Grayson Rodriguez Expectations

[SilverRocket]

13 minutes ago, interloper said:

He's not? That's what literally everyone has been saying for years now. I can feel the goalposts moving...

Maybe we're reading different sources but I've never considered him to be a Strasburg or Verlander type. He wasn't even said to have the best stuff in the system (DL Hall did).

[dystopia]

15 minutes ago, SilverRocket said:

Maybe we're reading different sources but I've never considered him to be a Strasburg or Verlander type. He wasn't even said to have the best stuff in the system (DL Hall did).

You don’t need to be those two to be touted as an ace. And he was touted as that. That said, nobody should be considering him a bust based on a month and a half in the big leagues. 

[Just Regular]

At its most basic, he is a high school RHP, one of the very best American kids whose date of birth rounds off to 1.1.2000 that the MLB Clubs grabbed at age 18 in 2018.

Unlike say Nick Bitsko or Dylan Bundy or Daniel Espino, he has attained age 23.5 (happy half birthday Grayson) without any major Arm issues.

For most of this time, his talent has been curated and constrained by an Org executing one of the deeper dumps in recent history, of course only because the AL East is that much better than the NL Central or AL West.     Also, covid.     

It'll forever be a black box if he could have been Kerry Wood or Josh Beckett.   Beckett at 23.5 was enjoying that shiny new World Series MVP trophy.     Both those guys more or less had their last good seasons at 31.

[Spy Fox]

My perception of Grayson's long term ceiling isn't really damaged. 

What's a bummer is, I was hoping we might have a guy ready for a Spencer Strider, Alek Manoah, Shane McClanahan type rookie year where they look like the guy you were hoping for from pretty much the beginning. (Though, wow, what's wrong with Manoah this year?)

John Means I guess kinda did that, though he wasn't as highly touted. 

[SilverRocket]

1 hour ago, dystopia said:

You don’t need to be those two to be touted as an ace. And he was touted as that. That said, nobody should be considering him a bust based on a month and a half in the big leagues. 

To be clear, when I said ace, I meant it in the sense of a very top-tier pitcher, like top 5-10 in the game. Not in the "team's ace" sense, like top 30 in the game (what scouts might call a #2 starter). I do think he can be the latter, though the odds of that have gone down a little. I don't think most scouting reports were predicting the former. Sometimes the best pitching prospect is a #2... there are only a few aces.

For what it's worth, Kevin Gausman is currently #5 in pitching fWAR this year.

[Sports Guy]

48 minutes ago, SilverRocket said:

To be clear, when I said ace, I meant it in the sense of a very top-tier pitcher, like top 5-10 in the game. Not in the "team's ace" sense, like top 30 in the game (what scouts might call a #2 starter). I do think he can be the latter, though the odds of that have gone down a little. I don't think most scouting reports were predicting the former. Sometimes the best pitching prospect is a #2... there are only a few aces.

For what it's worth, Kevin Gausman is currently #5 in pitching fWAR this year.

Odds have not changed at all at what GRod could become.

[Moose Milligan]

2 hours ago, Spy Fox said:

My perception of Grayson's long term ceiling isn't really damaged. 

What's a bummer is, I was hoping we might have a guy ready for a Spencer Strider, Alek Manoah, Shane McClanahan type rookie year where they look like the guy you were hoping for from pretty much the beginning. (Though, wow, what's wrong with Manoah this year?)

John Means I guess kinda did that, though he wasn't as highly touted. 

Yeah, this is where I am. It doesn’t damage my long term perception of what he can be, but you just wanna see a guy step up from the minors and be a good addition right away. 

[DirtyBird]

On 5/16/2023 at 2:24 PM, Sports Guy said:

But Gibson can go to the pen.

I think we should leave him in the rotation.

[DirtyBird]

On 5/16/2023 at 1:49 PM, emmett16 said:

There are no pitchers in Norfolk that would do a better job than he is doing.  I’ll revisit that thought in another month. 

I think we might be able to find someone who can do at least as well.

[tntoriole]

Pretty clear Grod is not going to be the Verlander, Scherzer , DeGrom etc TOR. 
At this point, it is not clear at all what he is. 
If he doesn’t find his stuff that was there prior to the injury, he may never see the bigs again. 
Because if he pitches like he is now when he is at Norfolk, he is going to get hammered there too. 

Edited May 27, 2023 by tntoriole

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, tntoriole said:

Pretty clear Grod is not going to be the Verlander, Scherzer , DeGrom etc TOR. 
At this point, it is not clear at all what he is. 
If he doesn’t find his stuff that was there prior to the injury, he may never see the bigs again. 
Because if he pitches like he is now when he is at Norfolk, he is going to get hammered there too. 

Barring a cataclysmic injury he's going to get another sot in the bigs.

Just silly to suggest otherwise.

[RZNJ]

9 minutes ago, tntoriole said:

Pretty clear Grod is not going to be the Verlander, Scherzer , DeGrom etc TOR. 
At this point, it is not clear at all what he is. 
If he doesn’t find his stuff that was there prior to the injury, he may never see the bigs again. 
Because if he pitches like he is now when he is at Norfolk, he is going to get hammered there too. 

The stuff is there. You can see the plus change, fastball, slider, and curve. Unfortunately, the plus secondaries are few and far between.  He may look far away from success but I think he’s pretty close.

[Spy Fox]

14 minutes ago, tntoriole said:

Pretty clear Grod is not going to be the Verlander, Scherzer , DeGrom etc TOR. 
At this point, it is not clear at all what he is. 
If he doesn’t find his stuff that was there prior to the injury, he may never see the bigs again. 
Because if he pitches like he is now when he is at Norfolk, he is going to get hammered there too. 

At Grayson's age of 23.192 neither Scherzer or deGrom had reached the majors. At the same age Verlander was finishing his ROY campaign, and two years later he led the league in losses with a 4.84 ERA. There are many different paths to success. 

[accinfo]

15 minutes ago, tntoriole said:

Pretty clear Grod is not going to be the Verlander, Scherzer , DeGrom etc TOR. 
At this point, it is not clear at all what he is. 
If he doesn’t find his stuff that was there prior to the injury, he may never see the bigs again. 
Because if he pitches like he is now when he is at Norfolk, he is going to get hammered there too. 

Nothing is clear at this point.  Verlander had his up and downs his first couple of years.  So did Randy Johnson.  How about Kevin Gausman?  

[Going Underground]

Roy Halladay in his third year had over a 10 ERA and was sent to the minors.