![]() ![]() He has also seen a lot of time at first base and, more recently, a little bit in the outfield corners. It’s part of why he’s projected with a below-average hit tool here even though he’s performed at an above-average clip in the minors.ĭiaz is a viable defensive backstop, but he hasn’t ever had to deal with the grind of a full season back there, peaking at 51 starts at catcher in 2021. He’s only been able to pull breaking balls that don’t quite finish. A stiff, upright hitter, Diaz might have some issues with fastballs running in on his hands at the big league level, as he tended to be late on the ones he saw at Double- and Triple-A, driving them almost exclusively to the opposite field. Even while being a relatively free swinger, he’s only struck out at a 15-17% clip since entering full-season ball and has a rare hit/power combination for a catcher, though he has been a little bit older for each level. Here’s the text of his original report: Diaz has plus, all-fields power and covers the outer third of the plate especially well. Combine that with your standard issue Astros breaking ball complement (a hard, 90-mph cutter/slider and a slower knuckle curveball) and you very likely have an impact big league arm, if a somewhat inefficient one. But Brown’s fastball has the sort of action that gives pitchers margin for error in the strike zone, and his stuff is so nasty that he can be imprecise and still beat hitters. In fact, his fastball locations are still pretty scattered and his delivery remains quite violent. ![]() Make no mistake, Brown does not suddenly have Verlander’s command. He’s remained at the big league level ever since, and has maintained his ability to throw strikes consistently, improving on both his walk and strikeout rates. Brown’s stuff was already good at Wayne, and it leveled up pretty quickly after he signed, but it was the strike throwing that took a step forward in 2022 and led to his September call-up. Readers have probably seen the side-by-side mechanical comparisons of Brown and Justin Verlander, and took notice of Brown’s overpowering stuff during his brief 2022 big league debut. Drafted out of Wayne State, a Division-II school in Michigan, Brown’s arm strength and velocity have been sculpted to replicate the power-pitching formula in Houston. Here is his original report: Brown is the Mewtwo of pitchers, engineered as a facsimile of another powerful entity using science and technology. Brown’s fastball control has progressed substantially since last year (hell, just since spring training), enough that no matter how healthy the other Houston starters are come playoff time, this guy isn’t getting squeezed out of their playoff rotation if the Astros make it. He has now thrown enough innings to graduate and, as Grayson Rodriguez and Brandon Pfaadt have struggled, you can make a pretty good case (at this stage anyway) that Brown should have been the second-ranked pitching prospect in baseball this offseason after Eury Pérez. This is how Brown was graded during the offseason. ![]()
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