Miller: Five things to know
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. -- The kid has all the tools to become one of baseball's next greats. Hard four-seamer that sizzles. Blistering two-seamer that zooms in like a laser. Breaking ball with downward action that is downright nasty.
He also has Randy Johnson syndrome.
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| Daniel Cabrera looks to turn over a new leaf after leading the majors with 17 wild pitches in '06. (Getty Images) |
At 6-foot-9, last summer he was a backfiring car in need of a service station and a no-hitter waiting to happen.
When he grows into his spikes, as the 6-10 Johnson eventually did, the Orioles think they could have something very special on their hands.
When he will finish growing into his spikes, though, is as unpredictable as the destination of some of those fastballs last season.
"Daniel's mechanics are the way you want them right now," Orioles pitching coach Leo Mazzone says optimistically. "You don't have to tinker with him anymore.
"It's a matter of him just trusting himself a little more. It comes with experience and maturity.
"I think he's about ready to make a move."
Anybody who watched Cabrera take a no-hitter into the ninth inning in Yankee Stadium last Sept. 28 -- Robinson Cano finally busted it up with a one-out single -- knows that Cabrera making a move could have far-reaching implications in the rugged AL East.
Anybody who watched him lead the majors with 17 wild pitches and walk 50 batters in his first 10 starts knows that watching him also can be an exercise in exasperation. Those 50 walks were the most in so few innings (52 1/3) over 10 starts since 1986, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, when Bobby Witt walked 53 hitters in 50 innings.
"He's got one of the most overpowering fastballs around," says Detroit slugger Gary Sheffield, who was in the Yankees' lineup and went 0-for-3 the night of Cabrera's near-miss. "And when you're that tall, it makes it that much more quicker and deceptive, like Randy Johnson.
"When he has all of his pitches working, he's one of the toughest pitchers to hit."
Daniel Alberto Cabrera, 25, signed with the Orioles as an undrafted free agent in 1999 from the Dominican Republic. He has never met Johnson -- who walked 120 batters in 219 2/3innings in his second full season in the majors in 1990, then walked 152 in 201 1/3 innings in '91 -- despite the fact that they shared a division and similar height last summer.
He has, however, met Boston ace Curt Schilling -- who offered some spirit-lifting encouragement.
"He said he knows it's hard to be consistent when you're tall, throwing downhill and trying to throw strikes," says Cabrera, who was 9-10 with a 4.74 ERA in 26 starts last season. "He told me to keep working, and you'll get it one day."
Working toward that end, the Orioles have opted not to discuss the obvious with Cabrera. Maybe Elias computers spit out things like this, that Cabrera is the only pitcher in the last 40 years to pitch five innings or less and compile at least nine strikeouts and nine walks in the same game.
The Orioles, though, clearly aren't into negative reinforcement.
"I'm not even going to mention anything to him about walks and control," Mazzone says.
Fine with Cabrera.
"Next question," he says pleasantly when quizzed about last summer's 104 walks in 148 innings pitched.
The Orioles think a detour to Triple-A Ottawa last July helped him, they think the near no-hitter in Yankee Stadium will provide a positive springboard and they think he's matured.
"For him, it's his mental state and maturity level," manager Sam Perlozzo says. "He wants to do so well so badly that he lets the little things bother him."
When he returned from Ottawa last summer, the little things bothered him a bit more infrequently.
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When he walked off of that Yankee Stadium mound after his final 2006 start, he took with him a perfect reference point for '07 and beyond.
Now, let's see what he does with it.
He owns a DVD copy of that Yankee Stadium game, and he watches it "all the time to make sure that I'm doing the same thing."
"That was one of the greatest moments in my life, you know," he continues. "Not too many pitchers get that close to throwing that kind of game."
With his unique blend of pitches, size and arm, Cabrera is tantalizingly close to being a threat to throw that kind of game with each start he makes.
But when will he get there? Will he get there?
Mazzone sees a different Cabrera this spring, one that has become heart-attack-serious about getting his work in and paying attention to the small details. He also sees a consistency in Cabrera's side work that wasn't there before. Not to mention a rapidly improving change-up.
"There is no experimentation now," Mazzone says. "It's a matter of repeating. Repeat, repeat, repeat."
He whizzed through his first start of the spring in only 25 pitches in two innings, an event that added to Cabrera's confidence.
Last year? It ebbed enough that at times he flat-out refused to throw his change-up.
"Told me he was scared to throw it," Mazzone says. "I think he threw three changeups all last spring."
The flip side: Mazzone's charts show Cabrera surrendering only 11 hits on first-pitch strikes in 2006.
"When you consider all the first-pitch strikes he threw in games, probably 300 or so," Mazzone says. "Guess what? That's telling him that if he throws a first-pitch strike, it's pretty much lights out."
The message seems to be getting through.
"When you're in control of yourself, you see the game differently than the way you saw the game before," Cabrera says.
Adds Mazzone: "You talk about great attitude, a tremendous talent and talk about putting that all together in a 6-9 frame ...
"The true test will be when the bell rings, but you sometimes get those kind of feelings that somebody is growing into something."
