Barrett Astin is at a pivotal point in his professional baseball career. The soon-to-be 25-year-old (his birthday is October 22nd) right hander will be eligible for the Rule 5 draft this December unless the Cincinnati Reds choose to add him to the 40-man roster.
This is a big point in the career for all players. Being added to the 40-man roster pretty much leaves you a good performance and an injury or lackluster performance of a big leaguer away from finding yourself on the biggest stage of the sport. Being left off of the 40-man roster could potentially mean that you are possible being moved past, or in a best-case scenario, joining a new organization if they decide to select you with their Rule 5 selection (and thus you may stick as a big leaguer for a full season).
Barrett Astin is coming off of a very strong performance in the 2016 regular season for the Reds organization. With Double-A Pensacola the right hander, splitting time as a starter (11 games) and reliever (26 appearances) he posted a 2.26 ERA in 103.1 innings pitched with just 25 walks and 96 strikeouts. Cincinnati is going to get one final look at him before having to make the decision on whether or not they want to protect him or not. It also gives other organizations a good look at him to decide what they will do if he is left unprotected.
The first outing went well for Astin. He allowed just one hit in 2.0 shutout innings of work without a walk and with a strikeout. He induced five ground balls (all went for outs) in his outing, with the lone hit coming on a line drive.
On this night Barrett Astin was working with a fastball, a cutter and a slider. The fastball was working in the 92-95 MPH range with some rising action to it. His cutter was 88-90 and the slider was working in the 84-85 MPH range on the night.
The hitters had themselves a good night at the plate as well, but they are still playing the game as I type this, so there will be more on that Wednesday morning.