Seattle Sports Insider

Ask G-Money Show

and guess who gets the first question

Posted by

3/16/17

G-MONEY G-MAILBAG

Now that Gordon has found some time to talk hardball, we should put up a tab so he can take questions. Together we can rule the universe as father and son !!! ... well, shtickster and blank starester, anyway.

My own first question would be about Nick Neidert. Don't know the first thing about the guy. And the description of Neidert at the M's site doesn't give me the slightest clue why he would be ranked ahead of Andrew Moore. Isn't Moore what he hopes to be in three years?

Are there major leaguer pitchers who are templates? What's his arsenal, and what things does he have that are ahead of and behind schedule? Assuming he stays healthy, would normal development see him winning X games in Y year?

If you get a chance :- )

CHRIS HESTON

With all this talk about "fascism"* today, I'm going to find a way to make MLB go to 9-man rotations. Can you imagine? The Mariners would win 117 games. It'd be easy. Just pass a decree that no pitcher is eligible to appear in innings 1-5 more than one time per 10-day period. With this outfield, this lineup, and this 6-9 rotation, we'd make divisional play obsolete.

Heston did show his underbelly on Wednesday. When he centers a fatball, the bad guys will leisurely smack it out of a park with a stick. Three first-pitch Back Leg Specials in two innings. One went barely foul. Also, Heston couldn't hit the mesa behind the park if you gave him a GPS.

Heston is not a star and with his arsenal, will never ever be a star. But he's got a great chance to run a 90-105 ERA when called on. His outing Wednesday didn't worry us in the least. Some days, average/mediocre pitchers don't have it.

But wow, amidst the BB's and HR's there were some filthy mcnasty pitches. Did you see 'em? He threw changeups to lefties that sailed outside their swings like bottle caps. His slow yakker had a real big bite. And what was this, a slider? He threw a set back-to-back-to-back, like trip jacks, to one hitter that got two garbage swings and a tick foul. He came right back with a swerveball on the hands, but it nicked the guy's elbow on 0-2. That kinda day.

DEATHS GREATLY EXAGGERATED

Mark Twain, the guy who made the above quote, wrote many times about his premonitions of his own and his brother's death. Bing it if that kind of stuff interests you. Twain's dream about his bro' is one of history's most famous (and well-attested, in the sense any such thing could be well-attested.) But only Twain could predict his own death, apparently; other men were always wrong about it.

Felix isn't predicting his death this year and neither is Dr. Detecto. They only give you two pitches in this video, a slider and a 93 MPH painted fastball. But he went 5 scoreless in the Venezuela-USA game Wednesday, which is to say he threw a shutout in an All-Star game. ... well, y'know. It's not bad news.

...

Drew Smyly whuffed 8 men in 4.2 innings that game, the last six in a row. Many pitches in this video. His high heat / overhand curve whipsaw were far too much for Altuve, Miggy, Odor and company. The WBC has some moneyed cleanup hitters going, but they're little match when The M's Come Marching In.

HOT ROD JA-ROD

Hilarious play in the 1st of the Dodger game ... Heston picked a guy off first and then every M's infielder swarmed to the middle of the 1B-2B basepath. When Seager dropped the tag, the runner took off for a wide-open 3B. Only problem was, he couldn't beat the M's left fielder to the bag! ;- )

Next inning Ja-Rod slashed a single to RF and swiped second base with the greatest of ease. He splayed starfish style, hooking himself to second by a cleat as he airplaned by the bag. HEH

The KC fans told us that the man is a joy to watch play. Cindy pointed out how much he looks like Kenny Lofton, moving around, swinging the bat, floating around the bases. I think she's right.

BEN GAMEL

Got a 2-strike curve ball, and a good curve ball, and sailed it over the power alley fence like it was Home Run Derby. Blowers was as wide-eyed as Dr. D was. He's batting .303 with a .606 SLG now. Like we sez, you don't point at a minor leaguer and say YOU'll be the one. It's Kyle Seager who tells you HE'll be the one, thank you very much. Gamel is a sizzler.

Enjoy,

Jeff

*fascism isn't when you do microaggressions; fascism is when you shoot your opponents while they sleep so nobody argues with you. America's a pretty fun place to live in, compared to North Korea. Stay thirsty, er, thankful my friends.

Blog:

Postgame

Tags:

Drew Smyly

Comments

MLBT-R report

MLBT-R reported yesterday that the M's are considering an 8-Man bullpen.

Uh, wow.

Now it could be that, because the M's play 19 games in the first 20 days, the braintrust has decided that we need some extra chucking ammo to allow some time for everybody to get stretched out. Then we could bring up the extra bat/positional player and send down the worst arm of the bunch.

But 13 arms and 12 positional players is a pretty odd mix.

It would also mean that your two non-catchers on the bench have to be pretty darn flexible. In that situation we don't keep Heredia or Gamel up, as we break ST. O'Malley or Motter and Valencia would likely be it.

I would be surprised if we head down this path.

Dyson

If they're giving Dyson a shot to be an everyday player, Heredia and Gamel shouldn't be sitting on our bench the first few weeks.

Gives Dyson time to show what he is with Valencia and the UTIL player being serviceable when giving a player a day off. Nothing I dislike more than bringing up a AAA guy because he was hot and letting him sit on your bench 3/4 of the time.

So with the 1B platoon...

They have Motter (maybe O'Malley) playing backup SS and occasional OF ... with Cruz the 4 OF and Valencia the emergency OF?

You talk about controlling the matchups either in the top half or the bottom. With that situation you'd move the slider as far as you could over to the right, and then would whack it with an awl to wedge it an extra 5%.

Sounds like they're not that confident in their pen?

Exactly

Exactly the conclusion I arrived at. Even at that, I can't imagine they will go this way. Will see.

Taylor Motter the bat vs LHP's

The picture seems to be emerging that he's legitimately the "bat" among the three backup shortstops. Particularly vs LHP's.

Big arm, too. And the personality seems to be a major plus for the #25 spot. "Just happy to help my teammates and if I make the team that's gravy" type attitude.

I think his Fabio hair-flip after a head-first SB could become legend, too :- ) O'Malley may have his lotto ticket at becoming Zobrist Lite but I gettin' to like Motter.

Glad to see this thread.

Would be delighted to do one a week

If we had a couple-three Q's and if Gordon were up for it. Certainly I'll always have a starter Q!

A particular day maybe G?

Neidert is all about future talent coming to bear

Neidert is a strike-thrower like Moore, but he already has a consistent couple of MPH on Moore and the 3/4 armslot gets him some fun action on his pitches. His best second pitch is a change like Moore too. He throws both a curve and a slider, but from that arm slot I kind of expect him to narrow that down to one pitch at some point. Maybe not; sometimes it's amusing to get two breaking balls with slightly different action and speed and plenty of guys do. Moore is his mid-point projection, in that Neidert could be a 4-pitch guy who chucks pitches into the zone at will but has to use control to get his outs rather than pure stuff.

The curiosity about Neidert is his athleticism. He doesn't really look like a power pitcher body-wise, but his arm-speed and mound activity are really good. He's springy out there. If he bumps up a couple of MPH as he gets older (since he's all arm-speed and quick-step heat) then at his height you're hoping for a Greinke explosion (probably a step down from that, but still nice). Moore predicates his entire game on throwing strikes and working off of that. Neidert, if he develops, will be throwing strikes because he is just hard to hit wherever he puts it in the zone. That's why Neidert is higher.

Also, people have been underestimating Moore since forever, so why stop now?

But for Neidert, I'd say even at 19 he has a legit low-90s (90-94) FB with good action, a changeup that finally looks enough like his FB to be dangerous, and a curveball with some snap on it that I like. He's also got a slider in the bag in a get-one-over sort of way if his curve isn't working, so that's a decent backup plan. He has good #2, #3 stuff, certainly on projection. That's not what I'm worried about.

My concern with him is how he's been used so far. How do you let a guy start and then spend half the year not stretching him out? In his first 9 starts he never threw fewer than 5 innings, but in his last 10 starts he threw MORE than 5 innings only twice. They were the last couple starts of the year, which is a nice way to finish strong, but that alone gives me durability concerns. Yes, he's a teen, but that's some serious babying of the arm. Makes me worry about a Wade Miller situation where the arm talent isn't the issue on a skinny, shorter (for a pitcher) frame - the durability is.

Having Wade Miller upside is what puts Neidert over Moore, though. Neidert is trying to get to the bigs at 23, so you're thinking Spring of '20, IMO, with a Fall '19 callup. He could do it in 2 years and show up in May 2019 if he finds that groove, but we shouldn't have to rush him. That's what Moore and Povse are for.

Perfect

Answers my Q thoroughly. And nice balance of being realistic, pointing out the hope for a Greinke-Lite visual, and detailed explanation of Neidert's game.

+1 +1 +1

Adding on to Neidert / G-Money

When Neidert was drafted out of high school, he had been shut down by his high school for a sore forearm... or else Neidert would have gone much higher in the draft.

Further, I believe Neidert was shut down at the end of 2015 as well with a sore forearm... so he does have a slight history of needing to be babied.

Emelio Pagan

Is the prospect I hear the least about. Is he just behind too many names? Do you have faith that his command will improve enough to keep him moving up?

Next least would be Dillon Overton, though I heard quite a bit about him when he was acquired. For now is he just translucent spaghetti? Does he need to reacquire some of the lost MPH to get more attention? Are there any precedents for returning MPH > 2 years after TJ?

On Overton

On Overton, he is currently working out of the bullpen, and he has a 1 in 3 shot of making the 25 man roster to start the year.

I do not know if the M's plan on keeping Overton in the pen, or if there will be a move back to the rotation after his arm strength is back.

I'll let G handle the Pagan question.

Re: Pagan and Overton

Pagan is weird. His stuff is obviously fine, but his command has gotten a little worse at every level. Part of that is more experienced guys not swinging and making him throw strikes, which he fritzes out on sometimes. That said, so did Jeff Nelson and he was a good bullpen arm for a long time. Bullpenners tend to be up and down - relying on them to keep their stuff and consistency is a long shot over 4 years.

But the guy throws a heavy fastball, and a pretty stiff slider. Those guys tend to have worse control - you deal with it. Pagan was just as hard to square up in the upper minors as he has been in the low minors. I don't worry about his walks so much. A 10k/4bb arm with low hits is just fine. You don't necessarily want him closing (which is one reason you don't hear about his as much - setup men aren't as sexy) but even if that comes up there are the David Aardsmas of the world who can get it done for a couple of years before they go on the fritz again. Righties can't hit him with a shovel - they got lucky last year, trust me. Put a real defense behind him and there's not gonna be a lot they can do against him.

I've been a Pagano fan for several years, and that continues. He and Altavilla are gonna be fighting for a place in line, but I'm all right with that too. Worry more about the hits than the walks, IMO. If the hits stay low he's got a puncher's chance to be good for us.

As for Overton... no, his arm strength is probably not coming back as a starter. He's in Cha Seung Baek territory now, and being minus several MPH makes it harder for him to regain his expected impact. IMO that's why he's in the pen right now. If he can get some MPH back by throwing 1 inning instead of 6, then he can get that missing foot back on his FB and the bite on his breaking stuff which could make him a plus penner. We'll see. I'm not a strong bettor on his survival with the raft of minor league arms competing for spots, but I don't mind finding out.