May 22nd

[Jason]

Link

 

Rochester

Binghamton vs New Britain 5:35 PM

NBR: Meyer, A (2-1, 3.56)

 

Fort Myers at Lakeland 5:30 PM

Cedar Rapids at Beloit 6:35 PM

[TRex]

It's hard to find positives in Meyer's pitching line from tonight (6.2 innings, 6 hits, 3W, 5R, 3ER). However, he seemed to regain his composure and managed to retire 8 of 9 batters after his terrible 4th inning (after which I think he was already over 80 pitches).

 

One other very interesting stat from Meyer tonight is that the Binghamton hitters were only able to get 4 balls in the air all night! That's right, Meyer faced 30 batters, and the only balls in the air were a pop out to 3rd, a sac fly to center, a single and a double! He got 20 outs, 7 by strikeout, 12 by ground out, and the aforementioned sac fly! I have to learn to stop going through his starts on Gameday pitch by pitch because I go apoplectic over how many strikes are called balls. They must not actually use the same pitch f/x setup as MLB, or the umps just cannot figure out Meyer's knuckle-curve.

[jokin]

It's hard to find positives in Meyer's pitching line from tonight (6.2 innings, 6 hits, 3W, 5R, 3ER). However, he seemed to regain his composure and managed to retire 8 of 9 batters after his terrible 4th inning (after which I think he was already over 80 pitches).

 

One other very interesting stat from Meyer tonight is that the Binghamton hitters were only able to get 4 balls in the air all night! That's right, Meyer faced 30 batters, and the only balls in the air were a pop out to 3rd, a sac fly to center, a single and a double! He got 20 outs, 7 by strikeout, 12 by ground out, and the aforementioned sac fly! I have to learn to stop going through his starts on Gameday pitch by pitch because I go apoplectic over how many strikes are called balls. They must not actually use the same pitch f/x setup as MLB, or the umps just cannot figure out Meyer's knuckle-curve.

 

In addition to your excellent points about the umpiring, I believe it's important to not be discouraged at outings like this. The results you cite are right in line with the typical shaky minor league defense behind him- his FIP is ~1.10 Runs below his ERA.

 

Can I make this even more of a positive? He's virtually tied for 2nd in the Eastern League in that category with Kevin Gausman, who is almost exactly one year younger than Meyer. And of course, the Orioles have aggressively put Gausman in their starting rotation beginning tonight.

 

Meyer's control isn't where Gausman is yet, but he has a higher K/9 rate and part of the small difference in ERA is BABIP-related. If he keeps this up, there's no reason we can't see him this year, September call-up, or sooner.

[Oxtung]

It's hard to find positives in Meyer's pitching line from tonight (6.2 innings, 6 hits, 3W, 5R, 3ER). However, he seemed to regain his composure and managed to retire 8 of 9 batters after his terrible 4th inning (after which I think he was already over 80 pitches).

 

One other very interesting stat from Meyer tonight is that the Binghamton hitters were only able to get 4 balls in the air all night! That's right, Meyer faced 30 batters, and the only balls in the air were a pop out to 3rd, a sac fly to center, a single and a double! He got 20 outs, 7 by strikeout, 12 by ground out, and the aforementioned sac fly! I have to learn to stop going through his starts on Gameday pitch by pitch because I go apoplectic over how many strikes are called balls. They must not actually use the same pitch f/x setup as MLB, or the umps just cannot figure out Meyer's knuckle-curve.

 

There is no pitch f/x system in the minors. I think that it's a guy marking where he believes those pitches were for the Gameday app. This last spring Jack Goins remarked that he would like to install pitch f/x in all the minor league ballparks but the cost was prohibitive.