In 2017, Tejay Antone injured his arm. That required 18 months of rehab. Worries at the time were that this would sap Antone of his meager fastball-- an 88 - 92 mph disappointment in his previous three professional seasons-- and the TCU alum would soon be out of baseball. When he came back in the second half of 2018, Antone's fastball was back to below average normal. He struggled to knock off the rust and pitched relatively poorly in the A+ Florida League, with a 4.03 ERA and nearly double the walks from his previous A+ stint. He followed that up with an improved season in both AA and AAA last year and a newly formed slider. A ground ball specialist, at this point, Antone was a break-glass-in-emergency kind of guy. He was the type the Reds often trotted out while losing 90+ games for a decade.
Then a light bulb. Or more properly, someone got a hold of him and taught him how to throw the ball.
Antone now has a fastball that ratchets up to the mid-90s. Often. He's worked 95 - 97 and hit 98 over short stints this spring and summer. Not only that, as of his last stint pitching two days ago, Antone's slider is frisbee-like. It is, according to a Doug Gray article, considered a plus pitch by at least one scout. This combination of pitches allowed Antone to post a three-inning line of seven K's and no hits. No one got the ball out of the infield.
Obviously, Antone's isn't the typical development path. But his new-found stuff could be transformative for his career. More importantly, it puts Antone firmly in the cross-hairs of Reds' brass as a possible tandem starter early in the season and relief arm or depth starter as the season progresses. It's great news for the Reds' willingness to embrace analytics as they move forward in helping their minor leaguers work toward the bigs.
Four questions to discuss, then:
1) Where does Antone rank in terms of starting pitching depth for the big club, and do you trust him to become a viable option as a major league pitcher?
2) Antone did most of his development in the off-season as part of APEC, a Texas-based program. Is this, then, a one-off-- something the Reds can take credit for but had no hand in developing, or is it thanks to a burgeoning culture in the Cincinnati development process that prospects should embrace moving forward? In short, can Boddy do the same with other Red minor leaguers?
3) Does Antone's new-found stuff improve his standing in your own personal Reds' prospect list? (Doug Gray has him at 15, fwiw, and I suspect that may be underselling him a bit.)
4) What other Red minor leaguers would do well to follow the Antone plan, as it were? Who's short on stuff and needs a few mph to become a usable piece of the MLB puzzle?
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