Written by Greg Fertel | 05 June 2008

Bittle is the closer for Mississippi, and put up nasty numbers this season, including a batting average against around .100, and 16.1 strikeouts per 9 innings. He was dominant primarily because of his nasty cutter, a pitch that he threw regularly in the high-80's, but was unhittable. He also has a good change and a 4-seam fastball at 90-91, but he throws the cutter probably 80% of the time. I like this pick as a good bet to be a useful piece for the bullpen to be useful relatively soon. While Bittle doesn't have the velocity to be a closer most likely, he could be a very good setup man, and improve his cutter even more by learning from Mariano Rivera.  He is not a traditional bullpen prospect, but the fact that his cutter dominated metal bats in college is a good sign for future success against wood bats.  Bittle was one of the guys I posted about in the days leading up to the draft. The Yanks have evidently been following him for a while, as they drafted him last year in the 48th round, and apparently, they liked what they saw from him this season.

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