td11 wrote:Did the phils draft strasburg at some point or what?

FTN wrote:what is your theory based on?

How many examples like Stock can you cite?

I don’t have good batted ball breakdowns so I cannot report on his groundball percentage and other assorted numbers of note. Frankly though, the above is enough. 78 batters faced and 45 have been struck out. 45 of 78. Stephen Strasburg has struck out 58% of all batters that he has faced so far. Oh, and he’s done that while walking just 5%. Oh, and he’s been better with each start. Oh, and he was reportedly clocked at 102mph in in second start.

Good gracious.

td11 wrote:if he is a marlins or a nats next year, i will be very sad.

"The best I've ever seen," says a longtime scout. "And it's not even close."

C'mon. Better than Mark Prior? Remember how incredible he looked coming out of Southern Cal -- tall, big legs, good mechanics, robot-like. You're saying he's better than what Prior was then?

"Easily," says the scout, over the phone. "I'm telling you, it's not even close."

What did you see in him? "The day that I saw him pitch, his first fastball was 99 mph, and he was at 100-102 mph the rest of the way," says the scout, someone who is not inclined to hyperbole.

Yeah, heard he had a good fastball. Straight as a string, right? "That's the thing," said the scout. "Whenever you see a fastball at 100 mph, it's always straight. No movement. But his fastball has a lot of movement, which really doesn't make that much sense, because it's on the hitter so quickly. His fastball cuts."

Wow. His secondary stuff must be a work in progress. That's the way it usually is with guys who are that overpowering at that age.

"No," said the scout. "He's got a plus slider, at 93-94 mph, and he's got a plus changeup. He's the best I've ever seen."

Stephen Strasburg continued to rewrite the history books on Friday, striking out 14 over seven innings versus UNLV. Strasburg allowed two runs on five hits, though it could have been dicier for the San Diego State star.

After striking out the side in the first, Strasburg gave up back-to-back singles to lead off the Rebels' second. But the right-hander proceeded to strike out the next three batters -- the first two looking -- to end the threat. Strasburg gave up a run when he was called for a balk in the third inning.

Strasburg is 4-0 with a 1.94 ERA in four starts, and has tallied 59 strikeouts in 27 1/3 innings -- more than 55 percent of the batters he's faced. He's walked just five batters and has yielded just 19 hits.

FTN wrote:Strasburg; 7.0 IP -- 2 R - 2 H - 2 BB - 15 K

The bottom line on Stephen Strasburg is that, while he may be a consensus number one like David Price, mechanically speaking Stephen Strasburg is no David Price.
Like Mark Prior, Stephen Strasburg has some significant Inverted W in his arm action and a timing problem as a result (aka habitual rushing). This will significantly increase the load on his elbow and his shoulder and make him a very high risk draft choice. I could even see him pulling a Cole St. Clair and blowing up mid-season.
However, because his mechanics in some of the frames I have seen aren't quite as bad as Mark Prior's, and he sometimes makes the Horizontal W rather than the Inverted W...

...there is a chance that Stephen Strasburg could have a career more like a John Smoltz. In that case, he would be effective for periods of time but would also struggle with elbow and shoulder problems. It's a bit hard to say for sure, since Stephen Strasburg seems to show significant variability in his arm action from year to year.

some club officials think that if Washington takes San Diego State pitcher Stephen Strasburg with the first overall pick, Boras will ask for Daisuke Matsuzaka money (six years, approximately $50 million) or take him to Japan for a year, a threat that may scare Stan Kasten into selecting a lesser prospect.