I finally had an opportunity to watch Tommy Hanson’s last start, which was against the New York Yankees on June 23. His line was not an overly impressive.
5.1 IP, 0 ER, 4 H, 5 BB, 4 K
It was enough to get a victory, however. With outings like this, those wins are not going to come very often. In 2009, it always helps when you are going up against Chien-Ming Wang.
Statistics aside, there was no questioning the ability Hanson actually does possess. If he could consistently find the strike zone, he has the type of stuff that could be dominating.
Here my thoughts after actually seeing him pitch
His fastball sat primarily in the 91-93 mph range, though it did touch 96 at times. That may not be as hard as what was expected, but it certainly is more than enough. The pitch doesn’t have a whole lot of movement, but it seemed like it was enough to get the hitters off balance.
That’s definitely important.
He has a straight change, but he used it very minimally. By my count he actually threw it just twice out of his 99 pitches. If he can learn to use that pitch effectively, he’s going to be absolutely nasty.
His breaking stuff is good, but he had terrible command of it. Between his curveball and slider, he threw 24 breaking pitches. Only 11 of them registered as strikes. If you want to keep hitters off balance, you need to prove that you can throw another pitch for a strike at some point. Otherwise, hitters are simply going to lay off anything with movement, because they know it’s unlikely to find the strike zone. He didn’t do that in this game and was lucky to continue to pitch himself out of trouble.
His control was erratic all night, throwing just 57 strikes. The problem was that when he missed, he wasn’t even close. It’s tough to expand the strike zone when you are not even close to it. He walked five batters, and that doesn’t include hitting Robinson Cano, which he did on a 3-2 count.
I would say this was clearly not his best start, but you can tell by watching him that he has what it takes to be a top level pitcher in the major leagues. There are a lot of things he needs to do in order to get there however.
With the repertoire he showed in this start, I don’t see him consistently racking up the strikeouts, despite what he did in the minor leagues and the Arizona Fall League. His fastball was good enough, but it isn’t going to consistently overpower major league hitters. Throw in the fact that he had seemingly little control over his other pitches, and you have little to get swings and misses with.
That doesn’t mean he’s not going to develop into that type of pitcher in time. With what he’s shown before, he likely will, and it could come as soon as later this season.
For the time being, don’t look for him to be your savior there.
He’s clearly got the stuff to be a usable option and all fantasy owners should covet him on their rosters. Just be moderate in your expectations. He’s going to have some ups and downs along the way, especially early on this season. He’s not going to be an elite strikeout artist. His WHIP could struggle with his control issues.
The big question is if he has the stuff to overcome those problems.
Of course, it is also possible that this was just a down start for him, not fully showing off his talent. Either way, he’s a must own starter.
What do you think of Hanson? Is he a pitcher you think is going to excel now? Is he someone you want on your roster?
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