Mark Worrell - Two Pitches, One Crazy Delivery

by Harry Pavlidis on Feb 25, 2009 4:02 PM EST in Player Profiles

Buster Olney had this Mark Worrell video linked today.

You can read more about Mark Worrell from this recent article and this prospect profile from a couple years back from Future Redbirds. Looking at his PITCHf/x data from Worrell's June 2008 call-up, I can see he eliminated a 3/4 arm slot against lefties mentioned in FR.

Worrell throws a fastball (around 90) and what appears to be a slider (75). As you can see above, his delivery is very strange, and his flight paths are pretty wild too.

Worrell throws the ball up upon release, and really keeps the ball up in the zone - he almost never throws the ball down (see the zone plot below).

That fastball tails in on righties very nicely.

Keep an eye on Worrell during Spring Training. He got knocked around a bit during his cup of coffee, but he certainly is interesting.

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He doesn't suffer from a lack of confidence

and made no bones about how he felt mistreated by the Cardinal org.

SD does a nice job identifying undervalued relievers, he should do well there.

Future Redbirds I Beyond the Boxscore

by erik on Feb 25, 2009 4:15 PM EST reply actions

His home run production might drop a little in Petco

vivaelbeñsheets

by vivaelpujols on Feb 25, 2009 4:25 PM EST up reply actions

Can you say back and elbow issues?

WBULTV - BDale TV Prod

by bdalebs on Feb 25, 2009 4:50 PM EST reply actions

Can you say 'we don't know enough about biomechanics to say with any confidence one way or the other'?

by Graham MacAree on Feb 26, 2009 11:43 AM EST up reply actions

Yes.

Just saying it looks like he stressing himself a lot, and that if he had troubles with his back or elbow it wouldn’t surprise me. He could also have a very long and productive career.

WBULTV - BDale TV Prod

by bdalebs on Feb 27, 2009 10:31 PM EST up reply actions