Alright, so I decided it was time to really dig in on this Chase Burns kid. Heard his name floating around, saw some numbers that popped, figured I needed to see for myself what the deal was.
First thing I did was just some basic homework. Pulled up his team info, checked out his season stats, inning counts, strikeout numbers, walks, the usual stuff. You gotta start somewhere, right? Just getting a baseline feel for the guy.
Then came the real grind: video. Lots and lots of video. Found whatever game footage I could get my hands on. Sat down and just watched him pitch. Hour after hour. I wasn’t just looking at results, but how he was pitching.
- How’s the arm action? Smooth? Jerky?
- What’s his motion look like? Repeatable? Effort level?
- What pitches is he actually throwing?
- How does he sequence them?
- What’s the velocity look like on the fastball? Does it hold up?
- Does he command the ball or just throw it?
Made a ton of notes while watching. Rewound stuff constantly. Paused it. Really tried to break down his mechanics piece by piece. Watched him in different situations too – early innings, late innings, runners on, nobody on. Tried to see if he changed his approach or if his stuff held up under pressure.
Breaking Down the Arsenal
After getting a general feel, I focused specifically on his pitches. The fastball, obviously. Looked for velocity, sure, but also movement. Was it straight? Did it have run or sink? Then the off-speed stuff. Breaking balls – slider, curveball, whatever he had. What was the shape? Was it sharp? Did he throw it for strikes? Same thing with the changeup, if he used one. How much slower was it than the fastball? Did it look like a fastball out of his hand?
I also paid close attention to his mound presence. How did he carry himself? Did he look confident? What was his body language like after a bad call or giving up a big hit? You can sometimes tell a lot about a guy just by watching how he reacts when things don’t go his way. Harder to judge from video sometimes, but you look for clues.
Ideally, I’d get eyes on him live. See it in person. Feel the energy. See how the ball really comes out of his hand, hear the sound it makes. Couldn’t swing that this time around, so had to rely heavily on the film I gathered.
Once I felt like I’d seen enough, I gathered all my notes, all my observations. Started putting the pieces together. What are his clear strengths? What are the weaknesses or areas he needs to work on? Tried to paint a picture of the pitcher he is right now, and what he could be down the road.
Finally, I just sat down and wrote it all out. Organized my thoughts – the physical look, the delivery, the breakdown of each pitch, the command, the mentality, and a final summary of what I thought. Just getting it all down on paper based on everything I saw and logged during the process. Re-read it to make sure it flowed and captured my evaluation accurately. Job done. Now onto the next one.
