=== He's Baaa---aaaaack! ===
If Ryan Rowland-Smith executes the pitches that he executed against the Rays, he is one of the top 30 starters in the league, now.
aGAIN a tip o' the kelly to you amigos who, before RRS came back up to the bigs, voted him in a landslide to rise to the top during August-September.
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=== Wotta Hook ===
RRS threw 56 fastballs, 25 curves and 27 changeups/slurves. That is what you call an ace clinic out there, mate.
The change-curve was a fair dinkum David Wells hammer that never gave a bloke a fair go. Honestly don't remember seeing Wells himself throw a curve that snapped any harder than RRS' did on Sunday, and RRS threw it with a perfect release point. I didn't notice a Ray load up on a curve ball the entire night.
I saw the Rays load up, and square up, three balls:
I did not notice a Ray hit a curve ball hard at any time. And there were 25 of them -- 19 for strikes.
That was the curve ball of a young Barry Zito, or an old David Wells.
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=== And don't think he wasn't Gobsmacked about it ===
For the first time in 900 years, Kenji Johjima was having a ball back there. Once every ten seconds, he'd throw down the sign, RRS would rear back, Kenji would grab the ball out of the air like a juicy peach, and toss it back with palpable joy.
You coulda cried with happiness watching Joh get to catch a game like that.
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=== The Change ===
RRS threw the 27 changes and change-slurves, all around 80 mph.
Correctly, RRS often threw them to sink BELOW the knees (only 38% strikes on the change), as he should, and induced plenty of fishing. He got a couple of swinging strikes on changes just outside the black, too. Good on yer, Ryan.
Once he fired an 80 change with good arm action UP in the zone -- and a MOTO swung through it. Blowers marvelled. "Usually that pitch gets hit when it's up, but RRS has such a good touch for that change that he's getting away with even that."
.................
An amigo asked, does a change matter for a LH with a good curve (like French). It does when that LH throws 90.
What you are seeing out there, is the batter has his hands full with CURVE-FASTBALL. ... he's afraid of the yellow hammer when it is THAT good, so wow, here comes the straight pitch, he pulls the trigger on a fastball angle .... but whoosh, it's not there in time. The fastball is a changeup.
When the curve is plus-plus and the fastball's 90, the change can be death on a stick. Sunday, it was.
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=== FB and Pitch Mix ===
The 55-27-25 pitch mix was a true Japanese pitch mix, and RRS threw it easily and confidently to Joh's tempo.
Mike Marshall preaches a true 1:1:1 mix between fastball, curve, and screwball/change. He makes a great case that MOST pitchers should throw 33% fastballs (whereas the ML average is almost twice that, including cutters).
Marshall's Eutopia may be 1:1:1 but I'll take 2:1:1 any time, when the 1 and the 1 are your good pitches. So will Johjima.
....................
The heater, at 89-90, was only ML average for location, movement and velocity IMHO, but then again so was the young Barry Zito's. The real virtue of it was in this Brooks Baseball chart -- scroll to the very bottom and check the ALL-GAME PITCH PLOT.
That, my friends, is a gorgeous three-pitch separation.
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=== Most-Comparable Toolbox ===
Another pitcher who has, or had, these pitches:
Has been Andy Pettitte.
Which, when you think about it, isn't a bad comp for Good Ryan Rowland-Smith. Pettitte had the hard run on his FB, but in the other checkpoints the two SP's match up point-for-point.
Including in the all-important category of makeup.
For the lurkers, I'm not predicting 200 wins for Rowland-Smith. We're talking templates. Pitchers have different levels of ability within templates. Sandy Koufax and Clayton Kershaw pitch in the same template.
Still, don't undersell RRS. When he came up to the AL, he fanned >9 men a game with that arsenal. And at that time, he wasn't throwing the change in the dirt.
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=== When's the Next One? ===
Rays were lucky enough to get two on Ryan.
Don't know whether the lad will execute the same pitches again, but if he does, he can play for Dr. D's team.
Too right!,
Dr D
70 mph curve, 80 mph change, 90 mph fastball...YOWZA that's tough on hitters. I like that the change-up has similar horizontal movement to the fastball but significantly more downward break on it too. Fun.
He might not be consistently that good...but if he throws 10 games out of 30 with that kind of pitch mix and 10 games with the pitch mix and less command (like start #2) and 10 clunkers, that makes him a 4.20 ERA MOR starter.
Who would be a lefty pitcher in Safeco with three CF's.
Ya, your split is a little modest perhaps. 10 A games, 10 B games and 10 ker-splashes might be the bottom for him if his arm is feelin' this good. :- )
...when he was healthy he ran off a whole year (between the pen and the rotation) with good solid all-american saber-hero K/BB and reasonable HR rates. His minor league 9 K/9 and 3 BB/9 looks mighty fine.
If he can stay healthy, maybe he gets on a role and rips off a 14 for 16 QS streak or something cool like that.
People last year were talking about RRS as a possible clubhouse leader type...the great down-under hope to fix the broken Mariner clubhouse and anchor the pitching staff. People who know him think he's nails...a bulldog with a winning attitude and an outgoing friend-to-all personality to boot. Could be a MAJOR asset to the Mariners going forward to the post-Griffey era.
I do like the Andy Pettitte family of pitchers as RRS's best fit comparison. Pettitte is more effective against power hitting righties than RRS will be because his fastball has the cutting action (as you noted), but I'll take dirt cheap park neutral 4 FIP innings (in Safeco, he'll pitch better than Washburn...which as we saw this year with our outfield, could be a perfect storm situation some years), and he's under club control for at least three more seasons.
If you are talking about a young player who is average-solid to plus, at Scrub money, that's where I get excited.
RRS isn't just a guy you hope will provide mediocrity for peanuts. That's the Royals' ambition. RRS is a pitcher you expect to pitch well, and who might pitch very well. That's where the extra payroll space is the wind in your sails towards a powerhouse club.
Nice comp.
A slightly poor-mans Pettitte would mean better results in Safeco with our D.
Its great to see RRS's velocity back. I wonder why it left in the first place? It'd be really nice to see French throw in that range as well. We'll see in his next start.