Sunday Notes: Jackson Jobe Has a Jacob deGrom-like Cutter.
Jackson Jobe has added a cutter to the power arsenal that helps make him one of the top pitching prospects in the Detroit Tigers system. Every bit as importantly, he?s returned to full health following a back ailment that landed him on the shelf from early April to mid June. The recently-turned 21-year-old right-hander had incurred an L5 (i.e. bottom left vertebra) stress fracture, an injury he attributed to ?rotating fast and throwing hard at a young age when I wasn?t really strong enough to support that.?
The pitch now augmenting his fastball/slider/changeup combination was portended in a conversation I had with him last August. As his second full professional season was concluding, Jobe told me that he wanted to develop something new, ?probably a cutter,? and he went on to do just that.
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?I added it in the offseason, and on paper it?s a really good pitch,? the third-overall pick in the 2021 draft explained prior to his last start, which came on Friday with the High-A West Michigan Whitecaps. ?I dive into all the TrackMan stuff ? the vertical movement, horizontal movement, the spin efficiency, the tilt ? and use the data in pitch-design. The cutter has performed pretty well.?
Asking the analytically-minded hurler about the metrics on his cutter elicited a response that was preceded by a pregnant pause.
?I hate trying compare myself to this guy,? said Jobe. ?I don?t think there?s been anybody like him, and I?m nowhere close to being who he is, but my cutter is pretty similar to Jacob deGrom?s slider at times. When it?s good, I throw it at 93 [mph] with negative-two horizontal and four vert. Like I said, on paper. Obviously, he does a fantastic job of locating his. It?s not just metrics that make a pitch good, it?s how you use it. My goal is to one day be anywhere as talented as he is.?
The pitch-design process was relatively straightforward. ?One foot in, one foot out,? on adding a cutter when we spoke last summer, Jobe proceeded to broach the idea to his back-home pitching coach in January. He was then shown a grip, and being a natural supinator who finds it easy to get the ball to move glove-side, the pitch was ?pretty good right away.? All that was needed was mental cues and the fine-tuning that comes with repetition. Six months later, Jobe has full confidence in his newest offering.
He?s yet to begin featuring it extensively. Jobe estimated that he?s been throwing his cutter roughly 10-15 percent of the time, which is ?kind of what the Tigers want right now.? With just over 100 professional innings under his belt, 28 of them this year, continuing to master his fastball, slider, and changeup ? ?the core of being a starting pitcher? ? remains a top priority. Ditto being able to take the mound on a regular basis.
?Probably the biggest things I learned while rehabbing were how to take care of my body and how to dial in a good routine,? explained Jobe. ?Staying healthy is one of the hardest things to do in this game. I?ve heard many times that it?s a sport of attrition, meaning that the guys who stay healthy are the ones who have the best careers. You look at a guy like Gerrit Cole, who has hardly had any injuries, versus a guy like deGrom who arguably has the best stuff we?ve ever seen but has struggled to stay healthy. The rehab I did has me on the right track for that. Hopefully I can continue to get better.?
Jobe scattered four hits over five scoreless innings, fanning six and not allowing a free pass, in Saturday?s outing against the Lake County Captains. He picked off two of the four batters who reached base against him.
Fangraphs
