Last week I made the trip to Dayton to get an in person look at Dragons right handed starter Tyler Mahle. He’s been a part of a strong rotation in Dayton where the starters have posted a 2.87 ERA over 285.2 innings pitched.
Mahle has been right in line with that despite being just 20-years-old in a league where the average pitcher is 22. Here is what his statline looks like coming into the start on Wednesday night:
| W | L | IP | HR | BB | K | ERA |
| 4 | 3 | 58.0 | 5 | 8 | 54 | 2.95 |
Statistically speaking it’s tough to find much to not like. The right hander has controlled the strikezone very well, missed plenty of bats, limited the long ball and has an ERA under 3.00.
I shot plenty of video from this particular game, a game in which Mahle had nine strikeouts over 5.1 innings without a walk and just one earned run. Below is one of those strikeouts.
He mixes things up throughout the at bat, showing several different looks. Let’s take a deeper look at his scouting report from this game.
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Fastball | Like most pitchers, Mahle leans on his fastball a majority of the time. While he only sits in the 89-91 MPH range with the pitch he touched 93 a few times and topped out at 94 MPH once during the game. At times the pitch would show good sinking action as it got near the plate, but other times was rather straight. In both cases though, he was able to locate the pitch where he wanted to, often.
Breaking Ball | The reports from last year were that Mahle was throwing both a slider and a breaking ball. Last Thursday it was all curveballs in the 70-75 MPH range. A few of them could have been sliders, but were more likely curveballs that got away a little bit. At it’s best it was a slightly-above average pitch with good 12-6 action that he could spot well on both sides of the plate. Some were below-average on the night though that weren’t tight and just floated in there, but he missed the zone with the few of those, so he didn’t pay for them. With consistency, the pitch will be a go-to out pitch for him.
Change Up | On a night where his curveball was strong, Mahle didn’t go to the change up too often, but he did mix it in often enough to show hitters they had to be ready for it. Coming in from the 80-82 MPH range the pitch had solid sink and some armside run. It looks like an average offering right now and he sells the pitch well.
Other | With Mahle, control let’s his pitches play up, particularly at the current level he is at where hitters are generally a little more aggressive. Still, he likes to work on the corners with all of his pitches and is generally down in the zone, something that should work well as he moves up the ladder.
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