Just when the experts were willing to say Mazzaro could possibly be a number 3, along comes this from Gammons:

'Two scouts watching Oakland's Vin Mazzaro on Thursday agreed that they think he is "a young Chris Carpenter." One added, "I love Rick Porcello, but Mazzaro is the best young pitcher in the American League."'

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Again, I am sure that there will be the reactive replies (if any) that focus on me and my continued focus on this, but the point is that Mazzaro was a huge miss for the prognosticatorrs (sp?) on this site and I think there is an opportunity to look at the story surrounding Mazzaro and learn a little bit.

For example, I think that because of the small amount of information that is available on these prospects, when the coaches of a league (guys who actually saw Mazzaro pitch all year) look at a 21 year old and say he was the best pitcher in the league, maybe next time this should be considered a little more in the evaluation process. 

21 year old AA pitcher of the year with no love from MiLBall community has started MLB career with 13.2 scoreless innings.  Every day won't be as good as today, but I think the 97th best prospect rating and B- rating were excessively harsh. 

Why do the so called "experts" say he only has #3 potential when his stuff is very comparable to Hanson's (who got bombed today) and Hanson has #1 stuff? 

Mazzaro, fresh from his last 29+ innings in the PCL where he allowed 1 ER and was POTW for 2 weeks straight, arrived in Chicago tonight and promptly threw 6+ scoreless innings against the white sox.  Walks high and Ks low, but it was a pretty good start for a young sinker baller as the ump had a very high k zone.

Pitched between 90 and 96 and was pretty consistently at 94 for the first 4 innings and slowed down to 90 the last couple and was much more effective.  4 pretty good pitches all things considered.  Looks like he has the stuff to be very good, but it will probably be some learning to consistenly be very good. 

Still a great prospect and it was a shame he was not rated much higher on this board as his numbers last year, age (still just 22) and stuff deserved far more credit.  So far, looks like all the so called experts were wrong.

Having a nice spring so far.

5 innings, 7 Ks, 3 Hits Zero walks Zero runs Zero earned runs.

Did I say he is hitting 96 on the gun?

Oh yeh, I am sure that there are 27 better pitching prospects who fill up the strike zone with 90+  heat (with excellent movement), 4 solid pitches and quality pitching approach.

I guess there is always time for him to fail. 

Do people still really think there are 96 better prospects than him?  Small sample size, but 96 MPH heat is not so small.