Atlanta Braves Prospects: Spencer Strider Scouting Report

The Ceiling

As far as pitchers go, Strider has the highest ceiling of any of them right now. Anytime you have a pitcher who can consistently throw hard in the zone and rack up strikeouts the way he did in the minors, there is going to be a lot of optimism.

Now, he can’t get by just with the fastball at the big league level. And as I mentioned in the last section, his ceiling will depend on whether or not he’s able to find a couple of good secondary pitches to play off that fastball.

A slurve running down and away to the glove side and a change-up or curve dropping off the table will definitely be great complementary pitches.

If he can do that, then he has a chance to be a top of the rotation arm.

However, even if he can’t or he’s only able to make one of those pitches above average, he’ll still be a dominant reliever.

Comparisons

Although left-handed and bigger, Robbie Ray throws his fastball nearly 60 percent of the time in the mid-90s with a slider and curveball as secondaries.

Luis Patino is actually a pretty great comparison. They’re both about the same height and size with pretty similar arm action.

In his two years at the big leagues, Patino is throwing his mid-90s four-seam fastball about 60-65 percent of the time with his slider at 20-25 percent while mixing in a change-up.

I know he hasn’t broken out in the big leagues yet, but Patino is just 22 — younger than Spencer Strider — and was once a top 20 prospect in all of baseball.

Carlos Rodon gets by with a similar pitch mix, but again, is much bigger than Spencer Strider.