A former Rule 5 draft pick who had yet to translate talent into performance, Rowan Wick used a few tweaks from the Cubs’ pitch lab to optimize his impressive spin rate during a breakout campaign. Hard work and openness to change led to Wick ending 2019 among the league’s best “active spinners.”
The ~92% active spin rate (i.e., the amount of spin that contributes to movement) on Wick’s curveball ranked 15th of 399 qualified MLB pitchers in 2019. In other words, Wick was better than 96% of MLB pitchers in that regard. Let that sink in for a second.