10 Observations: Pitterson Rosa outlier fastball, Henry Davis contact, Braxton Ashcraft
Weekly look around the Pirates' organization
Murphy 5/20: This is my annual rant about 100% of minor league teams not having available streams to watch, since the Greensboro Grasshoppers are in Asheville.
In 2025, every minor league team should have some sort of stream set up. It doesn’t have to be anything complicated. Slap a camera behind home plate or out in center field.
I’ve always said this, teams should hook up with their local college and give out a credit to students to broadcast a stream.
Not too hard here.
Murphy 5/20: David Matoma continues to have mixed results, but he did throw the breaking ball a little more (if you look at statcast, the cutter and slider are one pitch) and was showing some feel for it.
Slowly, but surely.
Murphy 5/20: It does feel like Termarr Johnson is starting to figure things out. Watching him hit, I don’t think he will be a big home run guy, but for a second baseman, he won’t have to be.
I think that’s an important thing to remember. The offensive expectations for a second baseman aren’t as high as those for other positions. If he finishes around 15 home runs, with his approach and ability to take a walk, you are looking at an above-average second baseman.
Murphy 5/21: When I talked to Jim Horner about Carlos Castillo, one of the biggest things he mentioned was that he just needed to log innings. He’s young and just needs to pitch right now. You can see it at times for him. The slider is looking a lot better and sharper. The fastball doesn’t miss a lot of bats right now, but as a sinker/slider guy (with a change-up), he doesn’t allow much hard contact when he’s on his game.
Murphy 5/21: Jake Shirk doesn’t have the most eye-popping stuff, but he throws all his pitches for strikes and gets a lot of weak contact. He feels almost the opposite of what they look for in the later rounds, as the Pirates have historically gone for high-velocity, low-control guys.
He’s the opposite, but he’s carved out a role in the back of the Bradenton bullpen.
Murphy 5/21: Still wonder what Braxton Ashcraft would look like out of the bullpen. He got 10 whiffs on 16 swings with the slider. I’m still not quite a believer in the fastball, especially as a starter, but could play better as a reliever. I realize you probably keep him in the rotation for depth concerns, but long-term, I still see more of a reliever. He’ll be a back-of-the-rotation guy as a starter, and I’m not sure you need that in the near future.
Murphy 5/22: Without digging too deep, Clevari Tejada reached 96.8 mph with his fastball on Thursday, one of the highest marks I’ve seen him reach. He’s another, like Castillo, who is super raw as a pitcher, but you see bits and pieces of something that could be interesting.
The important thing is logging innings. He tossed five-shutout on Thursday, and did so while I was in Bradenton. He even carried a no-hitter into the fifth that start.
Murphy 5/22: He struggled to locate it at times, but I like the commitment that Mike Burrows showed to his change-up. The fastball didn’t miss bats, which will be something to monitor, but being able to throw the offspeed to both lefties and righties might help offset that a bit.
Murphy 5/22: Interesting note when pulling up Henry Davis’ player card. You generally think of the power, but he’s running a near 90% in zone contact rate, his exit velocity numbers are way down.
He got back-to-back starts over the weekend, and given some of Joey Bart’s struggles this month, I wouldn’t mind an extended look at Davis to see if he can put it all together.
I don’t think he should automatically get a run because he was 1.1, but he did have a solid game earlier in the week on both sides of the plate. Let’s see if he can build off that.
Murphy 5/23: The Pirates absolutely love their outlier fastballs, and chalk another one up in Pitterson Rosa, who got a $700,000 signing bonus during the 2022 international signing period.
I got some data on him last week, and he sat 91-93 with his fastball, and got about 18-22” of induced vertical break.
It’s a formula they’ve stuck to, especially in the international market. Outlier fastballs, high-velocity, and hope they can teach them some control.
The latter part has been an issue in the Complex, as the FCL team is walking over nine batters per nine innings right now. That stuff has been impressive, and the metrics really pop; the control part just needs to kick in.
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Huge agree on that Ashcraft take, and I’d add Burrows with him. Maybe non traditional pen guys since you typically think of good fastball dudes with light repertoires but leaning on each of their secondaries could help the fastball play up in 1-2 inning stints.
Hank Davis is strong as a damn ox. His poor exit velos track hand in hand with the newer statcast metrics on contact quality. Just doesn’t square the ball up very well. Would lead the league in pop ups if he were a starter.
I like these 10 Observations articles.
Also... of course everyone is talking about Ash and the pen and voila! Pretty nice outing last night.
-BB