Why, especially if you're the Astros with their pitching reputation and such, would you come out in the offseason and say "HOLY **** WE REALLY LOVE THIS GUY!!!!!"?
Right - also Brown is about as good as you will find at misdirection when it comes to public comments.
https://blogs.fangraphs.com/how-do-prospect-grades-translate-to-future-outcomes/ Pretty good article about how FG prospect grades have translated into major league outcomes recently. Further solidifies what I already believed, that it is much easier to predict outcomes for position players than pitchers and that most star pitchers don’t even come from the top of prospect lists. It also hammers home that there’s always a pretty wide range of outcomes, especially for guys in the 45-55 grade range. But, especially for position players, the odds are very high that: Grade 45-45+ guys will be somewhere between a AAAA player and a solid everyday player. Grade 50-55 guys will be somewhere between a solid bench player and an above average everyday player. Grade 60 guys have the same variance as 50-55 guys just with a much higher chance of being a star. Grade 65-80 guys are unicorns with extremely low bust risk and high likelihood to become a star. I quibble with the idea of labeling a guy who reaches the majors and spends a couple of years as an up-and-down player as a “bust”, especially if they were never graded higher than a 45+. I much prefer the term “AAAA”. A grade 55 or greater guy in that role is probably fairly labeled as a “bust”, but that outcome is perfectly reasonable for a grade 45 guy.
One thing I have been looking at and reading about this offseason is evaluating pitching prospects. I have a theory that pitcher health and endurance are highly undervalued traits (at least by prospect analysts). Injuries are so prevalent and impactful that if there is a “skill” to avoiding injury and staying on the mound, it’s an extremely valuable one. It could be anything from genetically superior ligaments, to a throwing motion that is less prone to injury, to a player’s ability to train to avoid injury, to plain old luck or just a player’s awareness of their own body such that they toggle their effort to avoid injury. I am working on re-ranking the Astros prospects to account for the offseason, and I’m going to weigh pitcher health pretty heavily when it comes to slotting the pitching prospects. It is a hard thing to measure, especially given Houston’s inclination to change pitcher roles, move pitchers between levels, have pitchers take breaks even when they’re not injured, and deploy a tandem rotation system that heavily limits innings. Fwiw, here is the list of Astros pitching prospects who were able to throw 90+ innings last season: Ryan Gusto Miguel Ullola AJ Blubaugh Colton Gordon Jackson Nezuh Tyler Guilfoil Edinson Batista Aaron Brown Nick Swanson Joey Mancini James Hicks Manuel Urias Yeriel Santos Trey Dombroski Derek True Alain Pena Ethan Pecko
Ullola prospect profile going back looks like Spencer Strider, who was the 24th ranked prospect in the Braves system in 2021. Electric fastball, decent secondary stuff that plays well off the fastball, trouble with control. They seem to have similar body types and athleticism as well. Easy to see why Brown is high on him
Mickey Storey, Vladimir Sutil, Brauly Mejia, and Starlyng Sanchez are all former Astros farm hands. Interesting that they included so many more roles in the announcement; I wonder which of those are actually new additions. Also interesting which levels have difference resources.
His situation is somewhat cut and dry. He isn't quite perfect from height perspective but close - about 6'2'ish with broad shoulders, good sized waist and hips and long arms. excellent lower body and smooth athlete with limber limbs and great hips. His stuff is excellent with its flat release and excellent movement. He has a possible mint fast ball and a couple above average secondary pitches. His problem is control related and cleaning up his mechanics some. The Astros don't make guys tone down their stuff in the minor leagues like some teams do - they let them go balls to the wall and hope a couple of years in AAA and early in their big league career that they get better command while giving maximum effort. We saw it with Hunter Brown, Spencer Arrighetti and now Ullola. It makes him a risk to fail, but at his age and upside he has a lot of value.
I love that flat is now viewed as a positive attribute for pitchers (well pitchers with a good 4S fastball anyway).
Some are - and flat is a relative term too. In this kid's case, it pops very late in the zone after a very flat projection to the plate and hitters say his release point is consistently annoying. It should carry over very well into the big leagues IF he can get better control. Sometimes his changeup will be crushed when he cannot land the fastball for strikes.
For the most part, there are three types of pitchers with flat 4S fastballs: 1) Those that don't give up a lot of walks that get great performance from their fastballs. 2) Those that give up a lot of walks and are all over the place in terms of fasball performance. 3) Pre-Astros Kikuchi. A flat 4S fastball is the equivalent to a nasty breaking ball. Maybe a pitcher can't control or doesn't have another pitch, but for the most part a flat 4S should be seen as a good thing. This isn't to say that pitchers can't do well with a non-flat 4S. There are many ways to succeed. Flat 4S paired with a nasty breaking ball from a RHP just has much more of a margin for error than most other pitching types.
Reports are that it is hard to pick the ball up early based on what hitters have said. I have seen where some hitters and scouts have claimed it is the release point/angle and others have said that it just comes out fast. He uses a 3/4 delivery 95% of the time but will sometimes mix it up- I’ve watched a lot of film on him and the deception isn’t from the delivery - I think it’s how his body lines up and the movement of the ball early that makes it hard to pick up. Regardless, his fastball comes at the hitters from a difficult plane and then moves really late in the zone - so by the time the hitters adjust to the difficulty of where the ball is released, it moves and not always in the same place (but typically up). Right now he doesn’t always know where it will break late- but has improved using it against lefties after struggling some. He sits 94-97 when he is in the middle innings and has a good cadence going. His release point tends to falter some when he cannot locate. I have seen him throw 99 and not really hurt his mechanics or ball movement. He should continue adding muscle and core strength - so a fastball at 97-99 really is projectable if he is successful. Secondary pitches are a mediocre curve that he has thrown for a long time and an above average slider that is something he hasn’t really thrown that long. He does have a change up that he can throw for strikes but sometimes doesn’t jump and ends up in the stands. Control issues plague him more than command. Some of it is his late fastball movement but some of it is that he has some mechanical and release point issues that spring up when thrown off rhythm. Abreu is the pitcher he is most compared to - and that’s a solid comparison. What I would point out is that Ullola doesn’t have the conditioning or work ethic issues that plagued Abreu earlier in his career and Ullola has a strong desire to not only remain a starter but pitch deep into ball games.
I one time really pressed Kevin Goldstein at the dog park while drinking coffee on why he and the Astros were so good at knowing which players to draft. He patiently listened to me for about two minutes before a sly smile came over him and I stopped talking and stared and he said: “Appel and Aikens twelve months apart. Know how many wins in the big leagues between them? None, not even a loss. Absolutely irrelevant. So don’t be fooled into thinking I understand baseball. If anyone does, I’ve never met them.”
This is exactly why my main personal focus is what happens on the field. *That* I can understand pretty damn well. It's all the other stuff that makes my brain want to bleed.
