chitownsportsfan

Carlos Rodon made his second Grapefruit League start Wednesday, which is more than he could say last spring. But his first and last pitches ended up in the seats, and in between, though the Yankees left-hander built his workload up to 60 pitches, there was a noticeable lack of life on his signature fastball. “Didn’t really have the fastball velo I wanted, but it’s one of those days,” Rodon said after allowing three runs in three-plus innings in a 4-3 loss to the Rays at Steinbrenner Field. “It’s one of those days you gotta be able to pitch without the fastball and use some other things, so that was good to feel that in a game that no one really gives a s–-t about because it doesn’t matter, it’s spring training. “But the competing side of me, don’t want to give up a home run on the front end, home run on the back end. But there was some good pitches in between.”

I mean, that's a clown thing to say to the media when you need to build the guy's confidence. Grifol has diarrhea of the mouth.

How about his hearing?

All I ask is the ability to call a no doubt HR a no doubt HR off the bat by the time he's got 100 games under his belt. Jason never figured it out.

My parents had one of those old school huge satellite dishes and once a year some dude would come over and "program" it so we got every channel free. Those were the days.

One of the funniest shows of all time. It's too bad it was buried on HBO at a time when not a lot of people had it.

I'd imagine Kong made Vaughn look like a little person. Andrew is not tall, and he's not particularly thick either. Get him on the "vitamins".

The stance is better. I really don't know what he was trying being that wide open. It clearly wasn't helping him see the ball or pull it better.

Stassi was a decent starting catcher before he had his personal absence and injury issues. Figured maybe he'd have put them behind him but from what has been described here he looks rusty, at best. Atlanta has some of the best scouts in baseball, they probably knew he was toast.

Yes.

What a purgatory they're in. Winning 100 games every year but can only win a title once a decade. And they have to put up with that LA weather! Poor things.

He did a puff interview and was like "I'm finally in good shape". JFC.

Was hoping maybe Stassi could be flipped but f*** it, whatever.

Stassi looks cooked physically based on what you guys are reporting. That sucks. Atlanta knew what they had, or didn't.

Do they still have that mega signal? I used to be able to listen to that station 500 miles away.

I like it personally. Has a homie feel.

New info has come to light. Appears you Chicago natives can watch it on NBCSN. @CentralChamps21

Doesn't appear to be.

I'd trade some happiness for strike zone judgement, or maybe not striking out 40% of the time on wild flails will make him happy. Just fucking hit, eh?

Curious to see if Stassi looks healthy.

That 80% projection on Vaughn is wild. And by wild I mean puke.

Honestly surprised ZIPS has that rosy of a 80% percentile projection for the SP. That gives me a little hope.

They will do a good job limiting it to a 6-3 loss. It would be ironic in a year they just say "f*** it" that a bunch of random guys they got for nothing outperforms Hahn's 50 million dollar pens.

I think it's pitch recognition and zone control against MLB pitching that has a scouting report on you and will attack every weakness without mercy. You just don't get that in college ball or even really in the high minors. It's a unique sport with the batter and pitcher battle. Defensively there's probably a bunch of guys that could play at 18, but there's no way they can control the zone well enough to hit much more than 200/220/300.

Soroka and Kopech "breaking out" would be turning into decent 3rd or 4th starters that can actually pitch 150 innings. That would be awesome, it would still leave us short 3 starters once Cease is traded and about half a dozen decent relievers.