Just don't understand the optimism about Tillman

[bluedog]

Yet, you are optimistic about Bergesen...That makes little sense.

Tillman is clearly more talented and clearly has more upside than BB.

Tillman is learning and has a lot to work on but he is improving and is still very young.

Tillman may never get it or he may end up being a solid mid rotation starter but right now, he should be given the ball every 5th day for the entire season, let him gain more experience and then see where he is.

Right now, he has essentially pitched one full season and he has done that at very young ages. On top of that, he has been playing with a new pitch and new mechanics, all the while having several different pitching coaches in his ear.

I am not trying to make excuses for him because his game has a lot of holes in it and he is a long ways away right now from reaching his ceiling but he is basically our 4/5 starter right now and he is giving us exactly what a back of the rotation starter normally gives.

The question is, how much more can he be? As long as we continue to see improvements, then you have to have hope for him to be better.

I am optimistic about Bergesen because his career numbers absolutely destroy Tillman's and he's had two spectacular 12+ start streaks in 2+ years. People like to say Bergesen "is what he is". Well if that's true, he's a career 4.50 guy who averages over 6.0 IP per start. Unlike other people, I believe he can (and will) pitch better than that long term. But even if that's all he is, its still superior to what we've seen from Tillman thus far.

[Ohfan67]

I believe that Tillman has more upside than Bergensen, but I am interested to see what Tillman could do when pitching one inning. I think his potential as a back of the bullpen pitcher might be higher than as a starter and the probability that he would reach his potential as a reliever might be higher. It would be fun to see if he could add two or three MPH to his fastball in one inning spurts. If so, then his off speed stuff would be very difficult to handle.

[Moose Milligan]

I am optimistic about Bergesen because his career numbers absolutely destroy Tillman's and he's had two spectacular 12+ start streaks in 2+ years. People like to say Bergesen "is what he is". Well if that's true, he's a career 4.50 guy who averages over 6.0 IP per start. Unlike other people, I believe he can (and will) pitch better than that long term. But even if that's all he is, its still superior to what we've seen from Tillman thus far.

Age, potential, blah blah blah..

[NickM21]

I think our fans look at the success and stuff of Matusz, Britton, and (to a slightly lesser extent) Arrieta and that leads them to believe Tillman and Bergesen are failures. Tillman/Bergesen are what they are. #4/#5 starters that could develop into #3 starters and maybe even more if all things go right. Tillman is the one that will take the longest to develop. The problem with Bergesen is when things go bad, they go REALLY bad. Tillman I think will be able to battle out of innings better but of course throw a lot of pitches. We'll see what happens, but I think they will both be quality guys to have at the back end of a rotation.

[Stotle]

I am optimistic about Bergesen because his career numbers absolutely destroy Tillman's and he's had two spectacular 12+ start streaks in 2+ years. People like to say Bergesen "is what he is". Well if that's true, he's a career 4.50 guy who averages over 6.0 IP per start. Unlike other people, I believe he can (and will) pitch better than that long term. But even if that's all he is, its still superior to what we've seen from Tillman thus far.

Tillman is about the age now that Bergesen was when he made his ML debut 3 years ago. Do you think Tillman might be in a different place if Baltimore decided three years ago to clean-up his backside flash and release and had him work on it through AA/AAA?

I don't blame BAL for not doing that -- I certainly didn't see his past mechanics as an issue when he was dealing in AA/AAA, and why fix something that may not be an issue? But now that we see (as VaTech astutely pointed out) he was telegraphing his secondaries and allowing hitters to sit FB, changes need to be made.

What sense does it make to not allow him time to make those changes? I mean, he isn't the first prospect to ever show up with the big club and find out that he'll need to do things diferently to succeed at the highest level. Rick Porcello went through 27 games last year as a starter and was highly disappointing. He has made adjustments this year and is looking more and more like a safe bet for #3 production moving forward, with that front-end upside still in place. I just don't understand the issue with having some patience -- particularly on a club that isn't really going anywhere anytime soon.

[Stotle]

Just wait till Britton throws a couple clunkers in a row.

I wrote that and then deleted it. The fact that no one seems concerned at all at the number of baserunners Britton allows and the limited number of bats he misses says it all. His stuff is clearly better than Bergesens, but folks should take a look at the rate stats for Bergie in his first year and Britton thus far. It's highly likely Britton will need to adjust and grow his stuff/execution in order to maintain the bottom line numbers (ERA+ xFIP etc.) that has going right now.

[TradeAngelos]

Since when is 23 years old "really young"???

It is not like the kid is fresh out of high school, he has been "developing" for 5 years after being a 2nd round pick. This isn't some 57th rounder with a low ceiling, this is a very talented pitcher.

This is his 6th year trying to "figure it out" and "make adjustments".

How long do you want to give him? 6 years? 7 years?

[primetime]

Tillman has a ways to go, but I've very much enjoyed watching him start to figure things out this year. It's disappointing to me that a fanbase that has watched terrible baseball for a decade can't show enough patience to allow a talented young arm to make adjustments and attempt to grow into a useful future piece.

He has 34 career MLB starts. That is fewer than a healthy pitcher would typically make in a single MLB season. I get it -- it's a results-oriented business when you are talking about fans. I just wish folks in general could get behind the idea that development is not always linear.

I could go off on how Matusz was treated the first half of last year and how Wieters has been treated the past two seasons, but I guess it's not really the point.

The O's definitely have their share of fickle, impatient, fed up fans.....13 years of futility will do that but the O's fanbase isn't really unique to any other.

In regards to Tillman, at this point in his career, his starts are simply brutal to watch. I understand that some of his peripherals are showing improvement but watching him start after start, I see an ok #5 starter, that seems to be very lucky to get through 5 innings. He struggles mightily with command, cannot put hitters away and cannot finish off innings.

Also, his "intangibles" seem to be lacking. His body language and the way he carries himself exudes a total lack of confidence and his pace is simply atrocious. His delivery is long, slow and it's clear that he's aiming the ball, which is killing velocity and movement. I would be ok with the velocity if I felt like he could hit his spots and effectively utilize his off speed pitches consistently but he's not there yet.

I keep telling myself he's young and that it's great that he's had even modest success at such a young age but something about Tillman just doesn't feel right to me. On the other hand, watching Matusz, Arrieta and Britton in their first few starts, even when they struggled, they carried themselves differently. They looked like they had a clue, a gameplan. Right now, Tillman doesn't appear to have much of a gameplan. He looks to me like a guy who's trying really hard not to mess up.

Tillman is a very interesting case. Perhaps what we're watching is the development of a potentially good starter, at least I hope we are. I understand what a lot of his numbers and results say but to this point Tillman doesn't pass the eye test for me.

All of this being said, to have a #5 starter consistently get through 5 innings and have your team still be in the game isn't that bad. In a perfect world, I'd like to have 2009/late 2010 Bergesen in the 5 spot but he may never be consistent enough to hold down a spot long term.

[Stotle]

Since when is 23 years old "really young"???

It is not like the kid is fresh out of high school, he has been "developing" for 5 years after being a 2nd round pick. This isn't some 57th rounder with a low ceiling, this is a very talented pitcher.

This is his 6th year trying to "figure it out" and "make adjustments".

How long do you want to give him? 6 years? 7 years?

6th year of figuring it out? I give up....

[Why_Knott?]

Now now, he doesn't sit at 86 mph. Fangraphs shows that his average this year so far is like 90.2 or something.

Still, he doesn't throw as hard as he did two years ago. I'm more concerned with the lack of fastball movement than the velocity.

I just feel like I'm watching a Steve Trachsel clone.

[cb3fsu]

I just don't understand the issue with having some patience -- particularly on a club that isn't really going anywhere anytime soon.

Didn't you hear? This team is a contender. They managed to get to .500 for a day.

[Stotle]

The O's definitely have their share of fickle, impatient, fed up fans.....13 years of futility will do that but the O's fanbase isn't really unique to any other.

In regards to Tillman, at this point in his career, his starts are simply brutal to watch. I understand that some of his peripherals are showing improvement but watching him start after start, I see an ok #5 starter, that seems to be very lucky to get through 5 innings. He struggles mightily with command, cannot put hitters away and cannot finish off innings.

Also, his "intangibles" seem to be lacking. His body language and the way he carries himself exudes a total lack of confidence and his pace is simply atrocious. His delivery is long, slow and it's clear that he's aiming the ball, which is killing velocity and movement. I would be ok with the velocity if I felt like he could hit his spots and effectively utilize his off speed pitches consistently but he's not there yet.

I keep telling myself he's young and that it's great that he's had even modest success at such a young age but something about Tillman just doesn't feel right to me. On the other hand, watching Matusz, Arrieta and Britton in their first few starts, even when they struggled, they carried themselves differently. They looked like they had a clue, a gameplan. Right now, Tillman doesn't appear to have much of a gameplan. He looks to me like a guy who's trying really hard not to mess up.

Tillman is a very interesting case. Perhaps what we're watching is the development of a potentially good starter, at least I hope we are. I understand what a lot of his numbers and results say but to this point Tillman doesn't pass the eye test for me.

All of this being said, to have a #5 starter consistently get through 5 innings and have your team still be in the game isn't that bad. In a perfect world, I'd like to have 2009/late 2010 Bergesen in the 5 spot but he may never be consistent enough to hold down a spot long term.

I understand and respect all of this. But seeing as how the organization has bounced him up and down the last two years and is on their second attempt to "fix things" (it appears the initial thought was they could just teach him a new pitch and fix everything) I'm having trouble thrusting too much blame on Tillman. Further, he has essentially (based on beat reporters) been told he is competing with Britton for his job every time he goes out there. It isn't exactly a nurturing environment.

Some will say, "So what -- toughen up and get it done." That's absolutely fair. But not everyone can flip a switch like that. If that means he isn't cut out for this organization long term, I hope they move him to a team that will try and grow him. I'd love to see him get a chance to develop, and if he fails than at least he does it on his own. I'll be smacking my forhead if he's back at AAA to start 2012 because the team wants him to keep "working on things".

[DrOrioles90210]

I'm always intrigued at the way Palmer speaks about Tillman whenever he pitches. Palmer never seems like he's anything other than brutally honest and he seems pretty optimistic that Tillman can become a good pitcher once he is more consistent with his mechanics. He's mentioned a few times that his velocity also has a good chance of increasing along with better control obviously. This is all based on what Palmer sees in his mechanics and what I guess he knows Tillman is working on with Connor, which gives me more hope than just looking at his numbers.

[now]

Hard to argue with everyone's frustration; yet it's funny that with the famous "eye test," HOFer Jim Palmer is still very much in Tillman's corner, while the eye test of a good number of our armchair Hangouters gets a failing grade.

[The Rick]

Tillman has a ways to go, but I've very much enjoyed watching him start to figure things out this year. It's disappointing to me that a fanbase that has watched terrible baseball for a decade can't show enough patience to allow a talented young arm to make adjustments and attempt to grow into a useful future piece.

He has 34 career MLB starts. That is fewer than a healthy pitcher would typically make in a single MLB season. I get it -- it's a results-oriented business when you are talking about fans. I just wish folks in general could get behind the idea that development is not always linear.

I could go off on how Matusz was treated the first half of last year and how Wieters has been treated the past two seasons, but I guess it's not really the point.

Great post, and I agree with the bolded part especially.

To me, he's had a much better feel for picking his spots and limiting the damage. Which, for a young pitcher who is struggling mightly with his control, that's all I can ask for. That's part of pitching, rarely do pitchers consistently harness their command, that's just reality.

I guess to sum it up, while it's frustrating to watch any pitcher with shoddy command, it does seem like Tillman is learning more and more how to pitch effectively at this level. I'm encouraged.