Josh Michael: Lefty Lowther continues to improve his stock

Before the season began, I was extremely excited about the starting rotation that the low Single-A Delmarva Shorebirds were going to have due to the vast amount of talent it contained. So far, that excitement has been justified and the standout of the group has been left-hander Zac Lowther.

The Shorebirds have one of the top three pitching staffs in the entire South Atlantic League and Lowther has been the ace of the staff in the early going.

Lowther, who turns 22 next week, was drafted by the Orioles in the second competitive balance round (74th overall) in last June's First-Year Player Draft out of Xavier University.

Currently ranked 17th and 15th among O's prospects by MLBPipeline.com and Baby Birdland, respectively, he has done nothing but improve his stock thus far in 2018.

Lowther leads the entire South Atlantic League in ERA (0.56), WHIP (0.44) and strikeouts (31). Over three starts this season, he is 2-1 and has allowed just one run on five hits and two walks over 16 innings.

The guy is dominating right now, and thanks to his performance last week, he was named the South Atlantic League Pitcher of the Week. Last week, he went 1-1 with a 0.90 ERA, 18 strikeouts and walked just one over 10 innings pitched in two starts.

There is a lot to like about Lowther, starting with his 6-foot-2 frame and 235 lbs. His fastball normally sits in the 90-91 mph range (I have seen him top 94 on occasion) and he has a pretty filthy curveball. His changeup is an average offering. While not a flamethrower, his fastball plays up thanks to his delivery that hides the ball well.

One thing some worry about with a guy who is piling up a lot of strikeouts is his pitch count, but Lowther has recorded his 31 strikeouts this season without eclipsing 84 pitches in any of his starts.

Lowther is coming off of a terrific debut season after being drafted last year where he went 2-2 with a 1.66 ERA, 0.85 WHIP and 75 strikeouts over 54.1 innings pitched with the short-season Single-A Aberdeen Ironbirds. His performance earned him a midseason New York-Penn League All-Star nod as well as a Baseball America Short-Season All-Star selection.

One thing that I really like about Lowther is the fact that he was a college pitcher. His arm was more mature at the time he was drafted and his college performance reflects what we have seen thus far. At Xavier, he set a school record for strikeouts (123) in his junior year and finished fourth in the entire NCAA Division I ranks with a 13.3 whiff rate. In the highly touted Cape Cod League in the summer of 2016, Lowther led the league in strikeouts (54) and strikeouts/nine innings (13.6). He was and is a strikeout starting pitcher.

With 2018 being his first try at a full-season affiliate, he will likely have an innings limit in the 120-150 range I am guessing, but that doesn't mean fans of the high Single-A Frederick Keys won't get a chance to see him this year. I have little doubt that if he continues to pitch the way he has been, Harry Grove Stadium will soon be his next home.

Josh Michael blogs about the Orioles for Baby Birdland. Follow him on Twitter: @BabyBirdland. His opinions on the Orioles will appear here as part of MASNsports.com's longstanding initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our pages. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.