The Cincinnati Reds have signed right-handed pitcher Dylan Rheault to a minor league contract for the 2020 season. The now 27-year-old pitched in independent league baseball in the 2019 season, throwing just 7.2 innings for Lancaster in the Atlantic League where he didn’t give up a run and struck out eight batters.

In 2018 he pitched for the San Francisco Giants organization, seeing time in Advanced-A, Double-A, and Triple-A where he had a combined ERA of 2.38 over 41.2 innings with 17 walks and 35 strikeouts. Originally selected by the Baltimore Orioles in the 19th round of the 2013 draft, he had control problems he couldn’t overcome in their system. He was released after the 2015 season and pitched at two stops in the independent league circuit in 2016, walking more batters than he struck out. Still, the Giants saw something they liked and picked him up. After posting a 104-to-86 strikeout-to-walk ratio while in the Orioles organization, he improved that to 81-to-39 with San Francisco.

His 2018 season saw something interesting happen, too. While the walk rate dropped off, his ground ball rate really jumped up. His rate of 56% jumps off of the page at you if you are looking for something that is above-average when it comes to his stats.

Without much data from 2019, that’s where things take an even more interesting turn. Dylan Rheault was on Team Canada in the Premier 12 tournament that took place after the minor league season. The 6′ 9″ right-handed reliever didn’t pitch in a game during the tournament as Canada was eliminated early, playing in just three games. Still, Canadian officials put him on the team despite him pitching a grand total of 7.2 innings the season before – for an independent league team.

One of those reasons could be that he’s throwing in the upper 90’s with his fastball these days. A big, tall pitchers with that velocity stands out. He also throws both a slider and a splitter. Rheault isn’t young, and he’s thrown a grand total of 4.4 innings above Advanced-A in his life. But it’s an interesting arm to take a look at in the spring and see if you didn’t find something there.