We already have several positive reactions to Tanner Scheppers' short outing in Sunday's Futures Game.
Baseball America, in their tools review, says that his fastball was the best, in a game full of electric fastballs:
In fact, Scheppers threw 98 mph on his first pitch, a called strike to Chun Chen (Indians), then threw three straight fastballs that registered 99 mph to Gorkys Hernandez (Pirates), though he wound up walking Hernandez after missing up and in with a pair of sliders that got away from him. He retired Luis Jimenez (Angels) on a 97 mph flyout to Ben Revere (Twins) to end the game.
Frankie Piliere includes Scheppers on his scouting list of most impressive players:
Tanner Scheppers, RHP, Rangers: Typically Scheppers shows off better command than he did in Anaheim, but even without it, his power arm was very impressive on Sunday. The tall right-hander sat at 97-98 mph with the fastball, and reached 99 mph on my gun. He was behind in the count and didn't get to use his 80-81 mph breaking ball much, but that showed promise as well.
Bryan Smith also includes Scheppers' fastball as one of the game's best:
Julio Teheran and Tanner Scheppers. I'm breaking order of appearance here to include Sheppers, but it seems apt to tie them together. Both have big and easy velocity, and both were impressive, but neither had control today.
After the game, Scheppers told Richard Durrett about his experience and said that he's looking forward to longer outings:
"And it's full go," Scheppers said. "I won't have any pitch counts to worry about from what I understand."
Scheppers has been stretched out as a starter and said he feels strong. He's focused on making his changeup more effective and said it's the best it's been in his career.
T.R. Sulllivan talks about how Scheppers could still impact the big league staff this season:
Scheppers' long-term future is still as a starter, but the Rangers are not opposed to using him in the bullpen this season if they need another big arm out there. Ogando seems to have made the jump without problem despite this being his first professional season as a pitcher in the United States.
"Whatever they want to do with me is fine," Scheppers said.
The only thing the Rangers don't want to do is trade him. The Rangers culminated their search for a No. 1 starter when they acquired Cliff Lee on Friday from the Mariners, but in all their discussions with other clubs, they made it clear they were not willing to talk about Scheppers or Martin Perez.