Danny Hultzen: Live in Person

By Anthony

I have seen Danny Hultzen more than most people, or I would like to think that I have. I watched him pitch in the Arizona Fall League as well as in Spring Training. So the other night was my third time watching him and I noticed a few adjustments that Hultzen has made since college. 

The first thing that you should know about Hultzen is that he throws across his body, or what is also called “cross fire”. Normally, a line can be drawn from a pitchers back foot, through their front foot to home plate. Hultzen does not; his foot is off to the side as you can see in this picture.

This has a few positive things and a few negative things that come with it. First of all, it puts more strain on his hips and shoulder since they have to rotate further to face square to the plate. This can lead to him tiring earlier and starting to miss high and outside to right handed hitters. It also allows him to hide the ball for longer since it comes from a further angle than normal.

He also releases the ball in a lower arm slot than normal, at about 3/4ths. This means that he will not be able to throw as hard as someone who releases over the top but his ball tails much more than someone who releases over the top. As an ex-pitcher who both threw cross fire and a 3/4ths I know very much what I am talking about. And what I saw in person corroborated this. His fastball was very good and tailed quite a bit away from righties. It was fun to watch from behind home plate. But not much more was.

Hultzen has now made two starts in AAA. He has made is 9 innings in two starts. That is not good. From what I saw, Hultzen has not yet made the adjustment to AAA hitters. That is not surprising, it’s a level better than he was at and he has only made two starts. He seemed much different than what he was scouted to be, at least in this last start.

When we drafted Hultzen, he was supposed to be a control guy with a decent fastball and very good off speed stuff. What I saw was a pitcher with an excellent fastball and pretty poor command of his off-speed stuff. I don’t know if he just didn’t have a feel for his changeup that day or if it was in the scouting report of the Las Vegas 51’s but I didn’t see much of it. His slider/ curve also couldn’t find the zone but still generated some swing and misses. 

In the first innings, Hultzen was lights out. He struck out the first two hitters he faced, including Blue Jays prospect Anthony Gose on a nice slider that broke away from the plate and Gose had not chance to hit. However, that was the only good inning that Hultzen had. And he only threw one off-speed pitch out of 10. That was a sign of things to come. 

The second inning saw Hultzen lose control of everything. He struggled to find the plate after Travis Snider had a solid single through the right side. He sandwiched another strikeout between two walks before walking another Las Vegas hitter to score Snider. As my dad is very fond of saying, “Its all in your head.” Hultzen lost focus and was unable to locate anything but his fastball for awhile. Through three innings Hultzen had two strikes with pitches that weren’t his fastball. Both were sliders that were out of the zone. That is not very promising from someone who is supposed to have very good command. 

All in all, Hultzen seems to have made some mechanical adjustments from when I watched him pitch for Virginia. He stands slightly taller on the mound, which is good. He seems to have improved and once he is able to settle down and make his adjustments, he should be a nice addition to the rotation. However, for all those who want to see him in Seattle in August, I don’t think that will happen, barring injuries. He still needs time to mature and he will end the year in August sometime to protect his arm and then get his shot at the rotation in March. Patience Mariner fans, patience.