Alex Lange

It is possible that the best season of Lange's hopefully lengthy career will forever be his freshman season at Louisiana State. It's a hard season to ever live up to again--12-0, 1.97 with 131 strikeouts in 114 innings as the ace of an LSU team that went to Omaha. In the two years since, scouts keep waiting to see that same guy again, but the slightly lesser Lange they've seen is still very good. Lange doesn't get to 94-96 mph as frequently as he did in 2015, but more than anything, teams have realized Lange's plus curveball is so good that they are much better off taking and hoping to do damage against his fastball. When he locates his hard-breaking curveball, he can dominate, but on nights he can't land his curveball for strikes he's not shown that his command of his 90-94 mph fastball is good enough to consistently get ahead with it. He shows occassional feel for his upper 80s changeup, which flashes late fade on the right night. Lange's delivery involves some effort which has explains some of his command struggles. Lange's lengthy record of durability and success make him a safe option at the back of the first round.