Game 142, Padres at Mariners
Mike Clevinger vs. Luis Castillo, 1:10pm
Sorry I’ve been away – a camping trip plus Covid in the family has made it impossible. And what a week to miss: the M’s had perhaps their signature win of the year on Sunday to beat Atlanta, and have essentially sewn up a playoff spot in 2022. The drought is about to end. All that remains is seeding.
So, let’s talk about that. The new playoff format from MLB is somewhat odd: the overall #1 seed in the AL (overwhelmingly likely to be the Astros) faces the winner of the match-up between the second and third Wild Card teams. The third wild card team faces off against the worst division winner, quite likely to be the Cleveland Guardians. Importantly, the winner of *that* series faces the AL’s second-seeded division winner, or the Yankees if they can hold onto it. There’s no re-seeding, and the three wild card teams are, at present, neck and neck. You could make a very good argument that the 6th overall seed has an easier path to the AL pennant than the top wild card team, and very clearly easier than the second wild card team.
The M’s schedule and the fact that Toronto and Tampa play each other so much gives Seattle a clear pathway to that top wild card seed. That’s good, to be clear: it would give them something we’ve been dying for since 2001: HOME playoff games. It’s not just a single game anymore, so that’d be three playoff games at T-Mobile. That’s pretty good. But the M’s record is *better* in road games this year, and for a very good reason: they still haven’t quite figured out how to hit at T-Mobile. After a good start at home, the team’s gone cold: they’re hitting .219/.303/.376 on the year in Seattle. Now, that’s better than last year’s mark, but it’s depressingly close to last year’s mark. Meanwhile, they’re hitting .238/.320/.398 on the road, and maaaan is it easy to forget just how depressed batting is right now.
Not every player has a T-Mobile problem. Julio Rodriguez is slightly better at home, and Ty France is clearly better there. But the players impacted by the low run enviroment are often *really* impacted by it. Jesse Winker is hitting .200/.329/.281 at home. Your starting bat-first LF has a home SLG% of .281. That shouldn’t be possible. Adam Frazier hasn’t been great anywhere, but Seattle’s BABIP-suppression and general lack of extra base hits means he’s been almost unplayable at home. All of this means that, at home, the line-up just gets a bit shorter. It’s not night-and-day different the way it was last year, and of course the pitchers get all of the power- and BABIP-suppression that Winker loses, so they’d be a tough out anywhere. But as we saw last night, the M’s can sometimes struggle to score runs at home.
Would you rather the M’s get the third wild card and face and ALDS series with the Yankees, a team they’ve beaten in the last two series (home and away)? Or get the top seed and face a red-hot Houston club in the second round? Would you rather the M’s get home field for the first round and then go to Houston, or be the road team against a mediocre Cleveland club and have a line-up that’s better prepared to do damage from 1-9?
There are good analytic, galaxy brain arguments to be made here, but let’s be clear: I care a lot more about M’s fans than the line-up’s BABIP woes. Give me the home series in round one every day of the week. Waiting to face Houston in the ALCS vs. the ALDS just isn’t some sort of supremely-valuable prize. If you want to win it all, you’ve got to face them at some point. Guarantee yourself home playoff games, and this entire fanbase can breathe a little bit easier, and that’s far more valuable than an edge in road pythagorean winning percentage.
Luis Castillo’s generally been the guy the M’s wanted when they traded a massive prospect haul to Cincinnati. He blanked the Yankees for 8 IP, but has had some hiccups along the way, notably in his last start in Oakland. Castillo has an absolutely gorgeous sinker with tons of armside run that pairs delightfully with his slider and death-dealing change-up. But the best pitch he’s thrown this year? His four-seam. The M’s have upped the percentage of four-seamers he throws to lefties, and it’s been incredibly successful. Castillo has been great against lefties as a Mariner, and has been even better at home thanks to a very low BABIP and George Kirby-like K:BB ratio. He just doesn’t give up free passes.
Using the sinker mostly to righties makes sense, as it’s a pitch with fairly high platoon splits. That armside run is much more effective against righties than lefties. But beyond that, it’s a pitch that – despite *looking* unhittable – has been put in play an awful lot. Again, in Seattle, that’s less of a problem. But it’s something of an issue overall. This year, Castillo has generated a swing and miss about twice as often as a ball in play with his four-seam fastball; less than 10% of those straight heaters become balls in play. His sinker is 3.5X as likely to be a ball in play than a swing-and-miss. Small sample, perhaps, as Castillo’s pitch type splits haven’t always been this different, but that’s something he should be aware of.
1: Juliooooo, CF
2: France, 1B
3: Suarez, 3B
4: Santana, DH
5: Winker, LF
6: Raleigh, C
7: Frazier, 2B
8: Haggerty, RF
9: Crawford, SS
SP: Castillo
Mitch Haniger’s sidelined with a back issue, so Sam Haggerty continues to get playing time, and he’s made the most of it.
Congrats to Cade Marlowe, the M’s prospect OF, on his promotion to AAA Tacoma. He shook off a brutal slump early on, and now has his season line up to .291/.380/.483.
Led by George Kirby and Logan Gilbert, M’s pitching has been dominant over the last 30 days: a 2.41 ERA and the second-most fWAR in MLB. But the back of the bullpen is struggling just a tad, with Paul Sewald, Matt Festa and Diego Castillo giving up some HRs. Matt Brash and Andres Munoz have been dominant, so it’s not a clear warning sign, but I wonder if the bullpen sees a shake-up in roles in the playoffs. The fact that they’ve never really had defined roles probably makes this easier, but it’s going to be interesting to see how manager Scott Servais handles this over the final month.
Game 137, White Sox at Mariners
Michael Kopech vs. Luis Castillo, 1:10pm
The M’s continue to benefit from nearly untouchable starting pitching. Their starters have a 3.29 ERA/3.27 FIP since the start of August, a performance which, if anything, undersells how good they’ve been. Similar to the surging Rays, the M’s starters have been excellent at limiting free passes. This has helped produce a dominant set of numbers. M’s pitchers have allowed a wOBA of just .281 since August 1, 5th best in the game, and just behind the juggernauts in Houston and Los Angeles. Their starters, led by Kirby and last night’s starter, Logan Gilbert, have essentially stopped walking people. This means that the hard-hit contact they give up, and they give up kind of a lot, occurs in situations least likely for that contact to hurt them.
But the real stars of the past six weeks have been the bullpen. We could’ve said that at several points over the past few months, but look at this. The ‘pen can take a very different approach. The bullpen is fine giving up walks, or at least, they give up more of them than the starters, but they absolutely smother quality of contact. The M’s pen has the lowest average exit velocity in the majors by over 2 MPH since August. The gap between the M’s and #2 is the same as the gap between #2 and #19.
Michael Kopech came up as a flamethrowing super-prospect, the centerpiece (along with Yoan Moncada) of the Sox trade that sent Chris Sale from White to Red. Famous for his top-of-the-scale velocity, Kopech has battled injuries off and on, but become a solid pitcher. That’s perhaps less than the White Sox hoped for, but more than looked possible when Kopech was rehabbing TJ surgery or another arm injury. He looked to have turned a corner last year, producing dominant K:BB numbers in a (wait for it) bullpen/spot-starter role. Limiting walks, something that had troubled him in the past, made him a potential Cy Young candidate in 2022, albeit potentially as a closer. How would starting full time impact him?
Well…it’s not been great. Kopech doesn’t have the top-end velocity anymore, and certainly not as a starter. He’s above average, for sure, but it isn’t overpowering. And what’s worse is that he doesn’t know where it’s going. All of his control gains from last season have been frittered away, as he’s now sporting a K-BB% of 9.4%, down from 27.7% last year. His fastball is still *good*, and it may be helping him hold his BABIP down in the .220s, but this does not, at first glance, look like a sustainable trend – particularly not since it was over .300 last year. For all of his velocity and elite spin rates, Kopech’s fastball continues to underperform. It’s not just the walks; he gives up lots of hard-hit contact, too.
Logan Gilbert and George Kirby are fine with hard-hit contact, and a part of me still thinks they could become Cy Young winners once they learn better breaking stuff to limit it. But their fastballs are so, so good that it doesn’t matter. Luis Castillo, Kirby, and Gilbert are all in the top 30 in MLB in Fastball run values (linear weights after each pitch) – it’s a counting stat, so the fact that Kirby’s that high despite having pitched 30-50 innings fewer than his competition says something. They give up hard line drives, but don’t walk many, and get swings and misses. Kopech’s done this before, but he is absolutely not doing it now.
Does this say that velocity isn’t important? No, I wouldn’t go that far. I still think spin is a bit overrated, and Kopech is showing why. But more than that, if you can’t control contact, then you simply have to control the zone. Giving up some smashed singles is fine for Logan Gilbert. It’s less good if you’ve walked two in the inning.
1: Juliooo, CF
2: France, 1B
3: Haniger, DH
4: Suarez, 3B
5: Winker, LF
6: Frazier, 2B
7: Trammell, RF
8: Casali, C
9: Crawford, SS
SP: Castillo
The Rays face Boston at home, while Toronto continues its series with erstwhile Wild Card rivals Baltimore.
Game 133, Mariners at Guardians
Robbie Ray vs. Xzavion Curry, 4:10pm
Since July, Robbie Ray’s sporting one of the most improved fastballs in the game, ranking 10th in Cameron Grove’s stuff/command metric improvement. Is he throwing his four-seamer harder? More break? No, it’s really not due to stuff at all – instead, he’s showing much better command of it. Essentially, his locations are expected to generate bad swings and bad outcomes by hitters. Do we see that in real games? Yes, kind of. Ray’s four-seamer has generated significantly more swings than it did in the first few months of the year. For a guy who’s struggled off and on with control and command in the past, that’s a notable achievement, and by and large, the results have followed.
But not entirely. Since August 1st, Ray’s four-seamer has become nearly untouchable, with batters hitting .122 and slugging .268 against it. But one of the big changes he made to get hitters OFF of that four-seamer was bringing in a sinker, and that pitch is… well, in that same time, batters are slugging .500 off the sinker, and righties, who face him a lot and see the bulk of those sinkers, are slugging .619. I get it – there are interactions at play, and you can’t just stop throwing a change-of-pace pitch without it impacting the rest of the arsenal. It’s not an open-and-shut case that going back to being (essentially) a two-pitch pitcher is the right course of action.
That said, if you throw a pitch that turns league right-handers into 2022-Paul Goldschmidt when they face it, you might want to throw…literally anything else. Ray was brilliant in August, but he’s still had an up and down year. Mostly up, don’t get me wrong, but there’s still room for improvement here.
Xzavion Curry has thrown all of 5 big league innings, and was called up to take the place of Aaron Civale, who went on the IL. Curry came into the year as Cleveland’s #11 prospect after a huge 2021, though he’s struggled quite a bit in AAA this season. Control had been his calling card coming into 2022, but he’s walked far too many this year. The key to his control was his four-seam fastball, an arrow-straight offering with good vertical movement. That rise has enabled him to throw it in the zone a ton, as hitters in college and the low minors would swing underneath it. I wonder if that’s happening a lot less in the upper minors… the scouting report on his secondaries isn’t glowing, so I’m not sure Curry had a plan B if his invisiball heater started popping up on the more advanced radar systems used by elite hitters. He’s had HR troubles occasionally in the minors as well, which makes sense given that fastball shape. No one’s going to have trouble elevating it – the only issue is making contact.
1: Julioooo, CF
2: France, 1B
3: Haniger, RF
4: Suarez, 3B
5: Winker, LF
6: Santana, DH
7: Frazier, 2B
8: Raleigh, C
9: Crawford, SS
SP: Ray
Luis Torrens played some 2B in Tacoma’s win last night over Sacramento. No jokes, no scouting reports, just…just thought you’d like to know. Mason McCoy hit a grand slam in the R’s 6-3 win.
Tyler Dollard starts for Arkansas today; he’s the biggest prospect among the affiliates’ probable starters.
Game 132, Mariners vs. Guardians
Luis Castillo vs. Cody Morris, 4:10pm
The M’s arrive in Cleveland red hot after sweeping the hapless Tigers. They just finished off beating these same Guardians back in Seattle, so they’ve been good against potential playoff rivals as well as roadkill like Detroit, and there’s really no question why.
The M’s pitching staff is on quite a run. In the last 30 days, they’ve been the best in MLB, with quite a gap between themselves and second-place…Cleveland. They’ve done it despite an extremely high (for today’s game) BABIP, but they haven’t given up a lot of home runs. They now have three starters in Robbie Ray, Logan Gilbert, and George Kirby who have somewhat elevated BABIPs, but who’ve been dominant at times. All three fit into a weird category of guys who give up hard contact, but strike out enough and, when going right, simply don’t walk anyone. This means that to beat these guys, you need a whole lot of well-struck balls in play to get down for hits, *right in a row*. That’s just not happening, and while that sounds like I’m kind of diminishing their own agency in their success, I don’t mean it that way. These guys are absolutely dominant on the things they can control, and thus giving up a few line drives each day simply isn’t a big deal.
But what about home runs? How can you give up hard contact and NOT give up home runs? Here once more we need to talk about the ball. As Joe Sheehan’s been banging on about, something weird happened in August, generally a month with a lot of home runs due to warm temperatures. The game was following its normal seasonal shifts perfectly through June: April’s SLG% was .362 with an awful ISO of .137, rising to .410 and .167, respectively, in June. Okay, rough start, but looking more normal. But then, a reversal: .400 and .155 in July. In August, the decline accelerated:: .393 and .148. August’s cumulative batting line is now lower than the season’s cumulative line. That makes…no sense whatsoever. That flies in the face of physics, or at least it would if the ball used was the same throughout. But recent history suggests we can’t assume that.
So baseball’s got a new, less-juiced ball, and they’ve put in new restrictions on the number of roster spots that can go to pitchers. All of this led starters to pitch *more* innings in August. Fewer pitching changes, fewer strikeouts, quicker games, and more scoring through balls in play seemed to be the desired goal, and MLB saw all of those things happen…except the last one. Strikeout rate is down, and was down in August. Fewer HRs also leads to fewer walks. But the runs aren’t showing up, as we’ve seen from watching the M’s pitching staff cut through the AL Central like a hot knife through butter.
All of this has hurt the M’s *offense* too. They’re batting .222/.303/.394 in the past 30 days, but they’ve done something pretty well. They’re tied for 4th with the Dodgers in the most HRs hit in the past 30 days. They can’t string together a bunch of base hits any better than the suckers trying to do it against the M’s pitchers, but they HAVE been better at taking the rare meatball they see deep. That’s been incredibly helpful in allowing them to score enough runs for their dominant bullpen to take over. The M’s just need to keep games close right now, and while they’re never going to blow teams out with their line-up alone, they’re scoring enough to win. It’s great to see a good team fire on all, or almost all, cylinders.
Speaking of the Guardians’ similarly good pitching staff: it’s banged up. Today’s named starter, Zach Plesac, is out after breaking a finger punching the T-Mobile mound after yielding a HR in his last start. Newcomer Cody Morris will make his MLB debut today. And Aaron Civale just went on the 15-day IL with a forearm issue this afternoon, too. It’ll be a series with some young pitching prospects – not exactly what Cleveland wanted in the stretch run of their quest for the AL Central title.
1: Julioooo, CF
2: France, 1B
3: Haniger, RF
4: Suarez, 3B
5: Winker, LF
6: Santana, DH
7: Frazier, 2B
8: Raleigh, C
9: Crawford, SS
SP: Castillo