Big Mac

I'm genuinely curious and like I've said, I haven't watched him this spring so I really am interested in your answer. What made him look bad? I'm talking beyond results, was velocity down, was command all out of whack, etc.? I wish I had a chance to watch and I'd appreciate insight from folks who watched him pitch this spring.

If its something like that I agree that's also understandable. The main point is it needs to be something beyond bad spring training stats.

Maybe he's not. Only one way to find out and that isn't by having him pitch at some bs extended spring training while there is no minor leagues. I didn't see him pitch this spring but unless he was topping out at 86 or dropped a heater on the clubhouse floor he should get starts.

Giving starts to Jorge Lopez and Wade LeBlanc over Akin seems like a productive use of this season.

It is easy to be down on a guy that gives up 2.4 HR/9 with 4.9 K/9 in his major league career. I think most people rightfully view his ERA this season as nothing but smoke and mirrors.

Oh boy is the OH meltdown when he starts next year at Frederick (or whatever the equivalent is after MiL contraction) going to be epic.

They just had Doug Brocail on MASN's Inside the Yard podcast and he said something along the lines of that there will be pitchers called up this season that the fans probably are not expecting to see. I did a quick google search for the exact quote but could not find it.

Hard pass. He is the type of player we need to be moving away from

There are rumblings on twitter that Mountcastle is being called up. Jason La Confora is reporting it.

Incredibly misleading thread title.

My opinion of Akin didn't change at all based on his appearance, and I've seen a lot of him in the minors so it would be problematic if it did. At a broad level, I think Akin is good enough to hold down a spot at the back-end of the rotation for a year or two before ultimately being pushed to the pen by better arms coming up through the system. I would be trying to work him into the rotation over the rest of the season and hopefully get him regular starts.

This would make more sense if Puig could play CF. He has started a grand total of 60 games in CF in his career and none since 2016. Also, I assume you mean poor defensively in the OF. I would not say we are poor defensively in the infield, especially on the left side.

If you are going to bring up Mountcastle I don't see how Puig fits really.

You can't really compare their AAA track records because Akin's only year was when they used the ML ball in AAA. It essentially became a completely different league. I didn't say Lakins or Sulser didn't deserve to be in their roles, rather my point was I don't understand why Hyde has shown so much confidence in them despite their very limited ML experience while at the same time he seems hesitant to use Akin unless we are up or down by 10 runs. It doesn't make sense to me. It is pretty clear that Akin has a better overall minor league track record than any of those guys. Eshelman gave up 10.1 H/9 in his minor league career, those guys tend to get clobbered in the majors. Don't be fooled by Eshelman's ERA after 12 IP this season. He still has a 5.68 FIP, is giving up 2.2 HR/9 and has a K rate of 3.6/9. He is a ticking time bomb out there.

It should be Akin. I do not understand the hesitation to use him while also having all the confidence in the world in guys with lesser minor league track records who barely have ML experience (i.e., Sulser, Lakins and Eshelman).

Well, Girardi was willing to pitch a position player before Hyde was willing to pitch Akin...

Hyde's pre-game comments today sort of suggested to me that he may not be the biggest fan of having Akin up here. https://www.masnsports.com/school-of-roch/2020/08/ruiz-on-his-defense-and-hair-hyde-on-davis-and-akin.html “I wanted to try to get him in the correct situation, try to take care of him the best I possibly could,” Hyde said. “It hasn’t happened yet and we’ve been playing well, we’ve had the lead and I’ve wanted to use other people right now. This is the big leagues and we’re trying to win games and so when I feel like it’s his time to pitch, that will be the time. Not exactly a ringing endorsement right there. Regardless, the way they have treated Akin with this call-up seems very out of the ordinary compared to how they are handling other prospects.

He also put up an .859 OPS in Bowie in 2017. He only has 211 ML plate appearances and has still managed a .709 OPS. I'm not completely giving up hope, but I don't think it's likely he becomes more than a platoon guy.

There really is no reason to be giving Dwight Smith Jr. at bats over Mountcastle at this point. I'd bring him up.

Well at least Hess seems like an easy choice for one of those. He has not pitched since opening day.

Assuming that Milone pitches on Friday and Means goes on regular rest on Sunday, it looks like we need a starting pitcher for saturday's game against the Nats. Any guesses? As much as I'd love to see Akin, I think the more likely options are Hess or Eshelman.

The stuff we've seen from Means the first two starts is pretty close to legitimate TOR stuff. He is sitting 94-95 with a plus change-up and improving curveball. His command last night was also very good, I didn't seem him miss his spot with his fastball very much. We would be drooling over a prospect with this arsenal of pitches.

Sisco is a bad defensive catcher but not nearly as bad as some make him out to be. He isn't unplayable at the position or anything and I don't think he is much worse than Severino.

I wanted to see Stewart get a lot of ABs this year and I'm not changing that stance over 12 ABs to start the season. To me, he looks like he is having good at bats. Let's get him as much time as we can this year and try and figure out what we have.

Pitch count. I think he had 19 in the 1st, 30 in the second and 24-25 in the third. Ended up at 87 through 4.