WEATHERS NOT SATISFIED WITH ‘TASTE’ OF MAJORS
After pitching in playoffs he’s doing all he can to make big-league roster
A.J. Preller followed Scouting Director Mark Conner and area scout Tyler Stubblefield into a Cheesecake Factory in Franklin, Tenn., in late June 2018. Conner and Stubblefield had spent a great deal of time in the area ahead of selecting left-hander Ryan Weathers with the seventh overall pick in the country. The purpose of dinner that night with Ryan, his father, David, and his mother, Kelli, was allow to Preller himself to get to know an 18-year-old kid whom the Padres were preparing to offer a $5.22 million signing bonus.
They talked about Ryan’s upbringing as the son of a former major league reliever, the future he saw for himself and a developmental path forward.
Before the night was over, Preller left with a promise from dad.
“Ryan’s a strike-thrower,” David Weathers told Preller. “If you put him in the big leagues tonight, he would throw strike one.”
A little more than two years later, as his 20year-old son jogged toward the mound at Globe Life Field in the third inning in Game 1 of the NLDS, the elder Weathers thought back to that dinner. Few would begrudge the joyful text dad sent Preller’s way after Dodgers shortstop Corey Seager swung through a 95 mph fastball at the top of the zone to start Ryan’s improbable debut. See. I told you.
He had indeed.
Weathers not only fired strike one at the Dodgers — in the postseason, no less — he turned in 11⁄3 scoreless innings in his first official game action since finishing the 2019 season in the low Single-A Midwest League. While the COVID-19 pandemic might have had as much to do with Weathers getting that opportunity as his performance last summer at the alternate site, he walked into his first big-league camp last month already on the 40-man roster and looking to make the most of odd but fortuitous circumstances.
“I got a little taste of the big leagues, as in three days,” Weathers, now 21, said Tuesday after striking out two and allowing a run in two innings in the Padres’ 7-2 exhibition win over the Diamondbacks. “I don’t want to leave so I’m hoping to do everything in my power to stay.”
He added: “I know that your first time in big-league camp you only get one first impression.”
It’s been a good one. He cut his weight on his 6foot-1 frame from about 235 pounds last year to about 220 as spring training began. That kind of shedding typically comes with making healthier meal decisions and a lot of cardiovascular work, although Weathers continued to be a heavy lifter in the weight room over the offseason. His specific regimen mirrored his father’s work as a player as he opted to run four times a week — in 2-, 3and 4-mile increments — in the “elements” in and around places in his hometown Loretto, Tenn. The goal wasn’t necessarily to drop pounds — just settle into a weight that worked well for him on the mound.
In the day of David Weathers — who is listed at 6-3 and 205 pounds at baseball-reference.com — that meant a pitcher usually had some meat on him.
“They seem to stay healthier,” David Weathers said, “so I never put emphasis on being lean when Ryan was younger. The question is, what is a good weight to pitch at and whatever that is for you, maintain it. What weight will you stay healthy at? It doesn’t matter if you look great on a beach if you can’t pitch.”
The Weathers males have always been able to pitch.
David threw for nine teams over a 19-year career, mostly as a reliever. He coached up his son along the way, helping him learn to command his fastball and a secondary arsenal that includes a mid-80s slider and a fading change-up. That stuff backed up as Ryan Weathers battled arm fatigue in his first year out of high school at low Single-A Fort Wayne in 2019 (3.84 ERA), but ticked up over the summer after he recommitted himself to conditioning following his first full year of pro ball.
In fact, his fastball — 8892 mph at Fort Wayne — bumped up to the mid-90s at the alternate site and even as high as 97 mph in relief work, leading the Padres to add him to the 40-man roster for the second round of the postseason.
“At that age,” David Weathers said, “you’re anxious to get out there and see if it will play against the bigleague guys.”
He did, striking out 2019 NL MVP Cody Bellinger — the son of Clay Bellinger, a former teammate of the elder Weathers — en route to working around two walks in a hitless 11⁄3 innings in relief against the Dodgers. Ryan also began to make an impression on Padres pitching coach Larry Rothschild, the elder Weathers’ pitching coach in the early ’90s with the Marlins.
As far as pitching IQ goes, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
“The one similarity, which is pretty glaring, is they’re both smart pitchers,” Rothschild said. “Ryan has a really good understanding of the game, ahead of his years. I’ve talked to David a few times. He understands it. He doesn’t want to be overbearing coaching his son. He wants to let people do the work. He wants Ryan to figure a lot of it out. For a parent to be able to take a step back at times — I know with my kid it’s not that easy to do — I really like what he’s done with him. He’s been great. He’s been terrific to talk to. He’s a proud dad, but knows the boundaries that are going to help his son.”
The Padres’ to-do list this spring includes helping Weathers soften a changeup, perhaps with a grip picked up from MacKenzie Gore, as well as fine-tuning his slider. For that, there’s no better mentor for a young pitcher in his first big-league camp than Yu Darvish, who “spins the ball better than any pitcher in the game and has like 17 pitches,” Ryan Weathers said.
“You’re getting to be around a lot of big-leaguers that have been proven in the game,” said Ryan, who’s No. 84 in Baseball America’s top 100 prospects and the Padres’ third-ranked pitching prospect behind Gore and Adrian Morejon. “Hanging out with Cy Young finalists, a Cy Young winner, just trying to pick their brain a little bit, trying to figure out some more stuff about baseball. Eventually I know in the long run it’s going to help me more being around them, watching them do their work, their routine and just trying to get myself to be more routine-oriented and hopefully get better as a pitcher.”
Of course, the chances of Weathers, without any minor league innings above Aball, making the team were slim before Darvish, Blake Snell and Joe Musgrove joined the roster this offseason, likely leaving him to continue his development somewhere in the high minors to start 2021. That’s fine. Weathers knows the road back to Petco Park.
He’s traveled it before. “It’s not about where you’re pitching; it’s about how you’re pitching,” Weathers said. “Whatever they need me to do is what I’m going to do. I’m in this organization to win games one day and I’m going to do whatever they need me to do to win games.”