For some reason the Astros were willing to part with Nick Tropeano so that they could land a back-up catcher. The Halos were more than happy to take him off their hands and maybe even have him be a big contributor in the majors this season.
Nick Tropeano
10 words or less: Great command, bugs-bunny changeup. Does it work in majors?
Position: RP Born: 8/27/1990
Bats: R Throws: R
Height: 6’4″ Weight: 205
2014 Rank: unranked (in Astros organization)
2014 Season Stats
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PITCHING
Fastball – C+. Nick Tropeano has a slightly above average fastball that sits 89-93, for the most part he’ll throw 91-92. His fastball has natural sinking movement and comes in slightly on a RHB.
Off-speed Pitches – A-. Nick’s go-to pitch of the off-speed variety is his “plus-plus” change up, which should rival Mike Morin’s for the best in the organization. It comes in 10 mph softer than his fastball, but it’s very heavy, the bottom drops out of it and he throws it in the strike zone. He also has a slider/curve that he uses somewhat frequently. This pitch is seen as major league average (above average for a prospect), but he seems to know when to throw it and keeps it in the strike zone, increasing this pitch’s effectiveness.
Control – A. Nick’s BB/9 hovers around 2.5 for his career. This is Dan Haren territory. Oddly enough, as he’s grown older and faced more advanced competition that could force him to throw strikes, Tropeano’s numbers (even those in the walk department) have improved. Which just illustrates the polish that comes with this particular prospect.
Command – A. Tropeano’s success as a pitcher is largely dependent upon his ability to keep the hitters guessing, and throw his pitches where they aren’t going to be hit hard. Because of his preceise command, he’s kept HR’s to a minimum, even in the most hitter friendly of environments. He’s also experienced a great deal of success in the strikeout department despite not having what we would consider “strikeout stuff”. This is just a term that means mid-90’s fastball and huge slider. I think any success he’s had so far can be directly correlated to his command.
Mechanics – A. I love Tropeano’s look on the mound. He actually reminds me a bit of Matt Shoemaker in his approach. There is clearly effort in bringing the ball to the plate, but not so much that he looks like a reliever. He finishes in a position to field, has balance throughout and seems quite agile and athletic out there. There definitely isn’t anything that suggest shoulder or elbow problems could be a future issue. Tropeano is good to go.
OVERALL
Performance – A+. I’m not sure there was anything Tropeano could’ve done better in 2014. He entered the season with great numbers in the low minors and good numbers in AA. It was expected that he’d probably get hit and his ERA would artificially inflate as a result of the Pacific Coast League environment. Instead, Tropeano rose the challenge and got even better. He was by far, the best pitcher in that AAA league last year. His ERA dropped down to 3.03, he allowed just 6.5 hits per 9 innings, he struck out just as many batters as he did in the low minors, continued to pound the strike zone and even earned himself a promotion to the major leagues with the Astros. Tropeano’s 2014 was capped off when he was traded for a major league player and left cellar dwelling Astros in favor of the first place Angels. All in all, things just couldn’t have gone better for Nick Tropeano in 2014.
Projection – B. I once made the mistake of not believing what I saw in a pitcher, bought into conventional/traditional thought and ranked that player lowly, trusting others before I trusted myself. That pitcher’s name was Matt Shoemaker. I’m not making that mistake again. Of course, this isn’t to say Tropeano will experience the same major league success as Shoemaker, but I do firmly believe that Nick will be a quality major league starting pitcher. We are constantly learning that good pitchers in the majors, don’t need to throw hard. Jered Weaver, Matt Shoemaker, Tyler Skaggs and countless others are in the midst of proving this right. What matters is getting batters out, and that’s what Tropeano has done his entire minor league career. With his ability to throw strikes and put his off-speed pitches to use, Tropeano looks like a future #3/4 starter to me. I think worst case scenario performance wise is major leaguers hit his off-speed stuff and he turns into a solid #5 starter. I predict he’ll have an ERA below 4.00 in the majors.
Estimated Time of Arrival – 2015. I think Tropeano has a decent shot at breaking camp with the Angels. I can’t say for sure if he’ll remain in the rotation, because their depth is crazy right now. But, if he continues to get outs, then 2015 should be the year Tropeano makes it to the major leagues and never looks back.
Grade as a Prospect – B+. Great numbers at almost every level of the minors, especially in AAA. Just 24 years old, knocking on the door to the big leagues. Has the stuff to succeed. He isn’t the sort of prospect to generate a ton of hype and thus won’t be on a Top-100 list, but he is the sort of prospect that will be a good major league pitcher very soon.
2014 in Review*
When the Angels acquired Nick Tropeano from the Astros as part of a trade for Hank Conger, I immediately began to wonder what was wrong with Tropeano. Statistically, he looked pretty solid in the minors. He’s moved up one level per year with good, but not great numbers at every stop. He doesn’t walk a lot of guys, has a good strikeout rate, is a little homer prone and had just one year where he looked “hittable.” There aren’t even platoon split issues as his minor league splits are virtually identical.
From a stuff perspective, he also looks perfectly fine. The fastball isn’t powerful as he favors movement over velocity, but he can reach back and touch 94 MPH when he needs it. He’s got a usable curveball and very good changeup, which explains the neutral platoon splits.
So what gives?
I think the real answer is partly that the Astros are trying to put themselves into position to start winning some games. Yeah, I know. Weird, right? Tropeano was expendable because he doesn’t have a high ceiling and the ‘Stros have a lot of high ceiling arms they’d prefer to use. The other part of the answer, I’m guessing, is that Tropeano is a flyball-heavy pitcher.
As I mentioned before, Tropeano has had some problems with homers, this is the result of his flyball tendencies, at least in part. That kind of thing doesn’t fly (pun very much intended) in Minute Maid Park. But at the Big A… gimme, gimme, gimme!
Tropeano is exactly the kind of pitcher the Angels have found success with because they can hide them in spacious outfield of Angel Stadium. One guy who Tropeano is already drawing a lot of comparisons to is Matt Shoemaker. Both had pretty good numbers throughout the minors and feature mediocre velocity but a killer changeup. Both only really have one knock against them: gopher balls. Clearly the Halos made it work with Shoemaker. Now they are taking a shot at doing the same with Tropeano.
Looking Ahead*
Tropeano will nominally be given a shot at cracking the Opening Day rotation, but he is highly unlikely to break camp with the team. He is far more likely to spend most of 2015 in Triple-A Salt Lake trying to keep his flyball tendencies from completely doing him in at high altitude. But he will also probably have a bag packed at all time as he is a prime candidate to be the up-and-down pitcher this year who joins the Halos whenever they need a spot start or a guy with length in the bullpen.
Tropeano made four starts in the majors last year and held his own, so we know he is ready if need be. That being said, he won’t exactly suffer if he spends most of the year with the Bees. Tropeano has proven a lot in the minors, but he needs to prove a few more things. In particular, Tropeano threw 145.1 total innings last season. He needs more durability than that. In fact, he only went seven or more innings five times last season. The Halos really need to use this year to get him accustomed to working a full MLB workload because there is a very high probability that he’ll need to take on that load in the not too distant future.
*As we do every year, the scouting reports and grades are provided by Scotty Allen while Garrett Wilson provides the 2014 in Review and Looking Ahead sections.
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