His versatility earned him seems to be at each spots, but Washington Nationals scouts noticed untapped potential as a pitcher. They drafted him within the fifteenth spherical, and Lee initially struggled.
“I can remember just being very, very wild,” Lee mentioned. “Just not being able to repeat many things and not having the smoothest of deliveries by any means. So to go through the years, developing and just striving to get better, and having the leadership to be able to bounce ideas and things off of was huge. I’m a testament to the Nationals’ development.”
He made huge strides, significantly in 2021, and the Nationals valued him sufficient to position him on the 40-man roster, defending him from the Rule 5 Draft. Lee made his main league debut Wednesday towards the New York Mets after simply 30 minor league begins.
“It’s a testament [to] all the collective work from the pitching coaches, the [pitching] coordinators, the strength coaches,” Mark Scialabba, assistant basic supervisor of participant personnel, mentioned. “Some of our [research and development] guys who really dig into the numbers and show where we can maximize his ability as well.”
When Lee was a freshman, his coaches debated the place to play him. Wes Johnson, the Razorbacks’ pitching coach on the time, had been following Lee’s baseball journey since Lee was 13 years outdated, and he noticed him play at a camp whereas he was a coach on the University of Central Arkansas. He’s now the pitching coach of the Minnesota Twins.
“When you first saw him, you’re like, ‘Okay, he can run, he can throw, he can hit, he can hit for power,’” Johnson mentioned. “Your very first thought is: You didn’t know which way to go with him. Didn’t know which one he was going to be better at. But time kind of played that out.”
Arkansas’ 2018 roster was loaded with expertise — it included present prospects Jackson Rutledge and Matt Cronin. But Nationals scouts noticed Lee and recognized his fastball and curveball as pitches that would turn out to be nice down the road.
During his first 12 months of professional ball, Lee mentioned, “I had to accept failure, and I accepted it a lot.” The coronavirus pandemic shut down the season in 2020, so many minor league gamers misplaced a 12 months of essential improvement. But for Lee, that offseason was a turning level.
He had a guidelines of tweaks for his supply after watching sluggish movement video with the participant improvement employees. He needed to eradicate reaching his glove too far out in entrance of him, which might pull his entrance off to his glove aspect. He additionally wasn’t staying on his again aspect sufficient both, inflicting his pitches to overlook excessive within the zone. He despatched movies of his progress to Scialabba to get suggestions throughout the shutdown.
“[I] was able to have time to really work on it and to get better at those things without repercussions, without a hitter in the box so you could work on those things and, failure or success, you were able to test things out,” Lee mentioned. “Coming out of the pandemic, I was a completely different pitcher and those months in a time where there wasn’t baseball gave me the opportunity to catch up on things that I was lacking in.”
Still, nothing could make up for stay baseball. And Lee struggled early in 2021 when bought to High-A Wilmington. There, he labored with pitching coach Justin Lord — now Class AA Harrisburg’s coach — and power coach Shane Hill.
“Evan is a really strong guy,” Lord mentioned. “And it was more of refining his delivery to get his strength to work the best for him within his delivery … sometimes less is more with guys, especially guys that are strong.”
Lord needed Lee to assault the strike zone so he harassed protecting Lee’s head nonetheless in order that he’d keep according to the plate. He additionally labored with Lee on touchdown firmly on his entrance leg to generate extra rotation towards the plate.
Those supply modifications — coupled together with his skill to manage his feelings and make changes on the mound — helped Lee flip a change. Lord mentioned it took time for Lee to learn to refocus when he make errors, however mentioned he’d by no means seen him look as calm as he did for his main league debut.
“If you don’t learn that principle and then you get to the big leagues and you’re in front of 30,000 fans … that’s when you start becoming somebody you’re not,” Lord mentioned about staying composed. “It’s very hard to control that situation then with your thoughts if you haven’t implemented that at a lower level.”
So what’s next in his development? His coaches and those in player development say he needs to work on commanding his fastball. He also has two more pitches — a cutter and a change-up — that the team believes could give him a stronger arsenal.
“Because of his athleticism, because of the work ethic that he has, his aptitude, he made strides year after year,” Scialabba said. “I nonetheless assume that he’s bought far more within the tank nonetheless together with his improvement, and we haven’t come shut but to the ceiling for him.”