Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Meyer has come a long way
Still, goal remains the same for 21-year-old fresh out of college
Max Meyer realizes where he is right now. He’s a few days into his first Major League Baseball spring training camp in Jupiter with the Miami Marlins. It’s sometimes hard for him to fathom.
Just a year ago, he was a junior at the University of Minnesota. He’s approaching the one-year anniversary of the game that got him here — when he used his top-end slider and fastball that tops 100 mph to throw a 14-strikeout complete game against the North Carolina Tar Heels. It was at that moment that Marlins director of amateur scouting D.J. Svihlik essentially locked Meyer in as the No. 3 pick in the 2020 MLB Draft.
“It is crazy to think how much has changed in one year,” Meyer said this weekend.
Personally, it’s the latest step in Meyer’s path to the big leagues — a path he admits he didn’t think was reality until the Marlins drafted him in the first round.
He had to weather a wild, unprecedented year to get to that point. There was no minor-league season in 2020, a consequence of the still-ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Instead of making his pro debut last summer, Meyer was at the Marlins’ alternate training site, then spent a month at the club’s instructional league and then spent four months in the offseason home in Woodbury, Minnesota, utilizing a wood mound in his family’s garage to keep up with his routines.
Meyer remained steady through it all. It brought him to Saturday, when he threw his first bullpen session of spring training with catcher Will Banfield. He’ll remain that way when he gets into his first spring training game at some point over the next few weeks, when he plays his first minor-league game and, he hopes eventually, his first MLB game.
If Meyer has made one thing clear, it’s that he’s going to make sure the stage is never too big for him.
“I’m kind of that guy that’s just ‘It’s another day. It’s another game,’ ” Meyer said. “I’m always 100% whenever I’m on the mound and I don’t let big moments get the best of me. I’m just going to keep playing the game I played my whole life.”
Now, that doesn’t mean he’s a complete, polished product yet. He has plenty of room to grow as a 21-year-old fresh out of college. He’s refining his fastball grip and improving his changeup to be a quality fourth pitch to go along with his slider and curveball.
He’s channeling his inner Max Scherzer and striving to play with an “I’m coming after you” mentality each time he takes the mound.
“You can see that emotion he brings to the game and how much of a competitor he is,” Meyer said of the three-time Cy Young Award winner. “It’s so fun to watch those guys. I feel like every game is a big game where I’m going up and giving it my all with every pitch.”
He’s also not trying to over-complicate things even with the high expectations surrounding him. He’s a unanimous top-50 prospect in baseball — ranked as high as No. 28 by MLB Pipeline and no lower than 48 by ESPN (The Athletic’s Keith Law has him No. 40 and Baseball America No. 44).
“Obviously you don’t pick a guy with your first pick — third pick in the country — that you don’t think is going to be electric,” Mattingly said of Meyer. “So he’s a guy with obviously good stuff with a number of pitches. It’s good to have him in camp.”
The slider is his top pitch. He’s played around with the grip throughout the past few years before settling with a spiked grip — pressing the tip of his index finger on the base of the ball while using his middle finger on the seams to help generate spin — during his sophomore year at Minnesota.
“It really started taking off,” Meyer said. “My velo has always been hard on that, but once I got into the weight room more, the velocity went up to around 90 miles an hour and I still had that depth and break to it. It’s just been feel over time and I’ve always had a good feel to spin the ball. It’s been my go-to pitch for a while.”
He got a feel for what professional baseball is like while practicing as part of the Marlins’ player pool during the coronavirus-shortened 2020 season. The games will come next.
For now, he’s realizing where he is right now, making it a letter less hard to fathom.
“Every day is a new day,” Meyer said. “I’m just ready to go whenever someone tells me.”