Honey Of An Ace

In dominant performance, Rays' Brent Honeywell shows he's ready for prime time.

- John Manuel

For many baseball fans and even baseball writers, Brent Honeywell is the guy who throws a screwball.

He showed at the Futures Game that there’s much more to him than that.

Ranked No. 14 on our Midseason Top 100 Prospects, Honeywell is the highest-ranked healthy pitcher on the list, two spots behind injured Cardinals righty Alex Reyes. He looked the part for the U.S. Team, dominating a stacked World lineup for two scoreless innings with four strikeouts en route to game MVP honors.

“I honestly don’t know where this one’s going,” Honeywell said of the MVP trophy, “but maybe my mom and dad will play rock-paper-scissors for it.”

The 22-year-old from Carnesville, Ga., had all his stuff working at the Future Game. He threw only one of his famous screwballs. He threw four-seam fastballs up to 97.7 mph, along with a curveball, several effective changeups and an occasional slider.

But the screwball, for a called third strike against Alex Verdugo, might be what he’s most remembered for. After all, he’s related to Mike Marshall, the 1974 Cy Young Award winner who rode his screwball to stardom.

The Dodgers’ Verdugo said the pitch acted “like a lefthanded curveball. It just broke right back into the zone. It’s one of those where you tip your cap.”

Catcher Chance Sisco had to handle four different pitchers, starting with Honeywell and his five pitches. He had faced Honeywell once as a hitter in Triple-A and said he was more fun to catch than to face.

“His stuff looked better catching him than facing him, because you get to see his stuff the whole way and see the movement from out of his hand to my mitt,” Sisco said.