No, not this strike-throwing machine.
Twins right-hander Kevin Slowey is scheduled for season-ending surgery to remove bone chips from his wrist, which is bad news because a) he’s a good pitcher, b) Minnesota is short on rotation depth, and c) he’s an awful lot of fun to watch.
Drafted out of tiny Winthrop University in 2005, Slowey drew lots of skepticism as a prospect because his high-80s fastball and lack of secondary offerings didn’t match the insane numbers that he posted in the minors.
He never blew anyone away, yet managed a 1.94 ERA and 361 strikeouts versus just 52 walks in 367 innings as a minor leaguer, including a 1.95 ERA and 116/20 K/BB ratio in 139 innings at Triple-A. While the Bob Gibson-like ERAs haven’t quite transferred to the majors, Slowey is 26-15 with a 4.39 ERA over 318 innings in the big leagues and has continued to post ridiculously good strikeout-to-walk ratios.
In fact, with 245 strikeouts and just 50 walks in 318 frames Slowey has the best strikeout-to-walk ratio and the best walk rate of the past 75 years among pitchers with 300-plus innings through the age of 25. Thanks to the miracle of Baseball-Reference.com, here’s a look at the all-time leaders in both categories through age 25.
BB/9 K/BB
KEVIN SLOWEY 1.42 KEVIN SLOWEY 4.90
Atlee Hammaker 1.68 Roy Oswalt 4.00
Bret Saberhagen 1.75 James Shields 3.89
Andy Sonnanstine 1.75 Cole Hamels 3.72
Scott McGregor 1.76 Jose Lima 3.68
Jose Lima 1.78 Huston Street 3.63
Lary Sorensen 1.80 Ben Sheets 3.55
Jim Merritt 1.88 Roger Clemens 3.54
Fritz Peterson 1.88 Andy Sonnanstine 3.51
Paul Dean 1.88 Jim Merritt 3.42
Not only does Slowey sit atop both lists, he blows away the competition by being 15 percent better than second place Atlee Hammaker in walk rate and 23 percent better than second place Roy Oswalt in strikeout-to-walk ratio. Not bad for a guy who averages just 89.6 miles per hour with his fastball and throws the pitch two-thirds of the time. Velocity and stuff are nice, but being smart and throwing strikes helps too.
