Player Name: Mario Hernandez
Position: P
School: St. Anthony’s
Mario is a 2017 graduate of St. Anthony’s HS. He is 6’0″ 170 lbs. He is a gifted student with a 94 overall average which qualified him for the National Honor Society.
His delivery is very clean but also very deliberate. He begins with a step back as he prepares for his leg kick. He looks down on the ground as a timing mechanism before locking in on his target. His leg kick is extremely high, a credit to some impressive flexibility. His back leg is firm. He hesitates briefly prior to his falling action. On one hand it serves as a way to disrupt the batter’s timing, who is expecting the pitcher to aggressively propel forward. On the other hand, it prevents him from maximizing his velocity. From that point the delivery is clean and efficient. He has a long arm circle and long stride. His front foot lands parallel to home plate. The arm angle is over-the-top.
Hernandez worked primarily in the 77-80 MPH range with the fastball. The two-seamer displayed good armside tail. He also mixed in a 74 MPH change up, 72 MPH slider and 73 MPH curve. His change up showed glimpses of being a plus pitch. It will need to be a little bit slower but the downward movement was there. Additionally, the slider was more advanced than the curveball and that’s fine as long as he limits the use of the curve to simply give the hitter alternate looks.
Hernandez has another year to develop before having to decide which college he will attend. If he can improve the tempo on his delivery and also find a way for the change up to be slower, he can be a starter at Div-III or reliever at Div-II.
