Joe Cavallaro, a sidearm-throwing righty, grew up in Venice, Florida. He pitched at Sarasota High School, where his dad was the baseball coach. From there he went on to pitch for the University of South Florida, where he was met with mixed results in his first two years.

As a freshman, he pitched in 14 games (9 starts), posting a 4.12 ERA with 6.75 K/9 and 4.77 BB/9. He got some more playing time as a sophomore, pitching in 16 games and making 14 starts, but he posted similar results (4.27 ERA, 8.00 K/9, 4.80 BB/9). Pitching primarily as a starter, which is rare for a sidearmer, he posted numbers that were certainly respectable but didn’t stand out.

In his junior year, he switched to exclusively a bullpen role, making 30 relief appearances and no starts. With a low sidearm slot and a high-80s/low-90s fastball, it made more sense for him to be in that role anyway as his stuff was likely to play much better out of the bullpen.

And sure enough, it did. His strikeouts soared and his walks diminished, as Cavallaro had a fantastic season pitching exclusively out of the bullpen. He posted a 2.28 ERA with 11.68 K/9 and 2.88 BB/9. His performance impressed the Mets, who promptly drafted him in the 24th round of the 2017 MLB Draft. Cavallaro began his professional career soon after signing with the Mets, posting a 2.34 ERA in 11 games (5 starts) for Kingsport. It was just a small taste, but he enjoyed a nice start to his pro career.

For the 2018 season, Cavallaro received a promotion to Columbia and was moved back to a starting role despite his success as a reliever in college. However, he handled it with no problem, pitching to a 2.09 ERA with 9.66 K/9 and 3.03 BB/9 in 77.1 innings. This earned him a temporary promotion all the way up to Binghamton, where he started one game and gave up five runs in five innings. Two days later, he was demoted to St. Lucie, which was still a step up from Columbia.

Cavallaro pitched the rest of the season for St. Lucie, where he got hit around a little more, with his H/9 rising to 9.7 compared to the 6.3 mark he posted in Columbia. Still being used as a starter primarily, his ERA rose to 4.84. Even with his relative struggles in St. Lucie, it was still a successful season for Cavallaro as he got a taste of three different levels. He has made solid progression since beginning his pro career, and it has come with very fine results. To date, he owns a 3.12 ERA with 9.1 K/9 and 3.1 BB/9 in 161.2 minor league innings.

It will still be interesting to see what path Cavallaro takes in 2019, considering that his stuff plays better in the bullpen and he was dominant as a reliever in college, but he has been used mostly as a starter in the Mets system and has found success in that role as well. Cavallaro is tall, standing at 6’4″, 207 pounds, which helps him whip the ball sidearm with a high leg kick to make it hard for the hitter to pick up. He features a strong slider that sits in the low 80s and serves as his main out pitch.

I had a chance to speak with Cavallaro about his career and the upcoming season.

MMN: Hey Joe, this is Mojo Hill from MetsMinors.net, thanks for offering your time to speak to me today.

Cavallaro: Yeah, no problem!

MMN: What have you been doing this offseason to prepare for the upcoming season?

Cavallaro: Just working out for the first few months, and then I picked up throwing. Just kind of work my way, do a little long toss, some fly-ground work, got a few pens before I left for Spring Training.

MMN: Did you pitch from an early age and what other positions did you play?

Cavallaro: Yeah, I pitched from an early age. I used to play shortstop, second base, third base — yeah, those were my main three that I used to play other than pitching when I was really young.

MMN: Growing up, did you idolize any MLB players or teams?

Cavallaro: I was growing up as a Red Sox fan, which makes it a little interesting with the whole World Series ordeal. I grew up that, but I was a big Josh Beckett fan. I really enjoyed watching him pitch.

MMN: What role models do you look up to for helping to get you where you are today?

Cavallaro: My one role model is my father. He has just always been there, always been doing things for me and my brother and sister, just trying to push us to be the best we can be.

MMN: Are there any pitchers you model your game after today?

Cavallaro: I look around at a lot of guys. I don’t really have a certain one, but I try to look at a lot of big league guys and see what they do well, see what they don’t, and see if I can apply usually guys that throw more in my slot so I can see how their ball plays, so like movement guys, stuff like that.

MMN: When did you know that you wanted to play professional baseball?

Cavallaro: I dreamed of playing since tee ball. There’s two sports that I used to play growing up, it was baseball and basketball. And, you know, baseball on grass I knew pretty quickly at a young age, and I just, I dreamed of playing professional baseball since tee ball.

MMN: So while at the University of South Florida, your stats improved a lot in 2017 when you moved out of the rotation to strictly a bullpen role. Is there anything different about pitching out of the bullpen that led you to find greater success?

Cavallaro: I mean you get thrown in more pressure situations with stuff like that out of the bullpen. Neither of them bother me, neither of them did a thing. I think neither of them have an effect on me in a certain way. I would just say that by my third year, I really started to get good grasp on mechanics and how my body works because I had my best walk numbers as well that year and everything like that, so I was able to throw a lot of strikes and attack guys, and repeat it.

MMN: When and where did you pick up the sidearm slot that you throw with?

Cavallaro: I’ve thrown that slot my whole life pretty much. I’ve probably dropped just naturally a little bit, but I’ve thrown that slot my whole life.

MMN: Steve Villines also throws sidearm, is this something you guys have talked about together?

Cavallaro: Oh yeah, Steve and I, we always used to talk all the time since Kingsport. Kingsport, you know that’s where we first met and everything like that, and we’ve been just talking about hitters ever since. You know, I take things from him, he takes things from me, cause we both are a little bit different from down in that slot, but we have, you know, similar looks, so.

MMN: What are your goals for the 2019 season?

Cavallaro: My goal for the 2019 season is, you know, to get better every day, keep learning as much as I can through the process and through the levels. Just basically try to become, you know, the best baseball player I can be, and hopefully I can get a chance in the show sometime.

MMN: Awesome. Thanks again for your time, and good luck this season.

Cavallaro: Yeah, no problem! Thank you very much.