Finding Giolito: Richards, Manaea, & Webb

by
April 8, 2020

The last of the Finding Giolito series comes to pause. I couldn’t find any footage on Logan Webb and the Manaea video was crap. That said, the Garrett Richards looked great.

Garrett Richards (Padres, RHP)

Games

  • 3/3/20
  • 3/9/20

Notes

  • Pitches straight ahead attacking the plate.
  • The slider has a curveball shape but in the low 90’s.
  • He never controlled the curve in either game. He was just giving away those pitches.
  • In the third inning of the 3/9 game, he lost control of everything. He might have tried throwing his change since he bounced a couple pithces way in front of the plate.
  • While the broadcast talked of the changeup, I didn’t notice him throwing one else it was one of the pitches he bounced.

Fastball

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Slider

Curve

Summary: He looked good. Early in the offseason, I watched his three starts from last season and he had no idea where the ball was going. During the Spring Training starts, he just pounded the zone with his fastball and slider. What makes the slider effective is the 12-6 motion so he can use it to get hitters out from both sides of the plate. Additionally, everything is down to generate groundballs and limit home runs if the Happy Fun Ball returns. His talent is in the Robbie Ray-class of pitcher. Maybe the as his teammate Dinelson Lamet … two dominant pitches that generate a ton of strikeouts. I haven’t picked up any shares so far but after watching him, I’m not afraid to own him if I draft again.

Sean Manaea (A’s, LHP)

Games watched

  • 2/29/20

Notes

  • Just a horrible camera angle where no movement can be checked for adjustments.
  • He’s still landing on the first base side of the mount and twists his body to home. I’ve felt the twisting motion has led to several of his injuries. Also, it means he’s been worse against righties (4.42 xFIP) versus lefties (3.68 xFIP).
  • Just farts around forever on the mound. Excruciatingly slow.

A pitch

Summary: With the horrible camera angle, nothing can be gleaned from the available footage.





 

Jeff, one of the authors of the fantasy baseball guide,The Process, writes for RotoGraphs, The Hardball Times, Rotowire, Baseball America, and BaseballHQ. He has been nominated for two SABR Analytics Research Award for Contemporary Analysis and won it in 2013 in tandem with Bill Petti. He has won four FSWA Awards including on for his Mining the News series. He's won Tout Wars three times, LABR twice, and got his first NFBC Main Event win in 2021. Follow him on Twitter @jeffwzimmerman.

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Charles HaywardMember since 2025
5 years ago

Disappointing useless writing on Manaea. You have made it clear in the past what your opinion is. Please move on.

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