Brenan Hanifee 6/28 notes

[Luke-OH]

First time seeing Hanifee pitch. Watching on milb.tv not a great camera angle for pitch recognition.

Hanifee is tall, slender, still has room to gain good weight but not so thin that he needs to gain weight.

He works fast and has an athletic, repeatable delivery. There is some effort in the delivery but he uses his lower body well which seems to take some stress of the arm.

 There isn't a ton of deception in the delivery but his long arms and strong drive towards home plate makes his fastball jump on hitters who were late on it all night ( I don't know how hard he was throwing but the swings said it was a good fastball).  The fastball seemed to have good downward plane and some armside tail and it generated a lot of GBs (I think all but 2 batted balls were grounders and only one ball made it out of the infield cleanly)

I think he was also throwing a slider and a change up. Neither of them looked to have much in the way of horizontal movement and I couldn't tell vertical break from the angle, but he was able to throw the breaking ball for strikes at times.  

His control was good, command was decent as well. When he missed the zone it was a mechanical issue where he left his body open and would miss armside and up, that led to the fist of his two walks (4 straight balls) but he was able to fix it pretty quickly and get back on track.

 

Final Line: 6IP, 3H, 1R, 2BB, 7K, HBP, 84 pitches, 57 strikes

 

[sportsfan8703]

Gotta like that he's pitching "deep" into games. He's not burning through his pitch count in 4 IP. 

[DirtyBird]

If he finishes out the season with performances like these, do you think he will jump to Frederick next season?

[weams]

7 hours ago, phillyOs119 said:

First time seeing Hanifee pitch. Watching on milb.tv not a great camera angle for pitch recognition.

Hanifee is tall, slender, still has room to gain good weight but not so thin that he needs to gain weight.

He works fast and has an athletic, repeatable delivery. There is some effort in the delivery but he uses his lower body well which seems to take some stress of the arm.

 There isn't a ton of deception in the delivery but his long arms and strong drive towards home plate makes his fastball jump on hitters who were late on it all night ( I don't know how hard he was throwing but the swings said it was a good fastball).  The fastball seemed to have good downward plane and some armside tail and it generated a lot of GBs (I think all but 2 batted balls were grounders and only one ball made it out of the infield cleanly)

I think he was also throwing a slider and a change up. Neither of them looked to have much in the way of horizontal movement and I couldn't tell vertical break from the angle, but he was able to throw the breaking ball for strikes at times.  

His control was good, command was decent as well. When he missed the zone it was a mechanical issue where he left his body open and would miss armside and up, that led to the fist of his two walks (4 straight balls) but he was able to fix it pretty quickly and get back on track.

 

Final Line: 6IP, 3H, 1R, 2BB, 7K, HBP, 84 pitches, 57 strikes

 

HHP  Front page

[Frobby]

41 minutes ago, DirtyBird said:

If he finishes out the season with performances like these, do you think he will jump to Frederick next season?

It's a little early to be asking that question.    I think a better question would be, if he continues to dominate at Aberdeen, might he be moved up to Delmarva at some point this season?

Let's remember that Alex Wells, at age 19 last season, pitched to a 2.15 ERA and 0.91 WHIP, but did not get promoted in-season and is pitching at Delmarva now.     That suggests the O's will be patient with Hanifee.

[DirtyBird]

25 minutes ago, Frobby said:

It's a little early to be asking that question.    I think a better question would be, if he continues to dominate at Aberdeen, might he be moved up to Delmarva at some point this season?

Let's remember that Alex Wells, at age 19 last season, pitched to a 2.15 ERA and 0.91 WHIP, but did not get promoted in-season and is pitching at Delmarva now.     That suggests the O's will be patient with Hanifee.

0.75 ERA, 0.83 WHIP and a higher K rate is better than that.

[Frobby]

8 minutes ago, DirtyBird said:

0.75 ERA, 0.83 WHIP and a higher K rate is better than that.

It's two games.    Even if Hanifee continues to do very well at Aberdeen, I'm not expecting those numbers to hold up.    If they do, he won't be at Aberdeen in August.   

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

It's a little early to be asking that question.    I think a better question would be, if he continues to dominate at Aberdeen, might he be moved up to Delmarva at some point this season?

Let's remember that Alex Wells, at age 19 last season, pitched to a 2.15 ERA and 0.91 WHIP, but did not get promoted in-season and is pitching at Delmarva now.     That suggests the O's will be patient with Hanifee.

Agreed. The one thing I learned is to be very weary of New York Penn League success, especially from pitchers. The hitting in that league is generally pretty bad most years and early on the high draft picks may not have arrived yet. Saying that, it's good to see the young man get off to a good start. There would be nothing wrong with him going to Delmarva next season and getting a full season under this belt at the age of 20.

[ChuckS]

4 hours ago, Tony-OH said:

Agreed. The one thing I learned is to be very weary of New York Penn League success, especially from pitchers. The hitting in that league is generally pretty bad most years and early on the high draft picks may not have arrived yet. Saying that, it's good to see the young man get off to a good start. There would be nothing wrong with him going to Delmarva next season and getting a full season under this belt at the age of 20.

Well, if you look at last year:

Wells performed very well and it has translated to full season ball.

Akin performed very well and it has translated to full season ball, minus some early season struggles.

Dietz was bad in Aberdeen and has struggled in Delmarva.

Sedlock was average in Aberdeen and has been bad in Frederick (a two level jump).

If we are just looking at last year it has been a fair gauge. 

[DirtyBird]

And I guess most of the Frederick rotation (everyone besides Akin) will be stuck there again next year.

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, DirtyBird said:

And I guess most of the Frederick rotation (everyone besides Akin) will be stuck there again next year.

They might get pushed up deserving or not depending on what happens below them.

[Luke-OH]

Way too early to tell with Hanifee, the fastball is interesting, and the delivery is sound, but secondary stuff didn't jump out and he'll need that as he progresses. 

[Ohfan67]

Yeah, but what was his time to the plate?

[Luke-OH]

4 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

Yeah, but what was his time to the plate?

Didn't time it, but looks like the O's have simplified his delivery a little bit from his high school delivery. That being said, he brings his leg pretty high, even from the stretch, so I doubt he is particularly fast to the plate currently.

[bobmc]

17 hours ago, phillyOs119 said:

Didn't time it, but looks like the O's have simplified his delivery a little bit from his high school delivery. That being said, he brings his leg pretty high, even from the stretch, so I doubt he is particularly fast to the plate currently.

Brandon Bonilla with 4 K's early - have you seen him?