May 7, 200422 yr Has anyone noticed this? D-Train has only two modes... absolutely dominant, or completely terrible. When he's pitching, you don't know which Dontrelle Willis is going to show up. It's rare for him just to have an 'average' performance. It is more blatant this year, rather than last... last year, he started off dominant, turned crappy, then finished the season mediocre. In the postseason he showed up as dominant again. At the beginning of this year, he started off dominant again and then took a sharp turn and was dominated by SF. He came out today, and was again dominated by LA. I think D-Train has the talent, and he is still very young, but he needs to learn consistency.
May 7, 200422 yr You have to wonder if Willis destiny is as a relief pitcher? with only two quality pitches :confused
May 7, 200422 yr it's pretty simple with DTrain. he's got to be able to throw his other pitches for strikes, and he's got to stay ahead in the counts. that's it. when he's falling behind in counts & having to rely on throwing fastballs down the middle, he's not good. when he stays ahead & can keep batters off balance with OTHER pitches, he can be very good.
May 7, 200422 yr As long as he's more "dominant" than "crap" im fine... until than, I'm not going to worry
May 7, 200422 yr He does need that third pitch though. That is something he is going to have to work on next offseason. But for DOntrelle its location location location. Today he couldn't locate anything but his fastball, and so hitters were sitting on it.
May 7, 200422 yr I don't understand how Willis can tell where the ball is going after that wind-up of his.
May 7, 200422 yr it's pretty simple with DTrain. he's got to be able to throw his other pitches for strikes, and he's got to stay ahead in the counts. that's it. when he's falling behind in counts & having to rely on throwing fastballs down the middle, he's not good. when he stays ahead & can keep batters off balance with OTHER pitches, he can be very good. Yep. Dontrelle was struggling to throw first pitch strikes tonight. It was clear he was going to have a long night as he kept starting with 2-0 and 3-1 counts on the majority of hitters.
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