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After making a favorable first impression in his first 157 big league innings between 2007 and 2008, 2009 was supposed to be the year Ryan Rowland-Smith secured his spot in the Seattle Mariners starting rotation for years to come. Of course, that’s not how it went, as he dealt with some elbow discomfort last spring and was bumped back down to AAA Tacoma after one short start.

What was supposed to be to a breather and quick tuneup ended up keeping him in the minor leagues for half the season.  His velocity was down, his command was off, his secondary pitches weren’t sharp and he proved unable to get AAA hitters out with any consistency.

But things started clicking in his last couple of starts with Tacoma and he was brought back up to give Seattle a nice little boost down the stretch.  RRS is now back in the same position he was in last offseason.  He’s written into the rotation as the third or fourth starter and is expected to bring consistency to that back end of the rotation.

What I really like about RRS is that he has a high floor.  He’s pretty solid across the board, so any improvements he make should push him up the ladder, rather than merely helping him gain stability where he is.  From where I sit, RRS is a solid #4 right now and can only move up with each improvement he makes.

RRS has decent command of four pitches that are all at least average right now.  His curveball and changeup in particular have a chance at being above average big league offerings sooner than later, and both have flashed as out pitches the last three seasons.  Working on getting those two offerings as consistently plus pitches is one thing he can do to get himself to being a reliable #3.

His control took a nice step forward last season as he lowered his BB/9 and raised his zone percentage.  If he can shave off a few more walks from his totals that will be another thing to moving him from back of the rotation arm to something much more valuable.

RRS’ strikeout rates will be something to watch.  His 4.86 K/9 with Seattle last season was the lowest of his career (minors and majors).  He’d be in better shape if he could keep that rate in the 5s and ideally up into the 6s.  His stuff visibly plays up out of the bullpen where he can put up K/9s in the 8s and 9s, and while we can’t expect him to keep up that level of effort over multiple innings, it would be nice to see him find some balance and be able to add a few strikeouts.

If RRS can improve the consistency of his change and curve, continue to keep his walks to a minimum and miss a few more bats he’ll be in great shape.  But RRS has his sights set higher– he’s said on radio that he sees no reason why he can’t be a top of the rotation pitcher– and will look for more ways to improve himself.

As far as Spring Training stories go, the ones about a pitcher experimenting with a new pitch aren’t much lower than the ones about a player showing up to camp in the best shape of his life on the fluff-o-meter.  In February, pitchers are trying all kinds of things, and most of the time they’ll scrap it before the regular season starts and go with what got them to the big leagues.

With that said, I’m going to try and not to get too excited about RRS reportedly trying out a cut fastball this spring.  It’s just an experiment and for all we know this could be the last time we hear about it, but I wanted to talk about it because of the two left handed pitchers RRS  mentioned when talking about adding a cutter: Andy Pettitte and Cliff Lee.

Pettitte has mixed in a couple great seasons to go along with years of above average performance and is one of the most storied postseason performers in our lifetime.  Cliff Lee has been one of the best pitchers in baseball over the last two seasons.  And as great as these guys have been, RRS isn’t far off from fitting himself into their template for success.

A fastball that sits in the high 80s and low 90s?  Check.  RRS sits right around 90 MPH.  Quality curveball?  Check.  RRS’ curve isn’t great, but it’s usually a pretty solid yacker and has flashed as a plus pitch.  Quality changeup?  Like the curve, it isn’t great but he has shown the ability to throw it at an above average level.  A slider to mix in on occasion?  RRS doesn’t use it often but his is pretty good.  Pound the strikezone?  RRS isn’t at their level, especially Cliff Lee who has out of this world command, but he is getting better and could be considered a control pitcher already.  Mixes pitches well?  This is more Pettitte than Lee, but RRS throws a lot of offspeed pitches and throws a below average number of fastballs.

Add a cutter and RRS is that same type of pitcher.

Of course, that doesn’t mean he’d be a Cy Young candidate.  A baseball player template offers a wide range of performance levels.  But you never know, and anything he can do to emulate successful pitchers with similar skillsets can’t hurt.

If RRS can develop a good cutter it could help him do three things that would make him a much better pitcher.  One, it would help him neutralize right handed hitters.  Considering that he’s going to face a lot more righties than lefties this is obviously important.  Over the course of his big league career, right handers have swung and miss less and hit the ball in the air much more compared to lefties, as would be expected.  Safeco Field has helped him keep many of those flyballs in the park– which is why GM Jack Zduriencik has stockpiled flyball lefties– but he doesn’t get that same benefit on the road and his splits reflect that.  The cutter will give him another pitch (along with his changeup) to combat right handers, inducing more weak contact and swings and misses.

Two, it will help him keep the ball on the ground a little bit.  Depending on how often he throws the cutter (should he carry this into the regular season, of course)– some mix it in as a secondary pitch and some use it as their primary fastball– he should be able to get a few more groundballs with it, especially against right handers.  Groundballs are great, especially with the defensive infielders Zduriencik has assembled.

Three, he could miss a few more bats with it.  Located correctly, RRS can use it as a swing and miss pitch against both sides of the plate, whether it is tailing away from lefties or busting right handers inside.

This is something I’ll be keeping a close eye on.  If RRS could bring a good cutter to the regular season it could be a nice little boost to him.  Here is some video of RRS working a bullpen in which he works in a few cutters.  You can hear him talking about it with catcher Josh Bard(?), and can see a bit of the cutting action on a few of them.

The downside of the cutter is that it is often associated with injury.  Of course, the case against it is Mariano Rivera, who throws nothing but cutters and has a long and healthy career.  But many believe that the cutter, thrown with a supinated release, can cause elbow trouble.  Considering that RRS has already had some elbow trouble, and specifically trouble with the range of motion in his elbow (perhaps caused by the lengthening of the ulna, a side effect of throwing with a supinated release, as RRS does with his slider and curve), this could be worrisome.

But that’s far too many words for a pitch that we may or may not see come April.  If he does bring it into the regular season I’m sure we’ll take plenty of time to talk about it once we see the results.

RRS is a solid back of the rotation pitcher with a decent chance at being a good #3, which would be great.  Anything to keep RRS in Seattle for a long time would be great, because he’s clearly the coolest Mariner.  He’s a fun loving Aussie that we all just so badly want to be buddies with, and he’s a fiery competitor on the field.  He’s extremely accessible to the fans, sharing his very cool life with us via his blog, Twitter and YouTube.  He offers up a nice piece of trivia as the first player in the game’s history with a hyphenated last name.  He doesn’t suck at baseball.  He’s awesome, and definitely in the running for most popular non-star Seattle Mariner.  Because of all that, we’re all hoping he can continue to be a productive pitcher, stay healthy and hopefully take the next step to be more than a replaceable back end arm.

Go Hyphen!