Former Blue Jay Pat Borders is 40 and still playing in the minor leagues, for the Mariners AAA affilliate, the Tacoma Rainiers. And he's still having fun. That's noteworthy. On Wednesday night, Borders went 1-5 with a single as the host Rainiers fell to the visiting Sacramento Rivercats, 6-3, under the pleasant gray skies of the Pacific Northwest. That's not noteworthy. I should add that Borders singled against A's phenom Rich Harden. That's not noteworthy all by itself, but yours truly was there to see it. I file this scouting report for Batter's Box.
It is easy to see why the A's are excited about Harden: his pitching motion is smooth and easy if not downright sublime; he is supremely confident on the hill; he works crisply; he has a live, if somewhat straight, fastball. I sat behind the dozen or so scouts for two innings, and Harden's fastball consistently fell in the 90-MPH range, topping out at 93. I expected Harden to throw harder -- all reports I've seen have him hitting 97 MPH -- but because his motion is so fluid, the pitch attacks the hitter that much quicker. It is possible the radar guns were "slow," but Rafael Soriano, one of the M's top pitching prospects and Harden's opponent Wednesday, consistently hit 94, reaching as high as 96. If the guns were slow, then Soriano is going to be Curt Schilling -- if his attitude improves. Soriano may throw gas that also has late-breaking movement, but he has the mentality of Kelvim Escobar; if things aren't going his way, he's not interested.
While Soriano tended to elevate his pitches -- this is easier and safer when one throws in the mid-90s -- Harden kept the ball down. His fastball did not have the "natural" sinking motion of Roy Halladay or Tim Hudson, but he was able to locate it in the lower portion of the strike zone -- despite not being overly tall (he's listed at 6'1" but that is generous) and despite having an extreme over-the-top motion. He did not nibble around the corners, instead relying on his late-arriving heater to minimize the damage when the ball strikes the bat. He seldom pitched inside, but he didn't have to; only two balls were hit with any kind of authority all game: a line-drive single by first baseman Craig Kuzmic and the single by Borders, a sharp liner to left. Many other hits -- he allowed eight -- were bloops, soft liners, or choppers up the middle. None -- yes, none -- of the outs were line drives right at someone, deep drives to the outfield, or sharp grounders.
The A's are being careful with Harden; he threw only 90 pitches in six innings, 55 for strikes. Combine that with his naturally smooth motion, and it's (reasonably) safe to conclude Harden will not suffer any serious arm injuries. For the night, in addition to the eight hits allowed, Harden walked four and struck out three. Jalal Leach, a high-school teammate of mine and a career minor leaguer, got one of the hits, a soft line drive to left. It was good to see Jalal, who could have carved out a fourth-outfielder-type career were it not for the severe misfortune of being drafted by the Yankees in the 8th round out of Pepperdine University in the 1990 amateur draft. Jalal is 34 now, a year older than I am, and he still likes playing baseball. When I asked him if he was ready to get a real job, he responded with, "Are you?" Obviously, I am not.
All that said, Harden's not ready. Despite going right after most hitters, he fell behind a solid majority of them. He struck out two people looking on dazzling change-ups, but otherwise he could not consistently locate his off-speed stuff for strikes. This is less problematic for a pitcher with a fastball and deceptive motion as impressive as Harden's, but when Pat Borders dissolves into Jorge Posada, it becomes a little more important. From what I could see, his control, overall, is shaky. This is not surprising, considering Harden walked 76 guys in 152 innings last year. Major-league hitters are even more disciplined, and Harden won't be aided as often as he was Wednesday night by Borders and a few other Rainiers who put the first pitch in play; Harden would have been out of the game earlier had Tacoma showed even a tiny bit more patience. In addition, two double plays and a caught stealing on a failed hit-and-run further limited his pitch count and extended his stay on the mound. Though it's certainly possible Harden could get the call sometime after the all-star break, it would surprise me if he sees any meaningful innings in Oakland this year. Command problems are ideally settled in the minor leagues or in the bullpen in long relief. They are not ideally settled in the midst of a pennant race, which surely the A's will be in this year.
I have to confess: other than the serenity of his pitching motion, overall Harden was something of a disappointment to me -- but that was due entirely to unrealistic expectations. I assumed I would see nothing less an overpowering pitcher who would completely dominate AAA fodder, look good doing it, and then after the game sign autographs for and give hot dogs to hungry six-year-old boys and girls, rake the pitcher's mound, and pay off my student loans. It's easy to forget Harden is only 21-years-old; he's not going to throw a perfect game every time.
And he doesn't have to. The lesson here is not that Harden is any less of a prospect because he didn't hit 100 MPH on the radar gun, strike out 16 hitters in six innings, or streak the outside corner every pitch. Harden is every bit the prospect he was before I saw him pitch, and he will be every bit the prospect he is the next time I see him pitch. There are two lessons here: 1) Mark Prior and other players who arrive in the majors with minimal minor-league experience and then play with a high degree of skill are extreme exceptions; 2) It's important to moderate our expectations for 21-year-old pitchers, even if they pitch for arguably the best organisation in the majors.
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