Many of our authors make a habit of speaking to scouts and other talent evaluators in order to bring you the best baseball information available. Not all of the tidbits gleaned from those conversations make it into our articles, but we don't want them to go to waste. Instead, we'll be collecting them in a regular feature called "What Scouts Are Saying," which will be open to participation from the entire BP staff.
Dodgers LHP Alex Wood: It's an ugly delivery. I don't care, he can pitch and changes speed. How many guys take comfortable swings off him? I'll be honest, the durability worries me.
Rockies RHP Jonathan Gray: It’s really stunning what’s happened to him since he was drafted. I can’t really explain it. The entire arsenal, as well as the command, has backed up. The only thing I can figure is he just couldn’t adjust to pitching every five days from what he was doing at OU.
Astros RHP Mark Appel: We passed on him because he doesn’t compete out there and he never has.
Mariners OF Alex Jackson: He looked fine when I saw him. The tools are all there and the power is impressive.
Cubs MI Javier Baez: I don’t want to make too much of the early return to action, but everything looks better. He looks more relaxed, more in control, and the results have been what you normally expect. He has a chance to earn back a lot of the high praise that he had garnered prior to this season.
Tigers LHP Luis Cessa: I like the arm. They [Mets] tinkered with his mechanics and he took off some the past year. I've had him touch 96 before. I would guess he ends up comfortably in a middle relief role.
Phillies OF Nick Williams: A team interested in Nick Williams shouldn't shock anyone. He can [redacted] hit the [redacted] out of the ball. The Phillies will be happy with their pickup.
Dodgers OF Alex Verdugo: After the first month of the season, it would have been easy to turn a blind eye to Alex. Well, look at his numbers now. He's getting it.
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Got Meadows and McGuire instead...much better prospects
He was clearly nervous. I didn't see overpowering, 3rd overall stuff, but then, I don't know how he's had his mechanics tinkered with or whether or not he's still adjusting to pro ball.
Having said that, this was his first start, when he missed he wasn't missing wildly (he seemed to be just off the plate a lot), and the movement on his fastball and slider was good. He's still a real work in progress, IMO.