Will Aroldis Chapman be a starter or reliever in 2013?
When Aroldis Chapman got his 6th speeding ticket for going 93 mph, it was after his Kentucky driver’s license had already been taken away. The judge let it slide I’m assuming because he realized that 93 miles per hour is simply a changeup for Chapman.
It’s his fastball that’s really fast. I was watching him pitch on TV and I personally clocked it at 123 mph. Don’t bother fact checking that. Just believe me. The speed you can fact check is 105.1 mph, which was the fastest pitch ever recorded by Major League Baseball and thrown by Chapman in 2010. While he commonly bumps up over 100, his four seamer sits at 98, and has a 33% whiff rate, which is just ridiculous.
While I joked about a changeup for Chapman, he really doesn’t have one. His second pitch is a wicked slider that comes in between 87 and 90 mph. Again, Chapman likes it fast.
But in order to transition from relief to a starter his fastball has been slowed down to 93 mph in...
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March 07, 2013
