1
Mangini's D please. I've heard him called everything from butcher to stiff to below average.
Cheney, 8/02/10
Had a chance to scope Senor Pineda, Deuce Ackley, et al on Monday night. Must be cool to fan 10 men per game when the other team has the pitches. Pineda has two grotesque tells, and in 80-odd pitches, the Aces didn't swing in front of a slider/change or behind a fastball one (1) time all night.
The Aces literally swung in correct time (or watched the pitch go by) 85 times in a row. Despite that, Pineda overmatched them. The Aces did manage to catch up to three or four of the tipped pitches, but except for that ...
Cindy could call the pitches from the stands, and they still couldn't make contact. Amazing. This guy has had the season he has had, despite high-school-level polish to his game management.
So, the bad news is, Pineda is a better prospect than SSI has advertised. More Pedro than Schilling.
He might conceivably be past Felix. His potential control -- after a few mechanical refinements that they'll certainly make -- is quite a bit better than Felix', even now. When a guy hucks it in there 97 mph knee-high on the black, you're talking Pedro.
And Pineda's slider is a true wipeout pitch. Like Randy Johnson: guess slider, get slider, and you can't make contact anyway. .... that 88 "change" is a feature pitch. Slap me silly.
..................
Got milk on Mangini's D at third, Ackley's batspeed, Halman's recognition, range in CF, Wilson's strike zone control ... various and sundry. Pages fulla notes, so if there's something you want addressed, suggestion box is below....
Stay cool,
Dr D
Comments
2
All of the above, Doc.
We want to know!
Thanks...
3
Doc,
Which Raineer slugger is better than his Mariners counterpart? Who can outhit Milton Bradley? Who can outhit Casey Kotchman, or Franklin Gutierrez? Is Ackley better than Chone or Jose Lopez right now?
4
What a tease! Lets hear it all!
5
But the Rainiers are fun to watch right now. Hopefully tomorrow can uncoil the fire hose.
Great angle Mojician. That hadn't occurred. Will do.
Gracias amigos.
6
Interesting. So you see his slider as plus, but he slows his delivery down on offspeed pitches?
The fact that hes still putting up those numbers tells a lot about his raw stuff.
7
That was like fresh baked cookies and having no milk around. You need to give us more than that. How about Ackley's keen eye at the plate. He is a walk machine.
8
Another good line John...
Intention, amigos, was not to be coy... only had 10 mins on Mon-Tue to put up a quick post, and thought we'd start a conversation thread ... preferably with space for all y'all to direct the scheduled posts...
Ackley's eye is deserving of a post its ownself... he really is the only Rainier who sits back and reads each pitch without cheating (well, now Smoak if you count him) ... special, special pitch recognition and reflexes... in fact in some AB's he reminds 101% of Ichiro/Boggs, waiting, waiting, waiting and then LINING the ball hard to LF with a forearm swing, hips disengaged ...
Other times, he'll decide to swing last-second, WHIP that bat around and smoke it down the RF line... on these he reminds of Edgar...
Hope to get to the 'puter tonight...
9
I read a quote from his college coach that he would review game tape and he would just keep going back to watch his swing and keep going back. People talk about the swing but the pitch recognition is off the charts. He is going to be a run scoring machine 1-2 hitter in the line up. I have followed him on MILB and 0-2 counts turn into walks.