Erasmo Ramirez Scouting Report 6.25.12 - Upside
.......................................
Q. He can pitch better? He gave up three hits, one walk and 10 strikeouts. That's got to be a Game Score of 90 or something.
A. He can pitch way better. He didn't throw that good Monday.
Tom Seaver once said that when he was right, a catcher should be able to catch 80-90% of his fastballs by --- > moving his glove at the wrist. One of these days, F/X will give us a Seaver Percentage. Number of times the catcher had to move his glove more than, say, six inches.
Dr. D has been charting Noesi this way; he's about 50%, give or take. Problem is, the other 50% miss badly.
Erasmo Ramirez threw, I would say, six pitches that hit the mitt on Monday. We're talking about fastballs. And the misses were frequently way off.
.
Q. So why didn't he get splattered, like he did his first two starts?
A. The major thing was, he threw 45% fastballs, not 70%, so they were in between. But the minor ... well, what's between minor and major Zum-bro'? Medjor?
The medjor thing was that when he missed Olivo's mitt, he missed OFF THE PLATE, not over it. I think I saw only five or six pitches that missed into the danger zone ... one was the HR to Smith, and another one was to Smith but he popped it up.
A pitcher can aim a fastball at one of two spots:
...............................................
If he aims it at the RED spot, and it randomly misses by 6", then guess what? It misses away, it's a perfect pitch ... it misses in, it's a tater pitch. He is guaranteed a strike, but is taking a risk.
This is the risk that Japanese pitchers are used to taking. They aim at the red star and watch amazed, tater after tater, as American League hitters blast their mistakes into the third deck.
It is also the risk that AAA pitchers like Erasmo are used to taking. They get tons of strikes, and get away with most of their mistakes. They arrive in the bigs and are shocked to see mistake after mistake launched with regularity.
............
Seasoned big league pitchers, such as Kevin Millwood, never aim for anything but the GREEN spot. If it randomly misses in, they're still probably okay. If it misses away, it's a ball.
No doubt it's a lot harder to pitch when you're behind 1-0 and 2-0. But it's the price you pay for facing Albert Pujols. Hisashi Iwakuma, Erasmo Ramirez & Co. have to accept that green vs red idea.
.
Q. What about the guys, such as Felix Hernandez and Michael Pineda, who can routinely throw it into the mitt?
A. Best of all worlds. :- ) They're always 0-1, 0-2 with no homers.
That's the thing. Erasmo is capable of that, but has not done it yet. I shudder to think what would happen if he pitched changeup-first, and had his pinpoint command with him. 95 MPH into the mitt, on strike two? ::shudders::
Erasmo did this a few times Monday. The first batter Crisp, he fired a 94 MPH laser beam right into Olivo's mitt after two offspeed pitches. He did almost the same thing to Weeks, next up. Two easy strikeouts. EASY strikeouts, no chance at all. Ramirez, with his mechanics, is capable of doing this much more often than he's shown so far.
.
Q. Any keystrokes left in there?
A. Just enough for this:
ng-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-top-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; border-style: initial; border-color: initial; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(0, 116, 189); text-decoration: none; ">June 25, 2012 - his Key Weapon
4 June 25, 2012 - the Eckersley Clause
.