Colorado Rockies: Jeffri Ocando Scouting Report, July 2017

Orem, Utah —— Entering play on Tuesday night, Colorado Rockies right-handed pitching prospect Jeffri Ocando is 3-1 with a 4.91 ERA over eight starts split between the rookie-level Dominican Summer League Rockies and the Pioneer League‘s Grand Junction Rockies, with 27 strikeouts over 33 innings pitched against 36 hits and 14 walks. I observed the 18-year-old Venezuelan in his July 2 start on the road against Orem; below is Baseball Census‘ full Jeffri Ocando scouting report, including several videos.

Jeffri Ocando Scouting Report — Video

Our first video of Colorado Rockies right-handed pitching prospect Jeffri Ocando shows his game pitches across that entire July 2 start against the Orem Owlz, where he allowed just one hit and no earned runs across six innings:

And our second Jeffri Ocando video shows more of his between-inning pitch action from that same day, to get a better sense of his raw repertoire:

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Jeffri Ocando Scouting Report — Notes

Jeffri Ocando has a long, skinny frame listed at 180 lbs., and even that seems generous. There are a lot of moving parts in his delivery, but it looked relatively smooth and easy, even though it takes work to repeat his mechanics. He generates power by dipping back his upper half during his delivery, and there’s some max effort there, but arm action is free and easy. Delivery hides the ball well to righties, arm action has his full repertoire looking the same out of his hand regardless of the pitch. Throws across his body pretty radically, adding to the difficulty for right-handed batters and giving him some more deception.

Ocando’s fastball sat mostly 91-92 mph but occasionally hit 93 mph. He ought to likely increase velocity as he matures and grows; there’s plenty of room to add weight to his lanky frame. He struggled with command through most of this July 2 start, but was effective regardless. Looks like he had great command in DSL, but he’s struggled since coming stateside. Good mix of fastball and offspeed stuff, though: he flashed a few changeups against Orem, but primarily showed off a fastball/curveball mix that kept hitters off balance. A few of those curveballs had decent bite, but Ocando will need more consistent break to be effective. Relied on it when he couldn’t locate the fastball. Control was good enough to work the bottom of the zone fairly consistently, but he struggled consistently working inside or outside.

He already shows great awareness on the mound, especially for his age, and Ocando fields his position well. Composure remained strong even with runners on base. There’s some point there; he carried himself like a veteran on the mound despite being only 18 years old and in rookie ball for the first time. Ocando’s is an extremely raw arm, but there’s obvious upside with a lot of room and time to grow into a professional pitcher.

Jeffri Ocando Scouting Report — Projection

As with any 18-year-old who has literally pitched in two games stateside there are a lot of wrinkles to iron out, but he could turn into an exciting pitching prospect in the not-too-distant future. If Jeffri Ocando shows consistent command and starts to put up the swing-and-miss numbers he had in the DSL over the last two years, the righty ought to find himself on the Colorado Rockies radar. His fastball looks to be his most promising future pitch with added velocity, but he could develop a decent curve and changeup in time, too. There’s no reason he can’t be remain a starting pitcher at this point, and he should get plenty of innings over the next few years to solidify a projection and see if the Rockies have anything of substance here.

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