The Blue Jays lost two of three in Houston over the weekend, and the much anticipated return of top prospect Nate Pearson to the rotation didn’t go the way anybody wanted. So let’s talk about it! But first, please indulge me while I attempt to make a living. Because if you’ve been sent here by a friend, or are an existing subscriber who would like to move to a paid membership so you can comment, ask questions the next time I open up the ol’ mail bag, or just plain old support what I do, click below to upgrade or become a subscriber. I will be eternally grateful if you do!
Does anybody here know if Nate was reliably throwing strikes in the minors? You can imagine a situation where somebody does really well even though they throw balls all the time, because they look enough like strikes that minor league hitters, who tend to chase anyway, strike out swinging. Major league hitters don't chase, and aren't fooled, and walk. If this is Nate's problem, then he needs to learn to throw strikes, and presumably he doesn't have to do that in major league baseball games. If, on the other hand, he had control in the minors but doesn't in the majors -- what could be causing this? Just the pressure of being in the majors? Are their charts somewhere that show where Nate has been locating his pitches? What do they show?
About injuries -- 7 days (which I am not sure is used for anything but concussions), 10 days and then 60 days is an odd sort of granularity. There are a whole lot of injuries that take more than 10 days but less than 60 to heal, and indeed the only thing that can often be done is wait a week or so and then see if you think the injury will heal in 'less than a week' or 'more' from that point in time. I think that this may be responsible for some of the double-speak -- clubs are reluctant to say "Right now only God knows when X will be ready to play, but in a week our high performance staff will be able to make a prediction which is better than a guess". "We made a mistake and thought he was ready to pitch, and he wasn't" is another thing they don't want to say. It would be nice if admitting to a mistake didn't immediately cause people to bring out the pitchforks and torches, but how to get to that more tolerant and realistic world from here?
In the BeforeTime, I was at a Pitch Talks event where Ross Atkins was the feature speaker. During the audience Q&A, he was asked about his favourite books and he mentioned a psychologist, whose name I've since forgotten, that had a New York Times bestseller about grit and mindset. More interestingly, he said that they'd had her in to consult for the team.
I hadn't read the book, but coincidentally had read reviews and interviews by her talking about praising process, etc., instead of the smarts or ability of the child in order to help prepare them for adversity and learn to grow from failure. Given how much Shapiro and Atkins talk about process, hard work and attitude, I guess it wasn't surprising to hear Atkins say they've had a researcher on learning and 'grit' consult for them.
But it does make me wonder if part of the decision to promote a prospect depends on whether they think he's got 'grit' and can handle getting beat up in the majors. And once in the Show, maybe the Jays are more willing to accept on field failure so long as the player has the right attitude and is putting in the work off the field. Especially for someone as talented as Pearson (and Vladdy and Bo), who aren't being challenged in the minors. If Bo gets to play through mistakes, why not Nate?
The Romero tweet about everything in that situation going 100 mph is such a good point that stats don’t account for and most of us probably overlook. Like, I can’t imagine having that few MLB innings, playing against a team that’s doing everything in their power to steal signs/location, having just tweaked your mechanics, and then having your command completely abandon you like that. The takes out there that “this is who Pearson is” are just ludicrous.
Thanks Andrew, you continue to provide the best Jays content out there. Pearson definitely should have had more time at AAA, but what was the quote from Charlie a few years ago...'We haven't got anyone else?' or something like that? I think that's what we're looking at here. With Stripling struggling, Matz trending down a bit from his nice start, you have to wonder how bad Roark was that we just let him go! If Ryu gets injured again or something happens to Ray, we are in big trouble.
Does anybody here know if Nate was reliably throwing strikes in the minors? You can imagine a situation where somebody does really well even though they throw balls all the time, because they look enough like strikes that minor league hitters, who tend to chase anyway, strike out swinging. Major league hitters don't chase, and aren't fooled, and walk. If this is Nate's problem, then he needs to learn to throw strikes, and presumably he doesn't have to do that in major league baseball games. If, on the other hand, he had control in the minors but doesn't in the majors -- what could be causing this? Just the pressure of being in the majors? Are their charts somewhere that show where Nate has been locating his pitches? What do they show?
About injuries -- 7 days (which I am not sure is used for anything but concussions), 10 days and then 60 days is an odd sort of granularity. There are a whole lot of injuries that take more than 10 days but less than 60 to heal, and indeed the only thing that can often be done is wait a week or so and then see if you think the injury will heal in 'less than a week' or 'more' from that point in time. I think that this may be responsible for some of the double-speak -- clubs are reluctant to say "Right now only God knows when X will be ready to play, but in a week our high performance staff will be able to make a prediction which is better than a guess". "We made a mistake and thought he was ready to pitch, and he wasn't" is another thing they don't want to say. It would be nice if admitting to a mistake didn't immediately cause people to bring out the pitchforks and torches, but how to get to that more tolerant and realistic world from here?
In the BeforeTime, I was at a Pitch Talks event where Ross Atkins was the feature speaker. During the audience Q&A, he was asked about his favourite books and he mentioned a psychologist, whose name I've since forgotten, that had a New York Times bestseller about grit and mindset. More interestingly, he said that they'd had her in to consult for the team.
I hadn't read the book, but coincidentally had read reviews and interviews by her talking about praising process, etc., instead of the smarts or ability of the child in order to help prepare them for adversity and learn to grow from failure. Given how much Shapiro and Atkins talk about process, hard work and attitude, I guess it wasn't surprising to hear Atkins say they've had a researcher on learning and 'grit' consult for them.
But it does make me wonder if part of the decision to promote a prospect depends on whether they think he's got 'grit' and can handle getting beat up in the majors. And once in the Show, maybe the Jays are more willing to accept on field failure so long as the player has the right attitude and is putting in the work off the field. Especially for someone as talented as Pearson (and Vladdy and Bo), who aren't being challenged in the minors. If Bo gets to play through mistakes, why not Nate?
The Romero tweet about everything in that situation going 100 mph is such a good point that stats don’t account for and most of us probably overlook. Like, I can’t imagine having that few MLB innings, playing against a team that’s doing everything in their power to steal signs/location, having just tweaked your mechanics, and then having your command completely abandon you like that. The takes out there that “this is who Pearson is” are just ludicrous.
Thanks Andrew, you continue to provide the best Jays content out there. Pearson definitely should have had more time at AAA, but what was the quote from Charlie a few years ago...'We haven't got anyone else?' or something like that? I think that's what we're looking at here. With Stripling struggling, Matz trending down a bit from his nice start, you have to wonder how bad Roark was that we just let him go! If Ryu gets injured again or something happens to Ray, we are in big trouble.