When he was a prospect in the New York Yankees system, Deivi García really was called “Little Pedro” in some circles.

That’s a viciously unfair sobriquet to attach to a young pitcher, and García never came especially close to looking like Pedro Martínez against big-league batters for New York, but it’s not an appellation anyone comes by through sheer coincidence.

García was, like the Hall of Famer, a short (5-foot-9), right-handed Dominican starter with an electric arm and a devastating changeup. He just hasn’t had the confluence of good health and consistent improvement necessary to emerge as a star.

It’s almost laughable to pretend that corner could still be turned. In 2024, García spent more of the season in Triple A than in the big leagues, despite playing for the White Sox.

The very worst team in baseball history couldn’t find room on their roster for him, and it’s not solely through their own incompetence or stupidity: García had an unseemly 7.07 ERA and walked 11 in his 14 innings with the Sox.

He is, right now, pretty bad, and at his current age, Martínez was just blooming into his full form, overwhelming and overpowering the National League en route to the 1997 NL Cy Young Award.

So, what gives with the title of this piece?

Again, it’s kind of a gag. It’s a joke about the former top prospect’s name value outstripping his apparent on-field value, and about the Brewers’ recent run of very impressive pitching development feats, and about that forced comp to a Hall of Famer that will hang on him like a 40-pound weight almost no matter what he does the rest of his career.

But, it’s also not entirely a joke. There’s stuff to like with García—or rather, there’s reason to believe the Crew really can fix some of the stuff that is currently not likable at all.

García’s biggest problem—not the only one, but you have to start somewhere—is an overlarge gap in his release points based on pitch type.

Don’t just see this chart; read the numbers and imagine the scope of variation they describe. García effectively has two different release points: one for his fastball and changeup, and a discernibly different one for his other offerings. That’s never good.

When he was a prospect in the New York Yankees system, Deivi García really was called “Little Pedro” in some circles. That’s a viciously unfair sobriquet to attach to a young pitcher, and García never came especially close to looking like Pedro Martínez against big-league batters for New York, but it’s not an appellation anyone comes by through sheer coincidence.

García was, like the Hall of Famer, a short (5-foot-9), right-handed Dominican starter with an electric arm and a devastating changeup. He just hasn’t had the confluence of good health and consistent improvement necessary to emerge as a star.

It’s almost laughable to pretend that corner could still be turned. In 2024, García spent more of the season in Triple A than in the big leagues, despite playing for the White Sox.

The very worst team in baseball history couldn’t find room on their roster for him, and it’s not solely through their own incompetence or stupidity: García had an unseemly 7.07 ERA and walked 11 in his 14 innings with the Sox.

He is, right now, pretty bad, and at his current age, Martínez was just blooming into his full form, overwhelming and overpowering the National League en route to the 1997 NL Cy Young Award.

So, what gives with the title of this piece?

Again, it’s kind of a gag. It’s a joke about the former top prospect’s name value outstripping his apparent on-field value, and about the Brewers’ recent run of very impressive pitching development feats, and about that forced comp to a Hall of Famer that will hang on him like a 40-pound weight almost no matter what he does the rest of his career.

But, it’s also not entirely a joke. There’s stuff to like with García—or rather, there’s reason to believe the Crew really can fix some of the stuff that is currently not likable at all.

García’s biggest problem—not the only one, but you have to start somewhere—is an overlarge gap in his release points based on pitch type. Don’t just see this chart; read the numbers and imagine the scope of variation they describe.

García effectively has two different release points: one for his fastball and changeup, and a discernibly different one for his other offerings.

That’s never good.

You can see that he does release the sweeper from the same cluster as the four-seamer and changeup, more or less. but it’s not the tight distribution of release points you might prefer from a pitcher. It’s important to ground-truth these things to ensure that a pitcher didn’t make a midseason change in arm slot or position on the rubber, but García didn’t.

The same plot for Freddy Peralta can be mapped just as neatly onto a 16×16-inch plot, rather than 20×20, and without the same degree of misshapen spray. García hasn’t found a way to be mechanically consistent, which was always a worry for him because of his size and how hard he throws.

Let’s flip that, though, and view it the other way. Sure, he’s a bit of a mess in terms of repeating his delivery, but we know the Brewers are superb at helping such pitchers along.

He also throws 95 with his fastball and touches 98, and we know that often, when the Brewers do adjust a pitcher’s mechanics, they pick up a tick of velocity.

Not only does García already throw hard, but he does it from a low release point, giving himself a 97th-percentile vertical approach angle. It’s a flat, hard fastball, and thus, even with merely average induced vertical break, it can miss a lot of bats at the top of the strike zone.

It’s also a pitch with more horizontal movement than most four-seamers, and much more variability in terms of horizontal movement from one pitch to the next than most pitchers have.

Look at that chart, and you can envision a lot of what the Brewers will be eager to do with him. That fastball can pretty readily split into two different ones, with more of a sinker to set up his sweeper and the riding four-seamer to set up his cutter (which is more like a hard slider).

I would guess we’ll see Milwaukee try to get him throwing the sweeper more, split out the fastball intwo two different pitches, and reemphasize the changeup at the expense of the hard breaker.

The curveball, if it stays in the arsenal at all, will become a strike-stealing soul-snatcher when hitters least expect it. García just doesn’t disguise that pitch well, and he doesn’t really need it, if he takes to the adjustments the Brewers introduce.

Throwing enough strikes will be paramount, and while Chris Hook and company have done a lot with less in the past, it would be unfair to assume they can automatically tame this wild arm. If they can, though, the upside is still great. García is a reliever, at this stage of his career, but he’s the kind who can go multiple innings and work all the way through an opposing lineup once.

With a sinker-sweeper-cutter-four-seamer mix for righties and a four-seamer-changeup-sweeper mix for lefties, he could be as tough as Joel Payamps in the pen.

That he won’t take up a spot on the 40-man this winter is a huge bonus for the Brewers. Now, they can bring him to camp In February, see how well he takes to some new pointers and how good the ball looks coming out of his hand, and delay any real decision point until around or beyond Opening Day.

He’s just a flier, but as fliers go, this one has real wings to it. The Brewers, meanwhile, are unbeatable flight instructors of late.