Carlos Rodon Is Finally Transforming Into A Frontline Ace

For everyone that was worried about Carlos Rodon, worry no more. He finally seems to have put everything together and is turning into one of the best young pitchers in baseball. Take a look at some of his last starts, all against first place teams:

This was before he played in the first game of yesterday's double-header, where he threw another gem against Minnesota. 6.1 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 9 K's. When he is healthy, Carlos has proven he can be the ace of this staff for the foreseeable future. His wipeout slider is absolutely disgusting, and one of the main reasons why the White Sox drafted him no. 3 overall just a few years ago. What has been really impressive as of late though has been his fastball. Not just how hard he has been throwing it or commanding it, but how he has been able to change the speeds on it. Yesterday during Rodon's outing, Steve Stone was explaining how young pitchers don't typically understand that their fastball can actually be used as two, or even three pitches. Rodon finally seems to be understanding that now. He can throw his normal fastball, that typically reaches 95 mph, or he can take something off of it and bring it back to the 92-90 range. Don't confuse this with a changeup, which is thrown with a different grip and usually rests in the 80-83 range. By changing up the speeds on his fastball, Rodon has been able to effectively throw off the timing of the batters without even needing to go to his changeup. Then he uses his slider as his out pitch. In fact, Carlos Rodon trusts his slider so much, he has been throwing it in fastball counts. In this video we have Rodon throwing his slider to 4 different batters. 2 of those situations there was a full count. Typically when the count is full, pitchers throw fastballs in the zone in fear of walking the batter. Instead, Rodon throws his slider in the dirt for the strikeout to end the inning on two separate occasions.

That is a confident man throwing the ball right there. And he is only going to get better and better with more experience. The only question again, is his health. He got off to a slow start this season and didn't make his first start until about halfway through the year. It took him a few starts to settle in and find his groove, but now that he has, he has been lights out.

Rodon has recently gone toe to toe with the best of the best in the American League (and the Dodgers in the National League) and more than held his own. Imagine what he can do against the bottom dwellers. With Lucas Giolito starting tonight, Reynaldo Lopez already on the team, and Michael Kopech and Alec Hansen moving on up, the future of the rotation is slowly starting to take shape. 4+ Aces on the staff is not entirely out of the question. If that is the case, expect Carlos Rodon to be the one leading the charge.