10 Observations: Hunter Stratton Having Strong Month Of August
A look back at the previous week in the Pirates system includes updates on Hunter Stratton, Roansy Contreras, Quinn Priester, and Jared Jones.
Nola 8/23: A name that I hadn’t been focusing on this year too much until a recent Indianapolis broadcast mentioned his recent stretch, is Hunter Stratton. After a fantastic 2021 season that saw him climb to Triple-A, he had an up-and-down 2022 season that put his wildness on full display. For the majority of the 2023 season it has been much of the same, but in the month of August this year, he’s been on a bit of a tear. Including Wednesday evening, he has now thrown 9.2 innings in the month of August while allowing only six baserunners. He’s given up only one hit in the month, one hit batter, and only four walks. He’s done all that while maintaining his usual high strikeout rate by fanning 14 hitters in the month, and closing the door in all three save opportunities this month.
Murphy 8/24: One name that has always been intriguing for me this year in Greensboro has been Cy Nielson. Yea, I’ve been burned by relievers in the lower levels before, but there is always something to make note of left-handed pitchers that can throw strikes.
Nola mentioned something about his curveball in the chat we have, so I went back and watched the game. Like I said, I’ve been burned by relievers, a lot, at this level, but a lefty that has shown the ability to get strikeouts and throws from a lower arm slot? That’s worth monitoring.
Murphy 8/24: Random, general observation of the Grasshoppers rotation going into next week. I did my best to try and plan it out to get a chance to see Bubba Chandler when I’m in Greensboro, and barring any big changes that should be the case.
As of now, I’ll be at the games from Thursday-Saturday, with Sunday up in the air. The game isn’t until 6 pm ET, so we aren’t sure if we want to hang around till the game, and then drive the four hours back up to Virginia afterwards.
Including that game, for the sake of it, that leaves the potential starters I’ll see as JP Massey, Po-Yu Chen, Bubba Chandler (update: now with him on the Development List, we will have to see if the rotation gets mixed up at all) and Derek Diamond, only missing out on Thomas Harrington. It would be nice to see Harrington pitch, but still should be a fun stretch.
Nola 8/24: Wil Crowe was recently designated for assignment by the Pirates, but remember the other player in the Josh Bell trade? Eddy Yean recently just turned 22 in June, and his time in the Pirates organization hasn't been kind to the young right hander. To begin the year — his second tour in Greensboro — it was much of the same; walking 12 and giving up 14 earned runs in his first 17.0 IP. Since June 1st though, he's walked only 8 batters and allowed 10 earned runs in 27.0 IP while striking out 24. ERA by month: April - 4.32, May - 10.38, June - 4.82, July - 2.89, and August - 2.16.
Nola 8/24: Patrick Reilly. If my first two observations were about relievers, might as well make it 3-for-3. Difference with Reilly is that he may have a chance to stretch into a starter. His first appearance didn't go well, giving up three earned runs on one hit, and two walks with two strikeouts. Since his debut, he's given up only one hit and one run in five innings. He's walked only two batters — none in his last three appearances — and one hit batsman to go with nine strikeouts across those five innings. On Thursday evening, he struck out all three batters he faced, generating eight swings and misses on just thirteen pitches.
Data is limited, but he's been up to 97.4 MPH, sitting mostly in the 94-96 range. We've been hoping to get some metrics like VAA on him, but Prospects Live’s database has been finicky lately. So no numbers. That said, we can look at the pitch-by-pitch data on Statcast that has his fourseam with generally 10-13 inches of vertical break. In my estimation, this bodes well for above average to elite IVB and VAA when paired with his velocity.
Murphy 8/25: That was maybe the weirdest usage I’ve seen for a starting pitcher this year, but Quinn Priester entered the game in the fifth inning and pitched the rest of the game.
Take that start on Friday as a blueprint for him to use going forward, and it’s so simple that theoretically it shouldn’t be hard to replicate.
Throw strikes early, keep the breaking pitches just close enough to the strike zone to entice hitters to swing, which they won’t. Before you know it he’s cruised through five innings walking one and striking out nine.
Murphy 8/26: I have a bit of a theory, if you want to call it that, on the whole deal with fastball velocity and what not. Without going too much into it (I will eventually), I don’t think it’s going to help like some people think it will. I’ve watched games where Mike Burrows maxes out at 95 mph and blow away people with a fastball like it’s nothing.
That leads me to Roansy Contreras, who pitched on Saturday, and I came away fairly impressed with his work. The fastball shape/analytics/metrics of his time in Pittsburgh aren’t horrible, but he was absolutely beaten around with it. I think that has more to do with his placement than anything else, as the heat map had a lot of red down the middle, which is a recipe for disaster (and one of the few times velocity would matter).
Would extra velocity help? Probably. The shape isn’t horrible, and says he can still have success with it up in the zone. It’s going to take him taking the next step in developing better command in the zone for him to unlock everything.
He’s not a prospect anymore but he’ll be someone I’m monitoring closely for the rest of the year.
Murphy 8/26: I talked about Joe Perez the other day, but there is another outfielder that has really come to play lately, and that’s Matt Fraizer. After Saturday’s game, he’s picked up 10 hits in his last he’s played in. He’s also reached base safely in 10 of his last 11.
It didn’t seem that long ago that it looked like the Pirates were going to have too many outfielders, with Fraizer being one of them. Hasn’t really worked that way, and there came a time that the Altoona outfielder was looking really stagnant, but they’ve really gotten a spark lately.
Murphy 8/27: Don’t really like to take one game into account on this, but still feels like I’ve thought this on more than one occasion. Sometimes I still wonder if Jared Jones is going to just end up being an elite closer, or bullpen arm.
I’ve seen him pitch into the seventh inning before, and he’s thrown 100+ innings in each of the last two seasons, but still feel like he starts to hit a wall in the fourth inning and beyond, and his stuff plays better when he goes fastball/slider. He picked up 19 whiffs on 39 swings between the two pitches on the day.
He’s taken a big step forward this year, and maybe it’s recency bias of just watching him. I still think he’s the second best pitching prospect in the system behind Paul Skenes, but even in that 10 strikeout game on Sunday, I still see some reliever in him.
Murphy 8/27: Generally when I got to Baseball Savant on days that Jones is pitching, the ‘top velocity’ section is filled with his name. He does have the hardest thrown pitch of that game (98.7), but the next four are all by Kyle Nicolas, averaging 97.6 on his fastball Sunday.
I know prospect value generally ties into a player remaining in the rotation, but somehow Nicolas seems more exciting as a reliever.
Looking forward to a season-end deep dive on Jared Jones.
Not to say there hasn't been *any* development this year, but his AAA performance sure looks a lot like his A and high-A performance.
I'll take baby steps.
Nice updates. I share Jeff's optimism about Reilly. Really think he could be a steal from this draft. I agree that the combination of his velocity and movement is intriguing. Even if his control improves only modestly, I would think he would still project as a shut-down reliever. He will need to clean up his mechanics a bit though, I think, and the Pirates have no track record in helping pitchers do so. (As in the case of Forrester, however, I am biased because Reilly's potential exploded in my minor league system in OOTPB and he became a premier closer for me when I played through as the Pirates GM).