Eyewitness Report: Chapman in Carolina

by Cormican on Jun 10, 2011 3:21 PM EDT

(AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

I'll preface this by saying I'm a Phillies fan, but follow Reds prospects pretty frequently, as I live 10 minutes from Five County Stadium. I honestly, probably see more Reds prospects than actual Phillies games during a season. I was excited to hear that Aroldis Chapman was doing some rehab work with the Carolina Mudcats, so I made sure to get to last night's game, as it was likely an on day for his rehab assignment.

It was hot, but not ungodly last night (it's all relative, as what constitutes hot here, may be equivalent to your Kitchen's convection oven), with virtually no wind and fairly low humidity. Chapman came on to pitch the 6th and part of the 7th inning.

Aroldis started off with a Rick "Wild Thing" Vaughn impersonation. He was throwing very hard, though some pitches were only slightly closer to home plate than I was. His first 3 batters he hit 100, 101, 101, 105 on the radar gun (stadium gun, so maybe a little hot). That was very exciting. Unfortunately he also threw a ball into the opposing bullpen (a pickoff attempt, clearly intended for Rick Smits), wild pitch, a few balls in the dirt, two walks (including one in which ball 4 traveled 105 mph and nearly decapitated the lefty hitter (I forget who, as I didn't have a scorecard on me)). He gave up a few hits as well, but most of them were of the seeing eye variety, and I wouldn't say anyone made solid contact on him.

Overall, he struggled mightily with control initially, then after a visit from the dugout (+ center field, as Denis Phipps was the only other Spanish speaking player on the field at the time) he seemed to calm down and stop trying to throw every pitch for the radar gun. He mixed speeds more and got out of the inning with no runs. His second inning of work started off like his first did, more control issues and 2 runners scored.

I was surprised how easy his mechanics looked in person. No dreaded Inverted W that I could tell. No overly extraneous motions (Dontrelle Willis type craziness, I mean). He seemed to stick mostly to Fastball and change-up with speeds ranging from 78 to 105 on the stadium gun. He was on a 40 pitch count and got removed pretty promptly after hitting it. I'll probably see him pitch again this weekend. I hope he cleans up his control this weekend, because he is a lot of fun to watch when he has it (which he did for stretches last night).

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Zebulon

If there’s a better name for a town in NC, I’d like to hear it. My freshman year hall counselor was from there.

"OVERCHARGE, v. To ask a higher price than you can get." -Ambrose Bierce

by RijoSaboCaseyWKRP on Jun 10, 2011 3:23 PM EDT reply actions

When I was in high school

I had a cat named Zebulon. She was named after Zebulon Pike though, not the town.

by Charlie Scrabbles on Jun 10, 2011 3:25 PM EDT up reply actions

Bald Knob

When you come to the fork in the road, take it.

by poojols on Jun 10, 2011 5:53 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions

Gnaw Bone, Indiana

by Heeringa on Jun 10, 2011 8:45 PM EDT up reply actions

Rabbit Hash, KY

"Wait, you think I'm being mean to the pretend orangutan?" -- battlekow

by jch24 on Jun 11, 2011 11:06 AM EDT up reply actions

Intercourse, PA

by Cormican on Jun 11, 2011 2:24 PM EDT up reply actions

I just met someone today from Boring, OR

I nearly laughed in their face.

by Brendanukkah on Jun 13, 2011 11:48 AM EDT up reply actions

Thanks for the report!

"Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching." - Satchel Paige

by PeteyHendrix on Jun 10, 2011 3:30 PM EDT reply actions

Thanks for the report dude

hopefully he’s maturing and can figure out how to compromise his insane velocity with mixing it up

Joey Votto on Colin Cowherd: "I don’t know who he is"

by UncleWeez on Jun 10, 2011 3:34 PM EDT reply actions

Thanks for this, man.

It’s always nice to get a report from someone who was actually there for a minor league game and not try to piece things together from the box score.

Anyways, I’m glad to know his control was on for parts of the game. Hopefully he can clean it up and get back to the form he was in at the very beginning of this year; this team is way better when Chapman is locating his pitches and is able to come in and completely shut a team down for an inning.

"I bet that sex Bengals fan is really pissed now." -DT3428

by sexsalad on Jun 10, 2011 4:32 PM EDT reply actions

Just to clarify

The changeups you mentioned were probably sliders.

by RedHopeful on Jun 10, 2011 5:07 PM EDT reply actions

Thanks for the input

In the future, I really need captions.

When you come to the fork in the road, take it.

by poojols on Jun 10, 2011 5:52 PM EDT via mobile reply actions

I was dropping in to ask something about Mesoraco

I stopped to see this report, and thanks so much for dropping some knowledge.
/rec’d

Souldrummer twitters at @souldrummer25
If Sammy Solis would just learn Satchel Paige's "hesitation pitch", he'd be in DC right now.

by souldrummer on Jun 10, 2011 8:15 PM EDT reply actions

Thanks for prettying up my article and the front page promo

Change-ups may have ben sliders. Probably bad ID on my part. He seemed to mix in a 3rd pitch a few times.

by Cormican on Jun 11, 2011 2:32 PM EDT reply actions

tough to say

his slider is his main second pitch, but it usually hovers around 90. If there were a number of pitches 83 and below, those might have been change ups. I know they’ve been trying to get him to add a change up which hasn’t shown up in games but I guess he works on in bullpen sessions. Maybe they’re having him work on throwing it more while he is on his rehab assignment.

by pack_fan on Jun 12, 2011 12:32 AM EDT up reply actions

If they did, it worked absolute wonders. The 3 times he threw it, he got the worst looking swinging strikes as a result.

As a side note, he pitched better yesterday when he started (still on a 40 pitch count), but still suffered some control issues (threw a 100 mph ball behind a lefty at one point. I don’t mean behind in the count, I mean physically on the wrong side of the hitter). That said he still had a few stretches where he seemed to have better control, but it was come and go from hitter to hitter. I was at a bad angle to judge release point or any fine mechanics, so not sure what the issue was.

by Cormican on Jun 13, 2011 11:21 AM EDT up reply actions