On Monday, we ran through a progress report for what we called the “in-betweeners” — position players who had cracked the big leagues but hadn’t gotten more than 500 plate appearances in a season. Each of these players is finally getting a chance to prove he belongs in the big leagues.
Today, we’re completing the assessment by running through the pitchers who haven’t made more than 25 starts or 35 total appearances in the big leagues, starting or relieving, and are trying to establish themselves in the big leagues.
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For the sake of this article, we’re not going to include Hyeon-jong Yang, for two reasons. First, he has crossed those thresholds in nine seasons in Korea, so while he still isn’t an established MLB veteran, he has a ton of experience. The other reason is that he’s 33 years old, and the purpose of this assignment is to look at guys who are trying to stick around and be a part of the next contending team. Of course, Yang could stick around and prove me wrong at 35-plus years of age, but for now, he’s not exactly who we’re talking about for this.
On to the rest!
Dane Dunning (RHP) — 26 years old — Previous highs: 7 games, 34 innings / 2021: 12 games, 57 innings
Dunning seemed to solve a problem on Sunday — he made it through the first inning without allowing a run. That’s something he has now done in just seven of his 12 starts. The others included games of four-, four- and five-run first-innings before Dunning settled in. This should illustrate it better:
Dunning, first inning: 12 innings, 15 runs
Dunning, second inning: 12 innings, 0 runs
Dunning and Rangers manager Chris Woodward said after the game that part of the problem had been Dunning “establishing his sinker” in the first inning. Hitters knew it was coming and hunted it. These are the sorts of things that young pitchers learn early in their career, and Dunning seems to be progressing just fine. I expect him to be part of the Rangers’ rotation for years to come.
Kolby Allard (LHP) — 23 years old — Previous highs: 11 games, 45 1/3 innings / 2021: 12 games, 29 innings
You could make a case for Allard as the poster child of this entire discussion. He has occasionally looked like a solid No. 3-4 starter with potential to pitch for a decade in the big leagues, and he has also occasionally looked completely overmatched. Part of his growth and development has been learning which pitches pair well with others, and when to use them — completely normal pitching-development stuff. But part of it has been keeping his emotions in check.
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“Kolby has always been a very competitive, excitable guy, so he’s almost got to work harder to control his emotions and calm down,” Woodward said earlier this week. “He works too fast, and when he works fast, he’s like ‘OK, I’ve just got to get this pitch over with, I’ve just got to get through this.’ No, you’ve got to calm down, think about it for a second, execute, think with clarity. All those things we talk about on the mental skills side, and that’s a lot of the process that he needs to control that.”
Again, he’s 23. That’s not to say that a 23-year-old cannot be calm on the mound, but it’s a work in progress. And the best way to overcome things like that is often to go out and get that experience. Which — not to hammer the point home too hard — is what’s happening right now.
He just got his first start of the year on Saturday, and he allowed two runs by the time the fourth hitter came to the plate. After that, he calmed down and pitched through the fifth inning, allowing just one more hit and no more runs.
Demarcus Evans (RHP) — 24 years old — Previous high: 4 games, 4 innings / 2021: 4 games, 7 innings
Evans doesn’t throw the ball 100 mph, but he does throw it with a ton of spin: an average of 2,495 rpm — that’s 69th highest out of 572 pitchers to have thrown at least one pitch this year. He has also struck out 10 hitters in his seven innings this year, and while three walks isn’t elite, it still isn’t problematic since his career WHIP is 0.909. Hitters are notching just .167/.259/.375 (.634 OPS) against the 24-year-old, which bodes well for his ability to stick around.
So does his willingness to adapt, something that allowed him to add a cutter this past offseason.
“He had his pre-existing breaking ball, which was really inconsistent,” Rangers pitching coach Brendan Sagara said. “It wasn’t something he could (throw in the strike zone) very often. Last year in the short spurt up here, he pitched fine. But the concerns with projection were getting a spin pitch into the zone … it has become a better pitch than we all envisioned, just speaking to the talent of the pitcher. So we obviously have been really happy with it; he’s still throwing the other breaking ball as well, but just takes the pressure off of him having to strike that one, and also takes the heavy lifting off of the fastball as well.”
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A lat injury delayed his arrival in the big leagues this season, but it appears that Evans is here to stay.
John King (LHP) — 26 years old — Previous high: 6 games, 10 1/3 innings / 2021: 21 games, 30 innings
King has been one of the most pleasant surprises of the season. After posting a 6.10 ERA in limited big-league action in 2020, the left-hander has been one of the Rangers’ more reliable relief pitchers this season, accumulating a 2.40 ERA and is in the 97th percentile in chase rate. Also important as the team pushes the message of “attack hitters”: He has walked only six in 30 innings, good for the 93rd percentile, per Baseball Savant.
King, like Allard, is another high-energy, big-motor guy, but when asked what lesson he would give to younger relievers as they came up behind him, his answer sounded like someone who is starting to believe that he belongs.
“Your stuff plays, and you’re up here for a reason,” King said. “Just throw it over the plate. Don’t shy away, don’t be tempted to try to nick the corner or anything like that — that’s where I get in trouble. I know, a lot of guys try to be so perfect; just go out there and compete and let it rip.”
One interesting thing about King is that while he does “attack the zone,” he also has an extremely high chase rate. I asked him what allowed those two things to co-exist.
“It’s more with my offspeed stuff,” he explained. “My plan is like sinker, most likely always try to be in the zone — that’s my high groundball pitch. And then I know I have a little room for error if I’m trying to go away to a lefty with a slider if it goes a little down. But the main thing is selling it. My fastball with my hand speed with the changeup and slider. And usually, that’s what gets the hitters to see fastball and chase that ball under the zone or out, whatever it may be.”
Not groundbreaking stuff, but he’s doing it effectively, and with the help of a new pitch. Like Evans (and Kyle Gibson, for that matter) — it’s the cutter.
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“We did a couple things with him,” Sagara said. “He has really big arm-side movement on his pitches — sinker and changeup especially — and our question in the offseason was, ‘How do we get him to have more of a presence on the glove side of the plate?’ Something that not just moves into the righty, but more just establishes that part of the plate to set up his chase with the sinker and changeup, and the cutter was a natural fit.”
Taylor Hearn (LHP) — 26 years old — Previous high: 14 games, 17 1/3 innings / 2021: 18 games, 29 2/3 innings
The ceiling on Hearn still might be a mid-to-back-end starting pitcher in years to come, but for now, he is still in the bullpen. Overcoming a 2019 debut that served more as a kick in the teeth than a feather in the cap, Hearn rebounded nicely to have an effective 2020 season, posting a 3.63 ERA and 23 strikeouts in just over 17 innings. This year, his 4.25 ERA and 34 strikeouts are good, but aside from fastball velocity, he isn’t really setting the league alight just yet.
That’s an awful lot of blue for a guy trying to advance from reliever to starter. Still, his fastball is pretty unique and comes from the left side. There’s time to tweak his secondary stuff to help it play up, but he’s 26 years old. The big fork in the road isn’t here yet, but if you squint, you can see it coming over the horizon.
Incidentally, it’s truly perplexing to see Hearn in the 54th percentile for barrel percentage and average exit velocity (meaning he’s a little above average at missing the good part of the bat) while coming in at the 23rd percentile for hard-hit balls. I do not know what to make of that, beyond “I’ll check it out again at the end of the season and see if it makes any more sense.”
Kyle Cody (RHP) — 26 years old — Previous high: 8 games, 22 2/3 innings / 2021: 7 games, 11 1/3 innings
The Rangers’ 2017 minor-league pitcher of the year, Cody missed the 2018 and 2019 seasons as he tried to overcome elbow inflammation and ultimately succumbed to the UCL gremlins, undergoing Tommy John surgery. He made his big-league debut last season and posted a brilliant 1.59 ERA in 22 2/3 innings, but his high walk total (13) suggested there was room for growth.
This season, Cody’s ERA is an unsightly 7.94, but his strikeouts per inning jumped and he walked only two hitters. Alas, he’s on the 60-day IL with a right shoulder impingement.
The talent is almost certainly there. The question is health. Will Cody be able to stay healthy enough to pitch in the big leagues at all? And if yes, in what role? The ceiling is probably a No. 2-3 starter, but if his body doesn’t allow for that, perhaps he’ll be an effective member of the bullpen in the coming years.
Kohei Arihara (RHP) — 28 years old — Previous high: 0 games, 0 innings / 2021: 7 games, 28 2/3 innings
I’m not sure there’s much more we can say about Arihara that wasn’t said here. But not long after that post, Arihara hit an incredibly ineffective stretch, and we later found out that he had an aneurysm in his shoulder that required surgery. Arihara has pitched as many as 180 innings in a season in Japan, so it’s not like he hasn’t been a workhorse before, but if he plans to stick around long term in Texas, I just don’t think we have enough information to pontificate on the odds until he is healthy and can show us what he’s working with.
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Josh Sborz (RHP) — 27 years old — Previous high: 7 games, 9 innings / 2021: 25 games, 24 innings
Sborz has 32 strikeouts and eight walks in his 24 innings this season, which is excellent. He also has a 4.13 ERA — and like with Joely Rodríguez, that’s more a testament to a handful of bad outings than consistent mediocrity. Check out Sborz’s Baseball Savant percentile rankings:
This is like getting a report card that is all As and Bs and a note that reads, “Keeps making fart sounds in class. It is very disruptive.” Sure, OK. Let’s fix that curveball spin rate, c’mon. Otherwise, pal, you’re doing a pretty great job here.
Brett De Geus (RHP) — 23 years old — Previous high: 0 games, 0 innings / 2021: 16 games, 22 1/3 innings
Does de Geus really count as part of this group? Maybe not. He’s only 23 and made his major-league debut this season, but because he’s a Rule 5 pick and will have to stick with the club all season or be offered back to the Dodgers, it feels like a pretty big year for him. He has (predictably) struggled at times as he adjusts to the big-league game — he’s in the 23rd percentile for strikeouts, the 24th for walks and his ERA is an unsightly 8.06, which is higher than Kyle Dowdy’s was when the Rangers returned him to Cleveland in 2019 — but all hope is not lost. He’s in the 75th percentile for barrel percentage and the 80th percentile for hard-hit percentage.
We could (and probably will, at some point) dig into what it is about his pitches that keeps hitters from squaring them up, but for now, I’m going to say most of that success is not coming from the cutter; hitters are slugging .765 off the pitch, which is … bad.
Still, like Allard, he’s 23, and there’s time to grow — especially in a season in which the team isn’t in a playoff chase.
Wes Benjamin (LHP) — 27 years old — Previous high: 8 games, 22 1/3 innings / 2021: 6 games, 12 1/3 innings
If Allard is the poster child on the younger end of this discussion, perhaps Benjamin is the ideal of this on the older side. A perpetual underdog, Benjamin made his big-league debut in 2020 and was part of a tandem in the rotation at the beginning of 2021. One of the big selling points for Benjamin has been that, while he might get hit a bit, he throws a ton of strikes and won’t walk many guys.
Alas, he has walked 10 hitters already this season and is back in Triple A for the second time since Opening Day. There’s still time for him to right the ship, but 27-year-olds tend to get fewer chances to figure out things than 23-year-olds.
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Joely Rodríguez (LHP) — 29 years old — Previous high: 26 games, 27 innings / 2021: 17 games, 15 1/3 innings
Rodriguez is at the upper end of the age range for this sort of thing. In fact, he probably counted as more of an “in-betweener” in 2016-17 when he was 24-25 and a member of the Phillies. That didn’t end well, and the Rangers signed him before last season, as he was coming back from a two-year sojourn in Japan. Health was the main problem last season; in his 12 games (12 2/3 innings), he struck out 17, walked five and posted an ERA of 2.13. This year, he’s been less effective, with the same number of strikeouts (but only three walks!) in almost three more innings, with an ERA of 6.46
That number might be a little warped, however. There was some speculation that he was tipping his pitches against the Astros. The numbers bear that out: Seven of the 11 runs he has given up this season came in back-to-back outings against Houston.
Either way, assuming Rodríguez can steer clear of any more Astros disasters, he’s more likely to serve as a trade chip this deadline than someone who will be around through the 2023 season.
(Top photo of Dane Dunning: Tom Pennington / Getty Images)
