Honestly with regard to Newcomb I sort of wonder if he just falls into the trap of trying to throw it too hard. I'm by no means a pitching coach but it stands to reason if you can throw upper 90's you're probably generally relying on that a lot. And the thing is the harder you throw the more likely you are to lose control of it. I wonder some what if it would benefit him to do what the cubs have done with some of their pitchers which is to take away their best pitch and make him throw some other stuff. For example, teach him a sinker and tell him not to throw his 4 seam fastball. Presumably a sinker would do well for him as it does for Lester who he's drawn comps to. Lester doesn't use his sinker a ton(13% last year) but he locates it marginally better than his 4 seam(10% vs 8% walk rate).
Going from 4 to 2 seem is basically making a fly ball pitcher throw more grounders.
Word is his change plays off his fastball and has good action also. So he has the tools. Curve has good shape. I believe he needs to sit on his curve more in general and use a change fastball combo vs RH.
Like I said. He needs to learn to locate his fastball more than try to throw it by them. When he figures he can get by with weak contact vs trying to blow it past them; then he will be ready to improve.
From what I've seen guys with plus curves can become eliete just by learning to locate it and change speeds with it. If he masters his curve like that where hitters are expecting it and he comes in with a 95 over the inner corner it should be strike 3 more than not as they just couldn't pull the trigger.
So how he pitches is just important. He has the tools to be special
