Prospect Profiles 2009: Victor Garate

Overview-Signed out of Venezuela in 2001 by the Astros, the Dodgers acquired him through the minor league portion of the Rule 5 draft in 2007. After never advancing past low-A ball in 7 years with Houston, he made it to high-A in less than a year with the Dodgers. He's a starter for now, but he might project better as a future reliever.

Stuff-Garate's raw stuff isn't special, but he does have 3 solid pitches with his fastball, slider and changeup. His fastball was sitting in the 89-91 range and didn't have much more zip on it than that. It did have natural arm side tail, which makes it a much more difficult to hit than his radar gun readings would indicate. When he did throw his slider it seemed like a fringe-average pitch, but I think it has the potential to get better if he gets on top of it more to give it increased downwards bite. He has a low release point, so it flattens out a bit when it's not right. By far, the best pitch in his arsenal is his changeup. His mechanics allow for excellent deception and solid movement.

Command-Garate has a solid idea of where his fastball is going every time he throws it. His slider and change both have solid command, but I think it can get better. He'll lose his slider both up in the zone and down in the dirt towards the right-handed batting box at times. His changeup is great, but it would be even more effective if he could spot it in a similar fashion to his fastball.

Mechanics-He has very unusual mechanics that remind me a lot of Brian Fuentes. The benefit to this is that he hides all of his pitches exceptionally well, and it makes him a lot more difficult to hit than his pure stuff would indicate. Garate gets his arm up quite early but doesn't have any evidence of hyperabduction. He does reverse rotate his shoulders a bit but it's not something i'm particularly worried about right now. Probably the worst thing he does is flatten his arm out straight when he's throwing his slider, which puts a lot of stress on the elbow, but he doesn't rely on the pitch a lot. It's an unconventional delivery for sure, but I can't see anything that truly worries me about it, especially if he's going to be a reliever.

Mental-Scouts and coaches will attest that he's a competitive and aggressive athlete.

Health-No problems that i'm aware of.

Performance-Based on the scouting report, he profiles more as a finesse nibbler than a strikeout king, right? Wrong. Garate struck out 11.94 batters per 9 in low-A and then carried that over to high-A where he dispatched 11.03 batters per 9. Perhaps most impressive was that he kept his walk rates in low-A and high-A to a solid 3.24 BB/9 and 3.29 BB/9 respectively.

He was almost untouchable at Great Lakes, where his FIP was 2.41, but he became much more hittable after the promotion and posted a 4.11 FIP at Inland Empire. The good news is that both his BABIP (.380) and HR/F (15.0%) there were unsustainably high in the long run, so it's likely that he just ran into a little bad luck.

There's really not that much to critique statistically. The only thing I will say is that he was old for his level of competition last year, and he needs to keep his strikeout rates and walk rates similar as he moves up to face more advanced hitters. If he manages to do that, I see no reason why he can't be effective at the major league level.

Other-Nothing of note.

Projection-Based on what he's done thus far as a starter, there's little reason to remove him from that role.  However, I see him profiling best as a reliever, and he could be a potential setup man, but a solid middle reliever is most likely. The worst case scenario is that he ends up as a lefty specialist.

Since Garate is already 24, the Dodgers will probably start him at AA. If he continues to do well there, a big league call-up might not be far off. I could see him making his major league debut as a reliever sometime in 2009.