The Good, The Bad From Nationals Prospect Luis Perales' Up-and-Down MLB Debut

Before Wednesday's game, the Washington Nationals officially called up right-handed pitcher Luis Perales for his major league debut.

Expected to be used out of the bullpen at some point after recently-claimed pitcher Matt Waldron was scheduled to open the game, Perales' eventual appearance was a highly-anticipated one. However, it wasn't a smooth performance by the 23-year-old, as he had an up-and-down outing that was capped off by allowing a grand slam in the top of the seventh inning.

Still, there was plenty to like about what Perales displayed, even if his final stat line was underwhelming with four earned runs allowed on four hits with three walks and three strikeouts across two innings pitched.

The Good From Luis Perales' Debut

What stood out was the velocity from the right-hander. He touched 100 mph with his four-seam fastball five times. 10 other four-seamers reached the 99 mph mark.

While it was known that Perales could throw the ball hard, it was different seeing it in a major league setting. Out of those 15 pitches that were 99 mph or faster, two of them resulted in hits. Three were swinging strikes, while two were foul balls and one was a called strike.

Overall, batters swung at 23 of the 53 pitches Perales made. 11 of them were whiffs, which is sign that he does possess some high-end stuff that should pose some problems for hitters in the bigs.

The Bad From Luis Perales' Debut

Unfortunately, some of the issues the righty has shown throughout his career were on full display. Lack of command was the most glaring one on Wednesday, as 26 out of his 53 pitches were balls. And while his four-seamer popped due to pure velocity, six of those 15 heaters that were 99 mph or faster were balls.

He has to have more control with his fastball, especially because everything else plays off of that. Outside of his cutter, which he uses almost as an off-speed offering, the other primary pitch in his arsenal is the splitter. By design, he didn't throw a lot of those in the zone since they are supposed to make batters chase. But because he had problems locating his four-seamer at times, it was easy for the Colorado Rockies to lay off some of his put away pitches, which resulted in the poor walk to strikeout ratio compared to what he had been doing before his big league debut.

Of course, the grand slam Perales gave up is going to get the most attention. However, it was how he got himself into that position that was the more worrying thing.

After getting the first batter of the seventh inning to ground out, Perales gave up two straight singles on pitches that were over the heart of the plate. He then walked the bases loaded on five pitches. Then, after striking out the next batter to get to two outs, he hung a cutter that was blasted over the fence. Missed locations and walks are going to get punished at this level, and Perales learned that lesson the hard way during his debut.

This performance was nothing to panic about, though. Coming off Tommy John surgery, it was known that Perales was going to be a bit of a project this year. And even though there were some downs that took place during this outing, there was a whole lot to get excited about, too.

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