TJ Stuff: Hunting for Stardom
Hunter Greene, Dylan Cease, Cole Ragans
Welcome to “TJ Stuff”, a series which aims to highlight any intriguing MLB players and performances.
Quick Hits
Jack Letier’s stuff is still excellent as he continues to evenly spread out his arsenal. Fastball usage remains down greatly vs LHH (17% on season). He exited his start due to a blister. The Rangers say it was for precautionary reason.
Zac Gallen’s pitch shapes may have benefitted from the cold New York temperature as his fastball was up +1.5 iVB. Interestingly it exhibited more cutting action. I don’t expect the iVB bump to remain, but the additional cut is something to track moving forward.
Blake Snell could not get anything going yesterday as his fastball was down ~1.5 MPH with a drop in iVB. Hopefully this isn’t a sign of injury.
Hayden Birdsong made his debut out of the bullpen. He added +1 MPH on his fastball and +3” iVB to launch its tjStuff+ grade from 95 to 118. Incredible progression on the offering wo pair with his already strong breaking balls and excellent changeup.
Clay Holmes showed more confidence in his changeup, tossing it 23.5% of the time yesterday, up from 4.5 from his debut. Whiffs are still an issue, but he exhibited solid command yesterday to generate strikes.
Freddy Peralta’s velocity remains up across the board. He is generating more movement on all his pitches and tjStuff+ loves the changes (104 to 111 from 2024 to 2025)
Hunter Greene
Hunter Greene, who already averaged 97.6 MPH on his fastball in 2024, increased his velocity by +2 MPH through 2 starts this season. Whether he can maintain this level improvement over the course of the season is a big question, but he did not show signs of fatigue as he faced batters for the third time yesterday. He averaged 100.1 MPH in the 7th inning and fired off a 101.3 MPH fastball for his 93rd pitch of the evening. Greene added this velocity across the board while maintaining his pitch shapes in his arsenal. His new-found power has increased his fastball and slider tjStuff+ up to 115 and 113 respectively. Greene has been pounding the zone this season and letting his immaculate stuff speak for itself.
Dylan Cease
Dylan Cease is throwing an actual changeup! Last season the offering was tossed ~1% of the time an averaged 70 MPH. He referred to it as a “troll” pitch and was only used when he was certain that the batter was not swinging. This new version of his changeup looks promising. He throws is exclusively to LHH while ahead in the count and it sits in the upper 70s with an uncharacteristic 18” iVB and 9” HB. Changeups that lack depth typically do not grade out well in pitch models, but the offering is distinct enough that it was assigned a solid 101 tjStuff+. The other notable change Cease has made is the addition of a sinker. It sits in the mid 90s with more drop and run than the changeup and is an early count option against RHH.
I like these new additions to Cease’s arsenal as it gives him more weapons to work with and help limit damage. He has looked solid thus far and will be relied upon heavily by San Diego this season.
Cole Ragans
Cole Ragans lowered his arm slot from 45° in 2024 to 39° thus far in 2025 while maintaining his elite iVB on his fastball. This change has helped flatten out his fastball from -5.2° to -4.6° and the results have been excellent thus far. He is throwing the offering over 50% of the time and it has returned a great 26.8 Whiff%. He is doing a much better job at dancing around the heart of the zone which has helped return a sparkling 0.196 xwOBACON. Damage allowed was one of the few non-elite aspects of Ragans profile, and his improved fastball qualities should help in that regard.
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