Photo by James Farrance
In his last start for Triple-A Syracuse, we were again reminded why Thomas Szapucki was regarded as a big prospect before all of the injuries. This is a left-handed pitcher with an uncanny ability to generate swings-and-misses. When he’s good, he’s untouchable.
Szapucki dominated the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders over his four innings pitched. He would strike out nine of the 16 batters he faced. That’s over half of the batters he faced. It’s all the more incredible when you consider he didn’t strike out a batter in the first inning.
Thomas Szapucki struck out 9 in 4 scoreless innings for Triple-A Syracuse last night.
He struck out 7 straight at one point –all swinging (including José Peraza below). He is throwing a ton of curveballs, probably like 50/50 with the fastball.
K/9 is 15.75 pic.twitter.com/uM9GpDOmN1
— Michael Mayer (@mikemayer22) May 11, 2022
Szapucki struck out the side in the second and third innings. It was part of a stretch where he would strike out seven batters in a row. Those batters included players with Major League experience in Jose Peraza, Estevan Florial, David Freitas, and Miguel Andujar. He also struck out Oswald Peraza, who was rated by Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus, MLB Pipeline, and Keith Law as a top 100 prospect.
Put another way, Szapucki struck out and dominated quality Triple-A players.
As noted by MMN’s own Michael Mayer, Szapucki did this by mixing his fastball and curveball nearly evenly. Now, the fastball isn’t quite at the velocity was before the recent injuries.
Still, Szapucki is able to throw it in the low 90 with movement, and he’s able to ramp it up to 96 MPH. The question moving forward is whether he can get his velocity up to the mid to high 90s consistently.
Another factor here is Szapucki is rebuilding arm strength after the injuries and having only pitched 45 1/3 innings since the 2019 season. This is why Szapucki was limited to 67 pitches on a night he was dominating. Seeing Szapucki in better shape than year’s past, we can reasonably anticipate he will be able to gradually increase his pitch count.
The bigger story here is the curve. When he was drafted, Szapucki’s best weapon was that curveball. Like with Seth Lugo, it is a high spin pitch which will be what ultimately decides what his ceiling will be. On a night like this, you can certainly see him pitching in the majors either out of the rotation or the bullpen.
What role he serves is going to be dependent on how his change develops, which has always been the issue with Szapucki. Regardless of what happens with that change, what we are seeing now is someone who can be a Major League pitcher. Again, the key reason is how well Szapucki’s curve has looked.
That curve has been working well all season, and it has played very well off of that fastball. Really, the story isn’t just about the nine strikeout performance for Szapucki. Rather, it is about his start to the season.
So far, Szapucki has an astronomical 15.8 K/9. That is even better when you consider his 4.00 K/BB. Moreover, he has struck out 35.2% of batters he has faced this season. Among International League pitchers who have faced at least 44 batters, Szapucki has the best K/9. This speaks to how lights out his stuff has been and can be.
Overall, with each outing Szapucki is getting stronger and stronger. Szapucki, already on the 40-man roster, is making a case to bring that fastball/curveball combination to the majors If Szapucki keeps striking out batters at this rate, it will happen sooner rather than later.
