Schedule Update

I’ve been trying to plan out my spring travel schedule over the past week to figure what open tryouts I wanted to hit and where until the independent league seasons kick off in May.

There’s been both good and bad news in my contacting teams for more information about their open tryouts. The good news is that I’ll be saving a ton of money on gas. The bad news is that every tryout I was thinking of attending in the next few weeks has pitchers solely throwing bullpens as a means for talent evaluators to, uh, evaluate the talent.

As I’ve stated before, throwing a twenty pitch bullpen is not going to endear me to any scouts as I don’t possess a fastball that will light up a radar gun. Obviously, I’m biased, but if I’m truly looking to measure a pitcher’s worth, I want to see how he reacts in game situations against live hitters and not make a knee-jerk reaction on a guy depending on how hard he throws.

Now, most of the open tryouts are just a filter process for an invite to an independent league team’s spring training, so I’m not saying that teams will sign a guy based solely on his fastball velocity. However, teams will offer a spring training invite to a guy who can hit 89 with no semblance of control, while ignore a guy in the low 80s with control and good breaking stuff.

It’s unfortunate, but it’s the nature of the beast these days. What I really need is a time machine to go back to the 1940s, when the idea of a radar gun to document pitch speed was as fanciful a notion of sending a man to the moon. Then I could just step on the mound and if I could get hitters out, I could get signed; velocity be damned.

Alas, I can’t get my flux capacitor to work, so it appears I’m stuck in 2011 trying to prove myself amidst a sea of radar guns.

Even though I’d love the opportunity to throw in front of as many teams as possible, I need to be smart about the tryout process and not just throw a bunch of tacks against the wall and hope something will stick. No, I need to pick an open tryout that will give me the best chance to showcase my skills in a forum best suited to my abilities. And that is pitching against independent league calibre batters in real game situations with scouts in attendance.

That being said, I am eschewing single team open tryouts and focusing all of my attention on a two day showcase in Brockton, Massachussetts on April 30 and May 1. It will be much the same format as the Fort Myers showcase and teams from the following leagues will be in attendance: Can-Am League, American Association and Frontier League.

Now that the weather has warmed up considerably and the snow has hopefully left for another year, I want to start long toss sessions at least once a week. A fellow pitcher and I are hoping to start throwing outside regularly starting next week.

My indoor throwing session on Thursdays has been switched to Wednesdays at a different facility and I’m also throwing indoors every Sunday night. Truthfully, I’m going a little stir crazy throwing inside all of the time, so I can’t wait until outdoor workouts start so I can throw off a real mound again. February in Fort Myers seems so long ago.