Matt Krook Maintains Positive Outlook

PHOENIX–At this time last year, Matt Krook was just trying to survive.

Coming back from Tommy John surgery that wiped out the end of his freshman season and all of his sophomore year, Krook’s velocity had come back. But the feel for his pitches had completely deserted him.

Krook’s fastball has always had exceptional sink and run, but last year it ran in and out of the strike zone. Krook walked a high-but-not exceptional 3.7 batters per nine innings as a freshman. His walk rate jumped to 8.0 batters per nine innings as a junior.

“Last year I had no feel for anything. I had no trust in my stuff,” Krook said.

It was a bad time to lose the strike zone. Krook was a supplemental first-round pick coming out of high school in 2013. But his physical with the Marlins disclosed a potential elbow injury that led the Marlins to cut their bonus offer, so Krook headed to Oregon. Krook’s wildness led him to fall to the fourth round in last June’s draft.

That wildness didn’t improve in his pro debut, as he walked 7.7 per nine in his stints with the rookie-level AZL Giants and short-season Salem-Keizer.

But Krook says that with a full healthy offseason, the 2017 season should be much different.

“This is the first year from the very beginning of the season I can trust my arm,” Krook said. “Not worry about injury and just kind of play the game, which will be very nice. It just kind of clicked this last couple of months. I had a full offseason off and then started to build up again. It’s super different. This year I have great feel. I know where the ball is going.”

Krook’s fastball still sinks. It still runs, but now Krook says he has some understanding of where it’s going to end up.

“Sometimes I’m trying to hit a certain spot and it runs off the plate. I want it to move as much as it can, but this year so far I’ve been able to command it better,” he said.

Krook has also changed the grip on his changeup, giving him what he said is the best changeup he’s ever had. But the biggest question for Krook this season will be just how well he commands that low-90s fastball. As Giants pitching coordinator Bert Bradley explained, if Krook’s locating his fastball, everything else comes together.

“He’s got his mechanics in check now. Now he’s throwing strikes and he’s got a Zach Britton sinker,” Bradley said. “It’s the best lefty sinker I’ve seen as far as natural (sink). He’s got to just throw it down the middle. I was the same way. I had a good sinker. I didn’t try to throw for strikeouts because I knew it would be a ground ball. He’s a high velo sinkerballer.”

New And Improved

Giants righthander Melvin Adon didn’t sign his first pro contract until he was 20 years-old, which makes him an old man among Dominican prospects.

And as a 21-year-old making his pro debut, Adon has had a lot of catching up to do. But he also has a pretty special arm, one that can get to the high-90s or beyond pretty much whenever he wants to.

But the Giants have tried to tame some of his wildness by simplifying what he does. Compared to a year ago, Adon showed significantly less effort and more command in a spring outing against the Rockies. Where in the past Adon used to spin off to the first base side in his delivery, he now is focused on finishing more direct to the plate.

The arm is still extremely fast. The velocity still sits in the upper-90s, but Adon’s lower-effort delivery shows signs of allowing him to stay around the zone more often.

Adon will turn 23 during the 2017 season. He’s old for a prospect yet to pitch in full-season ball, but arms like his aren’t easy to find. And because he signed in 2015, the Giants won’t face a decision about whether to add him to their 40-man roster until he’s played two more full seasons, so there’s still plenty of time for him to refine his control and his slider.