A poster on another board, who called himself Redbirdinsight, described himself as someone involved in player development for the Cardinals in Jupiter. He struck me as genuine, and the board’s moderators vouched that he was what he said he was.

He said Ott’s problem wasn’t with the grip on his fastball, but on his inability to throw first-pitch strikes. He had high praise for Adam’s stuff, but said he hadn’t yet learned to pitch like a professional.

It seems to me that he’s still young enough to learn to harness his stuff, but I don’t know enough about player development to know if there’s a specific window of opportunity for pitchers to learn this, or if it’s an unpredictable learning curve. I know that Koufax guy took a while but eventually got the hang of it. Other guys, like Greg Maddux, seemed to be born with it.

One more thought:

Ottavino came out of Northeastern. I read a while ago that Northeastern’s baseball field is one of the most extreme pitching-friendly environments in all of college baseball.

I wonder if that affected his development.

I also wonder if Luhnow’s stats-focused staff took that into consideration when they drafted him.

On the one hand, we’re told that Walt lost control over the minors entirely, and had no say over anyone who wasn’t on the 40-man roster. So if it’s true that Jeff Luhnow was/is in charge of scouting, drafting, and development, then it must be Luhnow’s idea to put so much emphasis on the 2-seam fastball.

Conversely, I suppose it could be true that Luhnow’s policy was a nod to Tony and Dunc’s preference for sinking fastballs. Which would suggest, I think, that Luhnow had a line of communication with Tony and Dave that went around Walt.

Or maybe they communicated telepathically.

Anyway, until someone says otherwise, I’m going to assume the pitching policy is Luhnow’s preference and remains in place.

good call on norrick, their numbers are pretty close together. both have nearly as high of K%, BB%. norrick’s babip makes him look flukier, and ottavino gets more grounders. and ottavino is nearly two years younger.

With Ottavino I think I am suffering a bit from C. Lambert disease. He has nice stuff, but until he succeeds at AA I won’t be sold. I also hope that the change is there as he says. If so, he could be a really interesting prospect. I would say the ceiling is higher than Jaime, but the likelihood of reaching it is lower. Maybe a 9E vs. Jaime’s 8C (using McKamey ratings)…

You just have to love the FBall… When you look at pure numbers Norrick looks just as good if not better imho…