Yesterday, I identified and discussed the top seven prospect pitchers in RPM FB, which is fastball spin rate. Today, let’s do the same for RPM Break, or the spin rate of the pitcher’s primary breaking ball. While I found that RPM Break is more weakly correlated with the pitcher’s strikeout rate than RPM FB, it’s still positive, and most importantly, is fun to dive into.
Today, I’ll continue my look at prospect scouting and stats, but our metric of the day is completely objective — RPM FB, which is revolutions per minute of the fastball, otherwise known as spin rate. We know that the spin rate of a prospect’s fastball does correlate positively (0.19 correlation) with strikeout rate, so all else being equal, you want to see a higher RPM FB. With that in mind, let’s dive into the RPM FB prospect leaderboards, discussing the top seven as sorted by the metric and then FV.
We have finished reviewing the leaderboards in prospect pitch grades, but prospects aren’t only graded on their pitch repertoire. They also received grades on their command, so let’s check out the leaders in CMD – Present (CMDP). Here are your top eight prospect pitchers in CMDP, as sorted by grade and then FV.
We continue our look at prospect pitcher pitch grades by moving on to the Changeup – Present (CHP). While a changeup is a great weapon against opposite-handed hitter, Eno Sarris and I have found that they result in fewer strikeouts than you would expect. So a great changeup isn’t really a necessity, as a strong curve could be just as effective and lead to more strikeouts.
That said, let’s check out the top seven CHP grades, as sorted by grade and then FV.
We continue our look at prospect pitch grades, this time moving along to the curveball. Now, I present to you the top 7 pitchers in Curveball – Present (CP) grade, as sorted first by grade, and then by FV. I only included pitchers with a 60 grade CP and at least a 45+ FV grade.
Yesterday was the start of our look at prospect pitcher individual pitch grades, as I began with the fastball. Today, let’s move on to the slider. Now, I present to you the top 8 pitchers in Slider – Present (SP) grade, as sorted first by grade, and then by FV.
Let’s talk about the best prospect fastballs! These are the 9 pitchers with at least a 70 grade FB – Present (FBP) and 50 or higher FV grade for those with a 70 grade FBP.
Yesterday I began diving into prospect pitch grades and strikeout rate. Today, I’m going to share correlations with some additional pieces of data we might want to use to help project a prospect’s strikeout potential.
After concluding our look at hitter prospect scouting grades and stats, it’s time to flip on over to pitchers. I’ll begin by looking at the pitch type grades, strikeout rates, and SwStk% marks. First, let’s see how these pitch grades correlate with those two metrics.
As continue our look at scouting grades and stats, let’s now move along to hitter speed, represented by the Spd grade. Although there is also a Future grade, we’re not going to bother with it, as only four of 420 prospects earned a higher Future grade than Present. So all our analysis will be based on the Spd – Present (SP) grades. We’ll start by looking at correlations and grade distribution.
