Felix’s Fastball On Adrenaline
Dave · August 15, 2012 at 5:18 pm · Filed Under Mariners
You’ve seen Felix pitch this year at 89-92 with his fastball, and his average fastball velocity has been down compared to past seasons. Lately, though, it has started to come back. Today, once Felix decided to go for the perfect game, it came roaring back. Here is the velocity trend of his fastballs — all pitches labeled as either a four-seam, two-seam, cutter, or sinker by PITCHF/x — in today’s game as the game progressed.
Felix + Adrenaline = Welcome Back, Fastball.
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If anyone’s wondering, yes, that one 90 MPH pitch early in the game may very well have been a change-up. There are some pitches that were labeled change-ups that may have been fastballs. Felix’s two-seamer and change-up are hard for the system to distinguish. For this exercise, though, it doesn’t matter. Felix was clearly throwing harder at the end of the game than he has all season long.
I so badly want to see Felix pitch in the post season for the Mariners. Knowing him, he’d probably throw a no hitter first game
And yet looking at Matthew’s post at LL his fastball was just an after thought it was his change and curve that were generating all the swinging strikes.
It’ll be interesting to see if there was an adrenaline fueled increase in the movement of hi breaking pitches in the later innings too.
Don’t feel bad machines… Felix’s fastball and changeup are hard for ANYONE to distinguish.
(I’ve had warm cheeks for about 5 hours now– smiling like crazy… That kid is unbelievable! Literally, since the end of June in 4 games against the Yankees (twice), the Rangers, and now Tampa: 9 innings/0 runs, 8 innings/2 runs, 9 innings/0 runs, 9 innings/perfect game… That’s 35 innings against 4 great opponents, with 2 runs allowed… and 34 K’s… Wicked good… I was just saying the other day that we better re-up this kid or he’s gonna get $30 million a year if he hits free agency)
On MLB Tonight, after the game, Harold Reynolds posited that Felix had purposefully put on weight to get his fastball back. They showed a before-and-after photo even. It was hard to tell, but I guess he looks a little heavier than in April.