously suspected.
On Saturday he looked good, but the Indians lineup missed on a few meaty center-cut fastballs early, and a bottom of the order that featured the likes of fellow debutant Daniel Johnson, as well as Bradley Zimmer, and Roberto Perez. That said the fastball sat 94-95 most of the afternoon and his tight breaking slider worked well to his gloveside, particularly effective as an out pitch versus right handed batters.
For an even more in depth scouting report on Singer, check out Matt Thompson’s just published piece.
Two more long balls from Kyle Lewis over the weekend, and after Monday’s game he’s now 6-for-14 with two homers. Lewis has picked up where he left off last September, showing a lot of in game power and an aggressive approach. I said this on the forthcoming MLB Draft show with my co-host (and noted Mariners writer) Joe Doyle; Lewis is a lesson to stay patient with top prospects. His pedigree as the 2016 Golden Spikes winner and 11th overall pick in the subsequent draft was quickly forgotten as an early catastrophic knee injury derailed Lewis’ professional career before it began. Despite the bumps in the road, Lewis has come out the otherside. Where did the production come from? Well, it’s reasonable to be skeptical, discussed below, but his home park in Double-A Arkansas is one of the toughest on right handed power in the minors, if not the toughest. To put this in perspective, Lewis played more than a quarter (27.1%) of his games at Dickey-Stephens Park, which has a HR factor of 50 over the last three seasons (100 is average).
Cold Water: There’s certainly lingering questions about his hit tool and ability to make consistent contact (19.4 SwStr%, 59.6 Contact%, and a 35.2 O-Swing% over his first 90 PA). We’ve seen early success followed by deep struggles from other top prospects recently. Austin Riley being a prime recent example. An early swell of homers preceded a crash down to earth. Lewis is similar in that his short sample size success is ultimately unsustainable.
Speaking of fireworks early, Luis Robert capped off a strong opening weekend with a meaningless homer toward the end of Sunday’s loss to the Twins. Thus far Robert has looked the part making loud contact in every game he’s played in. Is he still hunting at times? Sure. Will he strike out a bunch this season? Undoubtedly. But he’s going to crush baseballs one out of every three swings and I can live with that. Robert is as tooled up as any young player right now. Once he adds a little polish look out!
Cold Water: The strikeouts are coming! But let’s just bask in his glory for now.
In glorifying fashion, after a morning of tough news Monday, the story broke that the Blue Jays will promote Nate Pearson to the majors to start Wednesday versus the Nationals in our Nation’s capital. Quick and dirty in what to expect from Pearson: a live fastball in the 96-98 mph range with the ability to sit 99-100 for stretches. He’ll mix in a slider that will sit low-90s to high-80s, with a changeup that’s an effective weapon versus left handed batters and a curveball as an early count strike-stealer. He’s going to be electric to watch.
Cold Water: Innings are the biggest question for Pearson, but it’s perhaps overstated. He did work up to 100 innings in 2019 coming off a full shutdown for a fractured ulna on a comebacker early in 2018. I’m sure he’ll have restrictions to start, which might damper some of the enthusiasm. The bigger issue is despite huge stuff, he hasn’t missed the amount of bats you’d expect. He had a pedestrian SwStr% of 11.9 in Double-A last year. I do think he’ll boast an above average mark this year, and he’s had 11 months to get better since I’ve last seen him with my own baby blues. So everything might have ticked up, the stuff, the command and the sequencing. All this to say, Pearson is a fun upside add, but far from a sure thing.
Old friend Daniel Johnson was promoted amongst all the madness of the surprise Brady Singer promotion, and he might see some run in the Cleveland outfield. He presents raw tools a plenty, with power, speed, and some defensive prowess to go along with a rocket arm. Less a name to go out and grab in redraft, and more one to watchlist and wait for news.
After Mike Foltynewicz was DFA’d there’s a handful of starters in the mix. The Tweet below lists them and brings you to our Atlanta Top 30 list.
The Tap is Broken...Only Cold Water
Houston Has A Problem
The Justin Verlander injury certainly is another hit to an already banged up staff overall. However, for our purposes it opens up significant opportunities. Framber Valdez was already in the rotation, so his spot is solidified, at least for now, but after him is a handful of prospects we’ve covered on these pages (do websites have pages?) in recent years. The top of the list begins with the recently returned Brandon Bailey, personal favorites Cristian Javier and Brandon Bielek, followed by a list of other names that have had their moments in recent years, Cionel Perez, Shawn Dubin, and Nivaldo Rodriguez. I’d gamble on Javier and Bailey even if it’s explicitly said early that they won’t be starting. With the way this season is playing out, playing the depth card, if you’re flush with roster spots of course. In some leagues (under 16 teams) it doesn’t make much sense to stash them.
Baby Marlins On The Way?
This post was initially scheduled to be released on Monday, but when the Marlins/Phillies news broke early that morning I had to rewrite sections. In the event this comes out and is immediately dated, forgive me, haha… seriously. At this point everything is fluid. BUT should the Marlins play with a heavily taxi-squad laden lineup names like Lewin Diaz, Sixto Sanchez, Edward Cabrera and of course Monte Harrison. Will any of them make an impact? If they play games, and are healthy, then yes. Doesn’t it feel like that’s really what this season is? A war of attrition.
Red Sox Rotation
In other news, the Red Sox rotation is god awful. I called it the worst Red Sox staff of my 38 years in Wednesday’s AL East preview and they’ve been worse, and less talented, than expected. Franchise savior Zack Godley(?!?) is next up. That was a joke, get it… Okay anyway, Tanner Houck was added to the taxi squad recently and he should be up at some point. Don’t expect him to set the world on fire but a one time through the order opener role could work. Other names to monitor are Bryan Mata (the best starting prospect of the bunch) Kyle Hart, Mike Shawaryn, Chris Mazza, Stephen Gonsalves, and the infamous Dylan Covey. In other words unless Mata or Houck are up and starting steer clear.
Here’s a quick list of prospects that could be promoted in the coming days: ahhhh… a Braves pitcher? NOT Nick Madrigal…and some guys you’ve never heard of, that you’ll likely not care about.
Not sure of any. As stated time and time again, wait until there’s an injury and the corresponding move.