To say that I’ve long been the “high guy” on the Sal Romano prospect train would be an understatement. He’s been ranked inside the Cincinnati Reds Top 10 prospects on this site for each of the last three seasons. It wasn’t until this past offseason that anyone else placed him in the Top 10. Some places still have him outside of their Top 10. Those people are, and have been, to put it nicely, not paying attention.
The raw stuff has been showing up for the big right hander for a while now. When he was drafted he was throwing 88-91 MPH. He was also 17-years-old with tons of room to add velocity. And he has. He’s now one of the hardest throwing starting pitchers in the organization. It’s not just the velocity, though. He’s generated a big number of ground balls throughout his career as well.
It’s been the development and improvement of the offspeed stuff that’s helped take Sal Romano to that next level. Finding consistency with his breaking ball was the first step. At times he would favor a bit of a slower curve over more of a power curve. For the most part he didn’t seem to have much faith in his ability to get hitters out wit his change up.
Finding consistency in both his approach, and finding some confidence in his change up in 2016 took Sal Romano from a guy with all of the right stuff to a guy in the second half who had that AND the dominating performance to back it all up. In his final 12 starts of the year for the Pensacola Blue Wahoos, these are the numbers that the then 22-year-old posted:
| IP | ERA | H | HR | BB | K | WHIP |
| 76.1 | 2.12 | 56 | 3 | 9 | 69 | 0.78 |
Those numbers are incredible. That’s half of a season of work, by a starting pitcher, with a 0.78 WHIP. That’s nearly a 7-to-1 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Sal Romano has always been a strike thrower. He took it to a different level in the second half of last season.
The Reds added him to the 40-man roster in the offseason after 2015. That comes with plenty of benefits for the player, but one of the big ones is that it gets you an invitation to big league spring training. While Cincinnati is looking for two starters to join the rotation, Romano entered the spring as a long shot to win the job. Given his lack of Triple-A experience, it’s still probably a bit of a long shot for him to win the job. Despite that, he’s taken his opportunities on the mound and dominated thus far.
Over the span of three games, including one start, Sal Romano has allowed just one run in 7.0 innings pitched. He’s walked just two batters and given up six hits. He’s also struck out nine of the 27 batters he’s faced. In the one game in which he pitched that was televised, the right hander passed the eye test, too. It’s still early in the spring, and the pitchers are probably still ahead of the hitters a little bit. But the longer that Romano can continue at this pace, the harder it is going to be to keep him off of the big league roster. Whether that means out of spring training, or after a small amount of time pitching in Triple-A with the Louisville Bats.