Jose De Leon

Position: RHP
Born: 8/7/1992
Height: 6'2
Weight: 185
B/T: R/R
Acquired: Drafted in the 24th round of the 2013 MLB First-Year Player Draft (LAD).

Most Recent Stats at Time of Debut
CURRENT SEASON STATS: 7-1 with a 2.61 ERA in 16 starts at Oklahoma City (Triple-A), striking out 111 and walking 20 in 86 .1 IP while allowing 61 hits.

Info & MLB Debut Date
Contract purchased from Oklahoma City on September 4.
MLB Debut Date: 9/4/2016

Debut Details
September 4, in a 7-4 win over the San Diego Padres. The starting pitcher, he got the win, allowing four runs, all earned, on six hits over six innings. He didn’t walk a batter and struck out nine. He also hit one batter with a pitch and made one error. Out of 86 pitches thrown, 58 were for strikes. Only four balls were hit out of the infield in those six innings, with three of his six hits allowed being infield singles (two of them being bunt singles by Travis Jankowski). The first batter De Leon faced, Jankowski grounded out to shortstop in his first at-bat, after which Wil Myers, became the first of De Leon’s nine strikeout victims, going down swinging. Yangervis Solarte then singled on a pop up to third base, after which De Leon hit Alex Dickerson with a pitch, but both were left stranded when Ryan Schimpf struck out swinging. De Leon recorded a 1-2-3 inning in the second, highlighted by Alexi Amarista striking out swinging to end the frame. In the third, with two out and one on thanks to a bunt single by Jankowski, the first ball of the game hit out of the infield went pretty far, as Solarte blasted a two-run homer to right field before Dickerson popped out. In the fourth, De Leon dominated again, sandwiching a soft groundout to first base by Hector Sanchez between swinging strikeouts from Schimpf and Oswaldo Arcia. In the fifth, he looked a little more hittable as Amarista led off with a single to center and, with one out, scored when Jankowski laid down his second bunt single and De Leon made a throwing error. Myers then singled to right field before Solarte then collected his third RBI of the game on a sacrifice fly to right to score Jankowski. De Leon picked off Myers for the third out of the inning before any more damage could be done. In the sixth, he made sure not to take any chances with those pesky baserunners, striking out the side in his final frame: Dickerson swinging, Schimpf looking and Sanchez swinging.

Player Notes
The first impression of De Leon’s linescore, with the four runs and six hits, doesn’t quite convey how dominant he was during those six innings. Undrafted out of high school in Puerto Rico, De Leon got on the map as the staff ace at Southern and, though he went deep in the 2013 draft, he has absolutely dominated hitters in the minors, striking out 446 in just 330.2 career innings before his promotion and walking just 99 while scattering 273 hits. In 2015, between Rancho Cucamonga (High A) and Tulsa (Double-A), he combined for a 2.99 ERA in 23 starts, striking out 163 while walking 37 and allowing 87 hits in 114.1 innings. That came after his pro debut at Ogden (Short-Season A) in 2014 when he went 7-0 with a 2.22 ERA in 14 games, striking out 119 and walking 21 in 77 innings. Not too shabby for a 24th-rounder.

2080 Notes
De Leon was ranked No. 37 in 2080’s 125 Preseason Prospect Rankings List, where we had this to say about him: “De Leon features a plus changeup to pair with a fastball that hits 96 mph when he reaches back for it. He is an advanced prospect who, like [Julio] Urias at #6, could figure into the Dodgers’ rotation plans in 2016, given the injury issues in their rotation last year.”