There were glowing reviews about Daniel Lynch in the Fall Stars game so I thought I’d watch for myself.  Actually, I’ve watched several times.  Of course, if I was going to watch again, I might as well share with everyone out there who is interested in the Royals upcoming future LHP.  Lynch dealt with some injury issues this year and the Royals sent him to the AFL to get a few extra innings on his season.  Lynch was strong and looked to be 100%.

Lynch threw a scoreless inning facing three batters.  Two of them struck out and one hit a harmless tapper to the right side.  Of course, the first strikeout had people talking.  It was because the robot umpire appeared to miss the call and grant Lynch a gift of a K.

Here’s the call.

A different view.

And finally.

Anyway, you probably saw that call.  You might not have realized it was Lynch on the mound though.  So that was the batter faced and the first strikeout.  Gas just below the zone running away from the RHH to the arm side.

The second batter didn’t fare much better.  The first pitch was some sort of off speed, a curve I believe for ball one.  The second pitch I believe was a change up and the hitter got it off the end of the bat rolling it to the right side for the out.  It had some arm side movement but I couldn’t get a good look at the spin on it.  Anyway, it was a 1-0 pitch that got an incredibly defensive swing.  That is really good news for Lynch.  If he is able to keep going forward getting defensive swings in hitters counts he will have a successful career.

The next hitter was the only LHH Lynch faced and saw a first pitch fastball in and out of the zone.  The hitter swung through the next pitch as it seemed Lynch threw it by him.  There were a few ewws and awws so I believe that was the 99-mph fastball he threw.  Plus it jumped on the hitter.  The next pitch was his curve which produced a foul tip.  With a 1-2 count, Lynch went back to the gas and froze the hitter on a fastball inside to end the inning.

How did Lynch look?  Flat out dominate.  It was one inning but if he can string seven of those together in a row…. Ace potential?  When Lynch was scouted his junior year at Virginia he was mostly working 88-92.  Right at the end he started working 92-94.  Reports were if he could keep that velo the Royals might have a steal.  Well, in this outing he was 97 to 99.  That was as a one-inning guy, but if he works 93-95 for entire starts, he is going to be a legit piece for the Royals rotation going forward.

Image by Jill Weisleder from MiLB.com.