In an era where scouting has become more and more of a science, rather than an art, there is becoming less and less of the overlooked finds that some teams stumble upon. The draft is becoming more and more "solved", and teams are addressing their needs more efficiently. The Tampa Bay Rays are showing that with a couple strings of high picks, any franchise can be turned around regardless of budget. Their starting rotation has been blowing opposing teams away since day one of the regular season, and they look to be the team everyone thought they would and more. James Shields continues to pitch above his expected level of success at the big league level. David Price is showing why he was the number one overall pick by becoming the AL's first 9-game winner. Jeff Niemann is 6-0 and posting up some incredibly impressive numbers. He is by far the biggest suprise in the rotation to those who follow by name only. Wade Davis has struggled lately, but still has great stuff and two put-away pitches. Matt Garza is commanding his filthy stuff, and making the Twins wish he was back in town with every start he makes. But there's more...
Jeremy Hellickson is sitting down in the Rays AAA affiliate and is making a name for himself. Any other team in baseball would have Hellickson in their rotation and he would probably be their number 2 or 3 starter. However, Tampa Bay's rotation is full, and aside from Wade Davis' recent struggles, it looks like there is no room for this phenom. I tend to do my own scouting on players, and use others reports as a supplement to my own observations, but the record on Hellickson is pretty strong from top to bottom.
Hellickson possesses a complete arsenal of pitches. His fastball sits at the low 90's, and it doesn't have particularly good movement, but he commands it well to both sides of the plate. He can also use a two-seam grip to induce groundballs, which is important, because Hellickson's real doozy is his changeup. His change has incredible depth to it, and he has great arm action, adding to the deception. It absolutely dominates left handers, and gets righties out with equal effectiveness. He will occasionally mix in a curve that has pretty good movement, but not as dominant as his counterpart in the big leagues, Wade Davis. Hellickson throws from a three quarters arm slot, and by watching video on him, you can see that with this arm slot he is able to make his excellent change move down and away from lefties and down and in on righties. I have also seen him take away some of the fade vs. righties and make it drop more downwards. Right now Hellickson is 8-2 with a 2.28 ERA in 12 starts in the minors, with an impressive K-BB ratio.
With impending free agents Carl Crawford and Carlos Pena, the Rays are in an interesting position. They will ultimately let Crawford leave to free agency, as he is expected to command large dollars and the team owner has already stated that he is going to cut payroll after this year. Remember, they still have 8 million on the books for Pat Burrell. Desmond Jennings will almost surely fill the gap that Crawford will leave in the outfield. This will leave a big hole at 1B, a position that is hard to fill if you're a low payroll club competing in the AL East. As it looks right now, nobody in the starting rotation is slowing down. This might open the window for the Rays front office to move one of their starters. If they were to do that, they would surely be able to pry away a slugger that they will need to bat behind Evan Longoria. Could the Dodgers be calling and dangling James Loney? He will come relatively cheap, and he will fill at least the defensive ability that Pena has provided at first for the Rays. They could look to fill the offense internally with the infield/outfield logjam they have with Sean Rodriguez, Reid Brignac, Ben Zobrist and Desmond Jennings. If not the Dodgers, there are a host of teams that would come calling if the Rays put one of their young talented starters on the market.
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