Things I’ve Been ___ On
[Author’s note: I always think of more things to mention and this got out of hand pretty quickly. The final word tally is over 6500, but it all breaks down into discrete sections of 250-500 words, which are manageable. You will manage.]
One of the things I rarely see addressed is when people of repute in some field admit their own flaws and indiscretions in analysis. It’s as if the only real way to continue building our own ostensible authority is to focus on our own successes and elide anything that doesn’t cohere with that vision. For the people doing the baseball journalism or looking towards front office work as a career— perhaps for any other industry— I suppose credibility and the insistence of it are necessary. But as something of a removed observer on the subject of baseball, who prefers to do it out of interest rather than think of it as a vocation, I’m blessed with the ability to talk about happenings without stressing too much about credibility. If I’m right or wrong, since the subject is relegated to a hobby, I don’t think of it as reflecting poorly on who I am.
People wanted a mid-season review. People often want prospect lists too, but those suck because they presume steady and identifiable stratifications of talent, parity amongst teams, and comparable risk/reward factors. Even outside of prospecting, the utilities I would find for listing would comprise a small list in and of itself. So I’m more content to do a review, but with a twist: I’m not going to talk about what has happened and presume objectivity. Instead, I’m going to address, as best I am able, the areas in which I made private or public predictions as to player development and talk about where I’ve been right to this point, where wrong, and where I can give myself an incomplete grade. In some cases, I won’t talk about what interests you specifically and there isn’t a single thing about unexpected breakouts, but this is my experiment.
I know that people rely on me for some of these perspectives because I’ve been starting at this stuff for an inordinate length of time, but my judgment is by no means perfect and I have my own biases and instances where I’ve shot from the hip. I want people to recognize that when I’m saying these things, I’m giving my own perspective based on what data I have and how I do my own calculus with it. I can be wrong. I can hit on some things out of acuity and others out of happenstance, and miss out because of bad process and bad luck. I can also hope that people try to come at these quandaries with the same rigor I try to [now and then], but for now I’ll just share what I’ve found.
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Game 102, Orioles at Mariners
Hisashi Iwakuma vs. Wei-Yin Chen, 7:10pm
Iwakuma’s a soft-tossing righty who’s whittled his walk rate down each year, and has fashioned himself into an elite MLB starter. Chen’s a soft-tossing lefty who’s *also* cut his walk rate each year, but his progress has stalled, as he’s been unable to crack the 4.0 mark either in ERA or FIP (though he came really close in 2013).
Both have slightly inflated HR totals. Chen’s come because he’s a fairly extreme fly-baller. Iwakuma’s a ground-ball guy who occasionally pitches up in the zone and because he’s got an 89mph fastball. Iwakuma’s superior command and a true wipe-out pitch in his splitter separate him from just about everyone, of course, but the contrast with Chen’s kind of interesting.
I just wrote about the new M’s, so, uh, scroll down.
Line-up:
1: Jones, CF
2: Romero, RF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Hart, 1B
5: Seager, 3B
6: Montero, DH
7: Ackley, LF
8: Zunino, C
9: Taylor, SS
SP: Iwakuma
This is about as right-handed as the M’s can get – if lefties are going to beat them for the second straight year, the M’s aren’t going to leave any right-handed bats in AAA untested.
Chris Taylor, Jesus Montero to the M’s
Bob Dutton of the News Tribune reported this afternoon that the roster spot the M’s had opened up by optioning Taijuan Walker back to Tacoma will be filled by SS Chris Taylor. There’d been plenty of speculation about the job, especially after the M’s hinted that they’d go with a bat, that Jesus Montero’s hot streak might have won him another job, or that Justin Smoak’s stint in purgatory was over. They skipped over Nick Franklin as well, apparently deciding to look for flaws in a player who hasn’t seen the majors before as opposed to the known issues Smoak/Franklin present. As it turned out, the M’s didn’t have one spot, they had two. With Willie Bloomquist heading to the DL, the M’s added Montero as well.
If you need a refresher on Taylor, he was the M’s fifth-round pick in 2012 out of (where else) UVA, where he played with Danny Hultzen, John Hicks and something like 10% of the M’s minor league system. He hit .284/.383/.445 in his junior year, which is the statistical line of a 10th-round senior-sign, but Taylor’s reputation with the glove was sterling. As a glove-first college SS, I guessed the M’s were trying to save some bonus pool money – 2012 was the first year with pools, remember – but instead, the M’s signed him to an OVERslot bonus of $500,000. That seemed odd, but the M’s saw an offensive threat lurking under some bad habits and mechanics. He was assigned to Everett, and promptly put up a .900 OPS in 150-odd plate appearances. Better than the college numbers, but it was a short-season league.
The M’s pushed him to High Desert the next year, then Jackson towards the end of 2013. He began 2014 in Tacoma, despite the presence of Nick Franklin, who’d ostensibly been in contention for the starting SS gig in Seattle. With Brad Miller, their original pop-up SS prospect, Franklin and now Taylor, the M’s were suddenly rife with middle infield prospects. Let’s hear it for the M’s player development team who got far more out of Taylor (glove-only guy), Miller (messed-up swing, can’t hit advanced pitching) and Franklin (gym-rat but lacks tools; no pop) than any neutral observer thought was possible. And yet, the reason the M’s are turning to Taylor now is that Miller and Franklin have, to varying degrees, been exposed a bit in the majors. Add Dustin Ackley to the list, and it gets scarier still. The M’s are apparently incredible at developing AAA middle infielders. How can that have so little bearing on big league success?
Obviously, the fact that two or three other successful prospects at AAA have struggled in the bigs doesn’t mean Taylor’s doomed. He’s unique, and in some ways, well-suited for the M’s right now. Unlike Jesus Montero, he’s done most of his damage against righties. While we can’t project him to run reverse-splits, he’s not going to be lost against righties. But he *is* right-handed, and if they wanted to platoon him a bit or pinch hit for Miller, that would actually make some sense. The fact that they now have a back-up (or a starter, frankly) for Miller means Willie Bloomquist can move back to filling in for everyone else, and it gives the M’s bench a bit of depth. Montero makes sense too, albeit in a limited role, but his speed and lack of a position limit his usefulness to this team. Until they’re ready to pull the plug on Corey Hart, Montero can’t add much unless he’s suddenly figured something out *this* trip to Tacoma.
Defensively, Taylor’s range looks to me about equivalent, maybe a tad better, to Miller’s (and superior to Franklin’s). Taylor’s hands and accurate arm have helped him make far fewer errors in the minors, though Miller’s arm strength on plays in the SS/3B hole may have the edge on Taylor’s. Offensively, Taylor lacks Miller/Franklin’s raw power. His batspeed’s a step behind Miller’s, and his swing’s more level than Miller’s, but that doesn’t mean he’s a contact hitter. Through the system, Miller struck out less. Taylor makes up for that in two ways. First, he’s got a good eye, and his walk rate’s been steady – and good. Second, Taylor’s speed is a legitimate plus tool. It’s why his range plays up a bit, and his baserunning has been best-in-the-system good. He’s stolen 69 bases in his 2+ years in the system, and he’s stolen them at an 86% success rate. That’s propped up by his incredible 2013, when he stole 38 bases and was caught only five times, but this is a weapon Taylor has that none of his predecessors have had.
Of course, they were all (even Franklin) seen as better bats. Taylor’s lack of HR-power will limit how effective he can be, but a SS who can run and take a walk could be pretty good. He’s struggled at times this year, and his numbers are held aloft by an incredible hot streak from mid-April to mid-May. But he’s not useless at the plate. Of interest to me, he’s shown the ability to battle against top-shelf velocity, putting up some good at-bats against Noah Syndergaard, probably the PCL’s top power arm this season. He recognizes breaking balls fairly well, but the thing I’ve been most impressed with is his ability to pull his hands in and catch up to inside fastballs. This isn’t to say he’s a 60-grade bat or anything. The M’s are just trying things out, and may ultimately be showcasing him for other teams. But the whole package is a bit better than the sum of its parts, which is something that stood out about Kyle Seager when he was coming up too.
Since his demotion, Montero’s been on fire in the PCL, and he’s put up a 1.271 OPS for the month of July. As Dave mentioned the other day in that debate with Rob Neyer, there are caveats. In addition to his large platoon splits (he’s annihilating PCL lefties, while he’s just been OK-to-pretty-good against righties), he’s posting very large home/road splits. If you know anything about the PCL, you know why that’s a red flag. Outside of Tacoma, which, for the PCL, plays as a pitcher’s park, the other teams in the Pacific Division are generally all extreme hitters’ parks. Colorado Springs is Coors field, if Coors was 1,000 feet *higher* in elevation. Albuquerque may be an even better place to hit, especially after Colorado Springs humidor’d up. Reno and Las Vegas too. So to see Montero’s home OPS at just .767 is a bit concerning. The other issue that hasn’t been mentioned as much concerns Montero’s batspeed. After Syndergaard threw six consecutive fastballs down the middle and got two strikeouts on Montero in May, I started looking at the pitchers Montero’s homered off of. It’s a diverse group, and, thanks to a desert windstorm, Syndergaard’s one of them, but lefty command/control guys are over-represented. Looking back at his MLB stats, Montero’s performance on velocity better than 93 or so looked to taper off after 2012, though of course the n is so small, it’s impossible to make any definitive statements. Thankfully, if you’re still the sort who’s hopeful about Montero, he’s made a mechanical change of his own.
As Ryan Divish reported the other night, Montero’s stance is quite different – it’s more open and much more upright. This tweak – something he worked on with Tacoma hitting coach Cory Snyder – may mean nothing. It may hamper his ability to reach outside pitches, or it may make it harder to react to breaking balls. On the other hand, Montero would probably trade some contact for power. As it’s now clear that he’s not fated to add defensive value at the big league level, his hitting needs to take several steps forward. The power he was rumored to have never really made it to the majors, and even his minor league slugging percentages are more great-for-a-catcher than great. If the new swing allows him to do more damage on the pitches he catches up to, that’s probably a trade he needs to make.
Welcome, Chris Taylor. Perfunctory head-nod, Jesus Montero.
Game 101, Mets at Mariners
Taijuan Walker vs. Bartolo Colon, 12:40pm
Taijuan Walker moves up to make this start after Erasmo Ramirez was rewarded for his sterling performance last night with a bus ticket back to Tacoma. It sounds crueler than it is, but here’s to Erasmo for stepping up when he (and the bullpen) needed him.
Bartolo Colon’s late-career, and really, it’s more like post-career, resurgence is still jaw-dropping to me. No longer the pudgy fireballer who won an undeserving Cy Young, he’s now a middle-of-the-rotation workhorse and, of course, the face that launched a thousand gifs. We’ve talked about it plenty here thanks to his time with the Oakland A’s, but the Bartolo Colon of this decade pounds the zone with fastballs. That’s almost all you need to know – he doesn’t establish the fastball, the fastball’s essentially all he has. Combining his 91-92mph four-seamer and 88-90mph sinker, he throws over 80% fastballs, the most in baseball. You’d think that as his velocity declines and the word gets out after several years of this that he’d suffer for it. And sure, his ERA is uglier now than it was when he pitched in Oakland. But Oakland’s the perfect stadium for a flyballer who challenges hitters, and he’s been unlucky thus far with the Mets. Sure, his HR/FB ratio’s crept up thanks to his new park (and not getting to visit Safeco so often), but his strand rate’s down dramatically, despite no real change to his BABIP. He’s posted FIPs in the 3’s each year since 2010, and that’s where he’s at in 2014.
Tai Walker returns from the minors as promised. The team sent him down not because of injury or ineffectiveness, but because they wanted him to continue to get some starts – something he may not have been able to do with the All-Star break breaking up the big league schedule. He’s been predictably wild in his two starts this year, walking five in his last start on July 6th. He was slightly better, but not great in his two starts in AAA after that, walking a combined four (with one HBP), and striking out just two in 10 innings pitched. Still, he’s on long rest and should be sharper today (knocks on wood).
1: Chavez, RF
2: Jones, CF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Seager, 3B
5: Hart, DH
6: Morrison, 1B
7: Ackley, LF
8: Miller, SS
9: Sucre, C
SP: Walker
James Paxton made a rehab start for Tacoma in last night’s DH against Las Vegas. He gave up three runs on two HRs in the first inning, but settled down after that, going 3IP yielding 3R on 3H (2HRs), walking 1 and K’ing 4. He was opposed by fellow injured-phenom Noah Syndergaard, who was brilliant, throwing 6 1/3 shutout against the Rainiers. The R’s won the second game, though, with a great pitching performance by one-time (and future?) prospect Forrest Snow, who’s been lights out in limited duty after his suspension. Andrew Carraway starts today for the Rainiers, and Stephen Landazuri takes the hill for AA Jackson.
Podcast: 60 Games Remain
Wednesday Morning Podcast!
Jeff and I postponed the usual Monday morning recording due to scheduling and the fact that the Mariners had most of the previous week off.
Podcast with Jeff and Matthew: Direct link! || iTunes link! || RSS/XML link!
Thanks again to those that helped support the show and/or StatCorner work in general last week, and in the past, and hopefully in the future. It’s truly appreciated.
Game 100, Mets at Mariners
Erasmo Ramirez vs. Jacob deGrom, 7:10pm
Ooookay, I know there was a game thread for last night’s game, and now I don’t see it. Hopefully, this one doesn’t get eaten. I’m tapping Jacob deGrom’s FIP in Morse Code here in case nothing else works…. [edit: somehow WordPress says it “Missed schedule”. Contents now rescued.]
OK, after taking care of Jon Niese last night, the M’s face a very different challenge in rookie Jake deGrom. Niese was a lefty ground-baller, exactly the kind of pitcher that usually gives the M’s fits. deGrom’s a righty with a GB rate around 40% in his brief career. Niese’s fastball has dropped to the 88-89 range, while deGrom still rushes it up around 94-95.
deGrom wasn’t a heralded pick out of Stetson, and his odds got longer still after undergoing TJ surgery the season after the draft. His stuff looked solid in 2013, with his velocity back to his pre-surgery peak, but he got knocked around a bit in AA. That said, he made great strides this year in the PCL – the velo was there, his change-up looked much better, and he even started to get ground balls. He ran a better-than-50% GB rate for the first time, and Cashman Field in Las Vegas is a good place to be a ground-ball guy. That said, he’s still something of an enigma. He’s striking out far more big league hitters than you’d expect. That GB% spike in AAA? It’s completely gone, and he’s back to being a fly-ball guy.
In the minors and (thus far) in the majors, he’s not run much of a platoon split. A curve and change-up are good ways to limit splits, and he’s comfortable throwing both to lefties. It’s just that how he GETS to those broadly-equivalent results is very different. To right-handers, he’s the extreme-GB% guy he was in the PCL. He’s at an almost 2:1 GB/FB ratio vs. righties, but against lefties, it’s just 0.76. Righties bash his sinker and change-up into the ground like they’re Derek Lowe pitches, but lefties don’t have the same issue. It’s somewhat remarkable that he doesn’t have platoon splits given how many more fly balls lefties hit. His four-seam fastball’s been effective against both, and that’s what 95mph will do for you, but it’s still a striking difference. So, despite the lack of observed splits, this isn’t a bad match-up for a lefty-dominated M’s team…even if they’re an org that’s struggled against plus-velocity and good fastballs in general.
Erasmo Ramirez returns, with Justin Smoak heading south to Tacoma. Ramirez’s control has made some strides in his recent PCL stint, though cynics would point out that his control *in the minors* has never been in question. The issue is can he avoid the mistakes that have cost him against big league teams. This is an important start for the Nicaraguan as the M’s need to decide if he’s in the mix for the #5 spot in the rotation long term, or if he’s more valuable as a change-of-scenery trade chip. That’s certainly selling low, but he could open some eyes down the stretch. Of course, given the M’s pitching depth and injury history, it’s probably much better to keep him in the fold.
1: Chavez, RF
2: Jones, CF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Seager, 3B
5: Hart, DH
6: Morrison, 1B
7: Bloomquist, SS
8: Ackley, CF
9: Zunino, C
SP: Erasmoooo
Last night’s twitter highlight was the debate between Rob Neyer and Dave Cameron on the merits of promoting Tacoma DH Jesus Montero. As you know, Montero’s crushing PCL lefties, and Corey Hart’s not crushing much of anything. Seems easy, but as Dave points out, it’s really not. At some point, they need to figure out if Hart’s capable of helping the playoff push, but the M’s are more aware of Montero’s limitations (from my point of view, batspeed’s the big one here) than fans just checking the stats at MiLB.com. Still, it’s an interesting debate, and one Hart’s really helping to make a topical one.
And, on the off chance you missed it, here’s Ackley’s stunning, HR-robbing catch from last night’s game.
Game 99, Mets at Mariners
Roenis Elias vs. Jon Niese, 7:10pm
The M’s take a break from intra-divisional contests (and their importance for the wild card chase) to host the Mets, who are still (let me check…) mediocre. I’ll admit I don’t think about the Mets often, but I just sort of assume they’re posting a .450 winning percentage or thereabouts. They’ve won between 70 and 79 games in each of the past five seasons, and that sounds about right for 2014 too. I know the M’s haven’t exactly been the toast of baseball since 2009 and have frequently been worse than mediocre, so I’m not pointing and laughing at them – they’re just freakinshly consistent.
Lefthander Jon Niese gets the start today. Niese has been a guy with a solid control and some sink, so he’s been fairly consistent too. He doesn’t overpower anyone – his four-seamer’s been in the 91 range, and his cutter was generally around 89 – but he had decent command and his curveball gets whiffs to lefties and righties. After some HR problems in his first few years in the rotation, he put up a very good season in 2012 thanks perhaps to increased command. And he did it despite the fact that the Mets brought their outfield in for the 2012 season, and lopped eight feet off the height of the wall. He’s never managed 200 innings, however, and he missed time due to injury in 2013.
He’s just coming off the DL to make this start, in fact. Looking at his peripherals, you see warning signs everywhere. First, his velocity’s down fairly dramatically. After averaging 91+ on his four-seam fastball every year since 2010, he’s down to 89.5 this season. After averaging 30-31% o-swing rate (getting batters to swing at balls) from 2011-12, he’s at just 26% this year. As you’d expect from that, his contact rate is up over three percentage points this season. His GB% is the lowest it’s been since 2010, and his K% the lowest it’s been since 2009. Thus, it’s not exactly a shock to look at his ERA and FIP and find…wait, what? Niese’s ERA is below 3, and his FIP’s staying steady in the mid-3 range, where it dropped to in 2012-13. If you guessed BABIP, yes, that’s clearly part of the explanation. A career .310 BABIP hurler, Niese and his defenders are allowing batters to post only a .283 mark this year. His HR rate’s stayed low, too, and he’s stranded more runners than he has in the past.
Thanks to that curve ball and a solid change-up, Niese’s platoon splits are fairly ordinary. He’s a bit better against lefties, as you’d imagine, but he’s been fairly tough on righties as well. They’re smaller, over his career, than his home/road splits, actually. That sounds promising and all, but essentially all pitchers benefit from Safeco.
The Mets have been a disappointment offensively, but they’ve posted solid defensive numbers; that’s clearly a factor in Niese’s low BABIP.
The line-up:
1: Bloomquist, SS
2: Jones, CF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Seager, 3B
5: Romero, RF
6: Smoak, 1B
7: Hart, DH
8: Ackley, LF
9: Zunino, C
SP: Elias
Go M’s
Game 98, Mariners at Angels
Chris Young vs. Tyler Skaggs, 12:35pm
It certainly feels nice to steal a win in a pitcher’s duel once in a while. After Friday’s game, yesterday’s looked so predictable, and while they couldn’t score two runs for Felix, at least they got two in extras to defeat the Angels who squandered Garrett Richards’ gem.
Today the M’s face Tyler Skaggs, the Angels prospect shipped to Arizona where he shot up prospect rankings before command issues and a troubling velocity drop made him extremely hittable. After a rough go with Arizona and then an equally rough trip through the PCL in 2013, he moved back to Anaheim, who promptly made a mechanical tweak that returned much of the missing velocity. The other big change concerns his batted ball profile. He’s got a fastball with plenty of vertical rise, so it wasn’t a big surprise to see him post low GB% in the Arizona system and in his MLB call-ups. But he’s a fairly extreme GB guy this year despite not much change to his pitch movement or pitch mix. He throws a four- and two-seam fastball, with a change-up and curve. He’s toyed with a slider this year, but he’s still mostly a four-pitch guy. In the past, his curve occasionally got grounders, but everything else generated fly balls. This year, the sinker and change in particular have been much better at getting ground-ball contact.
All those worm burners have really helped his biggest problem – the home run ball. His HR/9 rate has fallen substantially this year (though of course his entire career suffers from small sample size problems), and he’s been much better against righties. He seems like the kind of guy who’d have platoon splits, but he’s faced so few lefties, there’s no way to really know. He’s running reverse splits this year, but he’s faced only 82 lefties this year, compared to over 300 righties. Pretty much impossible to make much out of that.
Robinson Cano’s out today with a sore hamstring. Hopefully it’s nothing, but Willie Bloomquist gets his second start at 2B.
1: Chavez, CF
2: Bloomquist, 2B
3: Seager, 3B
4: Romero, RF
5: Smoak, 1B
6: Hart, DH
7: Ackley, LF
8: Zunino, C
9: Miller, SS
SP: Young
I think Skaggs will see more lefties today (4) than he has in any other game. Romero’s a righty, and does better against lefties, but starting him in the clean up spot seems like the triumph of hope over experience. But hey, Go M’s. Let’s get a series win.
Game 97, Mariners at Angels
King Felix vs. Garrett Richards, 7:05pm
Happy Felix Day!
Hisashi Iwakuma’s subtle improvements have been impressive to watch, but Felix’s have been even more surprising. It’s not like you doubt someone with Felix’s talent, but regression’s supposed to apply to everyone. Felix has been so good for so long, that you naturally wonder when he’ll start to taper off. I don’t really wonder about that any more – I just wonder what he’s going to do next. Watching Felix every five days is an absolute joy.
Garrett Richards has gone from struggling swing man, to Mike Scioscia’s doghouse, to emergency starter to near-All Star. The final all-star slot for the AL came down to Fernando Rodney and Richards, with the former getting the nod. The Angels weren’t terribly happy; now we’ll get to see how Richards responds to that slight.
Line-up:
1: Jones, CF
2: Romero, RF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Seager, 3B
5: Morrison, 1B
6: Hart, DH
7: Ackley, LF
8: Miller, SS
9: Sucre, C
SP: El Cartelua
Game 96, Mariners at Angels
Hisashi Iwakuma vs. Jered Weaver, 7:05pm
Ah, the All-Star Break. I know how much fans hate the interruption, the break in the routine of the 162-game schedule, but I’ve grown to really love it. Players talk about it, adoringly, as a chance to rest from the relentless grind of games, hotels and flights. It seems strange that a few days off could do so much, but then they’re the ones who don’t get a weekend for about nine months and I’m the one who just took a several-week vacation. The reasons a humble baseball blogger loves the break, then, are different. But, as is often the case, Jeff’s already pointed it out and summed it up perfectly. For me, the break is a respite from feeling like a fraud.
We look at numbers, we analyze pitch fx and we scour minor league box scores not out of some obsessive desire to know everything, but because at the macro level, they can inform us about the future. That minor league numbers, properly translated, tell us something about MLB success has been demonstrated many, many times, but that can’t doesn’t help when looking through the list of failed M’s prospects who hit in AA/AAA. It feels good to notice platoon splits in Jeff Samardzija’s batted ball profile, but you wonder about its probative value when he induces a flurry of grounders from the M’s lefty-dominated line-up. These macro- and micro-failures happen *all the damn time* and while it’s nice to understand that one game doesn’t change the pattern, or that the pattern that accurately describe the population may not work for every individual within it, they don’t always make it feel better. You know what does, though? Schadenfreude.
Jeff mentioned that the M’s still seem to be believers in Justin Smoak’s long-term potential, even though he’s no longer a long-term piece.* That MLB vets make similar errors – sometimes even bigger ones – actually does dull the pain. Along with booze-fueled All-Star Break evenings at home. The point of all this navel-gazing and self-flagellation (navel-flagellating?) is this: how bad did MLB whiff on Hisashi Iwakuma? Billy Beane is rightfully lauded for his accomplishments, but it’s not like his record’s spotless. Still, winning the rights to Iwakuma and then not getting a deal done? How about the next year when basically any team could’ve had him, but he came to Seattle at a yearly cost of $1.5m, or just about half what Willie Bloomquist will get this year, or about what John Buck and Stefen Romero cost.
It’s easy to see why, to apply the lessons we’ve learned and say confidently that you simply don’t sign a pitcher coming off of arm soreness. You can’t really *fault* MLB for it, but it’s nice that there’s egg on the faces of people much smarter about this stuff than I am. Can Iwakuma adapt to the MLB schedule and succeed? 2013 showed conclusively that he could. How will he deal with age and its attendant velocity loss? The answer this year is, “By getting better.” 2014 is shaping up as Iwakuma’s best on a rate basis; he may not hit the innings total he put up last year, but when he’s out there, he’s been astonishing. Masahiro Tanaka’s splitter got deserved praise when he was healthy, and his stuff really was a tick better than Hisashi’s, but Iwakuma is a poor man’s Tanaka only in the most literal sense – he’s paid far less.
This year, Iwakuma’s posted an almost invisible walk rate, and he’s done it by throwing more balls.** By pitch fx, he’s thrown less than 50% of his pitches in the zone, but he’s pitched from ahead in the count far more than the league average. How? Because Iwakuma’s first strike percentage is exceptional – by Fangraphs, he’s 5th in baseball in this metric. From there, his options open up. That first strike allows him to expan the hitter’s zone, which he can do both through fastball command and through his main weapon, his elite splitter. Pitching ahead means hitters are more likely to swing at balls, and his splitter means that when they do, they’re more likely to hit grounders. This gets us to another hidden reason for Iwakuma’s success – his BABIP. As you know, pitcher BABIP varies, and tends to regress to league-wide averages. There are exceptions, of course – guys like knuckleballers, and many lefthanders seem immune, for a number of reasons. Rany Jazayerli talked about one of them in this great Grantland piece on Mark Buehrle the other day. But Iwakuma shouldn’t be an exception. He’s a righty, of course, and his BABIP success isn’t the result of getting fly outs (fly balls are converted into outs more often than grounders) like Jarrod Washburn or current Mariner Chris Young. How can a righty ground baller run a career BABIP of .268 thus far? Because hitters are putting pitcher’s pitches in play. Over a third of Iwakuma’s grounders have come on balls. Batters’ BABIP when they swing at balls is awful. Iwakuma gets ahead of hitters and then gives them the choice of swinging over the splitter or tapping it gently to Kyle Seager.
Lloyd McClendon was asked on the radio (probably Matt Pitman on the pre-game show) what made Iwakuma so effective, and the first answer he gave was fastball command. At the time, I thought the answer was clearly, *clearly* his 70-grade split and not the 50-FB, but the more you look at it, the more you see what McClendon is getting at. Batters have swung at his splitter a lot, and they don’t have a lot to show for it. They don’t WANT to swing at it, but if they’re behind in the count, they kind of have to. Iwakuma’s fastball, which he throws on around 65% of first-pitches, allows the rest of his arsenal to play up. It’s not just Iwakuma. Look at this list of the pitchers with the *lowest* zone% in baseball, and while there are the occasional control-challenged projects, it’s peppered with the best pitchers in the game. There’s Felix, Sonny Gray, Tanaka, the surprising Tyson Ross. For some of them, the key is pure stuff – Ross’s slider and Yu Darvish’s…everything allow them to get outs on balls. Tanaka/Felix/Iwakuma and Dallas Keuchel, they’re relying on getting ahead first, and then allowing batters to get themselves out.***
Hisashi Iwakuma is awesome.
1: Chavez, RF
2: Jones, CF
3: Cano, 2B
4: Seager, 3B
5: Morrison, DH
6: Smoak, 1B
7: Ackley, LF
8: Miller, SS
9: Zunino, C
SP: Iwakuma
* Justin Smoak’s contract’s up after this year. He has a team option for 2015 that’s pretty cheap, but you’d have to imagine that people above McClendon’s pay grade are looking at that $150,000 buy-out longingly. Smoak’s option would’ve become guaranteed if he had 525 PAs this season. That month-long rehab stint is going to make that all but impossible to hit.
** I mentioned this regarding James Paxton once, but here again we have data sources that disagree. I’m picking one that I think is the best and that happens to fit the argument I’m making. I hate it when people do this without owning up to it, so I’m owning up to it. You could argue that he’s throwing more strikes, as BIS and Statcorner thinks he is. All of these sources have their fans, and you could certainly argue for one over another, but just FYI, I’m going with pitch fx here. To make matters worse, I’ve used the BIS measure for first-strikes. I shouldn’t mix up the sources, but Fangraphs doesn’t have a pitch fx-based metric for that. Caution! Or hey, it’s a baseball post, yay!
*** Yet more full disclosure – Felix and Ross are running suprising BABIP numbers this year, and both have very high GB rates, but neither put up great BABIPs before, and it’s not like they’ve really changed their approach. Keuchel fits this theory *perfectly* but for the fact that his BABIP is completely average this year; I tend to think that’s because he’s pitching in front of an experiment, and not a real baseball team, but I may be making too much of the pitchers-limit-BABIP-by-letting-hitters-hit-out-of-zone-pitches thing.