Lakeland vs. Tampa Notebook
Pitching
Gabriel Barbosa and Joe Miller were very strong starters for both Tampa and Lakeland on Tuesday night. Barbosa was a Rule 5 Selection for the Yankees, taken from the Colorado Rockies. He threw 6 different pitches on the night, with a near even distribution between his curveball, sinker, four-seam, change-up and slider. The cutter was not far behind in terms of usage either. Barbosa felt comfortable pitching backwards, especially leaning on his secondary pitches in the 4th inning. Nothing really stood out, with the velocity sitting low 90s for his fastball. The windup is fairly simple and repeatable, with a more over the top and high release point. It would be great if Barbosa climbs the ranks with this diverse repertoire, but the lack of a true carrying pitch may work against him. Still, it was one of the best starts from a Tampa pitcher thus far this season.
Nothing about Joe Miller stands out as he’s listed at 5'10. He’s a lefty with a 3/4 delivery and a simple motion but he did a really solid job against the Tampa lineup. His fastball sits in the low 90s, with a mid 80s change-up and a slower slider at 78mph, with a decent amount of drop plus glove side movement. There’s also a cutter that works in between the slider and fastball, with good depth and little to none horizontal movement. Miller on has two starts on the season but he’s currently running a ridiculous 21 strikeouts to 1 walk on the season in just 14 innings. He’s 24, out of UPenn and it’s his second go at Single-A but his slider gets whiffs and while his change-up was put into play, it wasn’t hit particularly hard. It’s a long path to get to the majors, but Miller has enough working for him where they should continue to use him as a starter and maybe bump him up to High-A later in the year.
In terms of relievers, Montana Semmel struggled to miss bats in his two innings of work. He gave up a homerun to Brett Callahan but managed to induce a double play from Jose De La Cruz. What I see from Semmel is a very jerky motion, particularly when he breaks his hands and comes into a T position. It’s a double edged sword where he generates good velocity but I don’t think he does a great job repeating the motion. His slider was probably his best pitch in terms of command and getting batters out. Osiel Rodriguez relied on his sinker and used his change-up and slider sparingly, but worked a clean inning.
Cam Brown had a mirror delivery to Dunedin’s Kai Peterson, as he completely turns his back to batters and comes in from a low crossfire angle. He barely used his curveball and change-up but managed to freeze Roderick Arias to end the inning with the change-up. Donye Evans is a large man at 6'6 and a low arm angle but it’s not overwhelming velocity, topping out at 93/94mph. He got whiffs on all the sliders that he threw and closed out the game despite the tying run getting to second. He was wild with his change-up and sinker but close enough to the zone to let the Tampa bats get themselves out.
Luis Serna and Joe Adametz were the game two starters. Serna had a bad time, with his fastball getting hit hard. Most troubling was that he was getting hit hard by a lefty heavy lineup. The change-up is still a good pitch but Lakeland seemed to attack his sinker whenever they saw it. His slider was effective when in the zone, but looking at his zone chart, you can see some of the problems Serna had:
That cluster of yellow in the left handed box is a mix of Serna attacking low and away to right-handers and trying to spot back leg against left handers. Simply put, nobody was biting at those pitches. He walked four and was out by the third inning. Adametz on the other hand, was good enough. He walked three and gave up 5 hits but nearly went six innings. He’s big and lanky, reminiscent of Chris Sale in appearance and motion only. He delivers cross fire at a low release point. He filled up the zone with sinkers and sliders, and only made one mistake to Oscar Gonzalez, who was on rehab assignment from Scranton, for a homerun. When Adametz missed, he generally missed arm side by a lot with his offspeed and sinker. He showed comfort throwing sliders to both righties and lefties. He lived in the zone, which will work at lower levels but as he gets in higher levels he may get hurt by his pitches living in the zone.
Garrett Apker followed Adametz and sat 95mph with his four seam fastball, which he got 8 whiffs on 18 swings, generally up in the zone. The slider and change-up were used sparingly.
Position Players
I came away impressed with Kevin McGonigle, Max Clark and Josue Briceño. McGonigle was in his first action of the season and showed great control of the zone and aggression when he saw a pitch he could hit. He starts in a slightly open stance with a straight up bat and slightly crouched stance. He has a slight leg kick with a quiet load. He didn’t chase outside the zone and was comfortable even against secondary pitches. It’s more hard line drives then homerun power, and he looks pretty filled out.
Clark was equally impressive, starting his series off with a scorched triple that drove in McGonigle. He has a slightly bigger leg kick than McGonigle and a bat wrap and gets his foot down early. You can see certain pitches where he really drives his back hip forward, especially on takes. Clark may have some room to put on some more muscle, but right now it’s also hard line drive contact. Clark is more prone to strikeouts currently but he too is comfortable taking pitches on the border and is posting 88.9% Z-Contact% on the season.
Both McGonigle and Clark were strong in the field. Clark backed up a errant throw to second and threw the runner out at third when he tried to advance. He also stole a hit on a quickly dropping line drive in front and to the left of him. McGonigle didn’t have many opportunities in the field, as he was DH and then pulled early in the second game due to it being 13–1 after three innings. McGonigle did get caught trying to be too aggressive on a delayed steal from third. Manny Palencia didn’t make too much of a pump fake to second and McGonigle booked it before realizing Palencia still had the ball. Despite that, you can see why Tigers fans could dream of this duo at the top of a lineup with ample room in Comerica Park. They’re both only 19 and will probably see extended time in Lakeland before moving up.
Briceño is a large man, who makes a lot of loud contact even on outs. Despite his large stature, he didn’t show much propensity for whiffs. He stays tall in his stance and coils up with his leg kick. I don’t think he will stick at catcher. He bobbled transfers on two separate steal attempts but negated one by throwing out Roderick Arias when he tried to advance to third. He hasn’t fully tapped into his power, which will be more important if he does have to move to first base or DH.
Jose De La Cruz has some of the most impressive exit velocities in the Florida State League, with a max EV of 112.8 mph. The issue is that he swings and misses quite a bit, running a 31.8% K rate in his third run at Single-A. He’s struggled with secondaries as well, with a 39.7% whiff rate. On top of that, while all of his hits were 102mph or faster, they were all ground balls. The power is tantalizing, but as always there still needs to be enough contact to make it work, and right now De La Cruz isn’t showing it.
Much of my Tampa observations from the Dunedin series still apply. Roderick Arias is still swinging and missing a lot, especially against secondaries. It was encouraging that he only struck out once each in two games that I saw and balancing it out with a walk each and several hard hit singles, but he hit another skid of multi strikeout games in the games following. George Lombard Jr. is working deep counts and walking more than he is striking out, but has shown little to no power beyond some hard hit line drives. He also landed on the injured list recently with no listed reason. Dylan Jasso has been impressive this season, with a .400 OBP. He starts with an open stance to a slow big leg kick with a slight bat wrap. He ended up striking out in two of his four at-bats in the only game I saw of him.
Next series will be one of the best teams in the FSL in Clearwater, with plenty of quality players.
