See the NLDS Game One preview for Atlanta.

The naysayers who insist that a 5-11, 170 lb pitcher won’t last in the MLB have been waiting for Tim Lincecum to regress since 2008. But after winning back-to-back NL Cy Young Awards with back-to-back sub-3.00 FIP seasons, it’s hard for even a young superstar to keep up that level of production without the rest of baseball adjusting. Still, to say that Tim Lincecum fell back to earth this season is like saying that Princeton dropped behind Harvard in the 2011 U.S. News rankings. Of the pitchers in the playoffs, only Roy Halladay and Francisco Liriano (along with Adam Wainwright and Josh Johnson) have a better xFIP than Lincecum (3.15). Considering that Lincecum actually has a higher ERA than his teammates Matt Cain and Jonathan Sanchez, the Giants look very good running their big three starters out there against the Braves.

Lincecum had an up-and-down season down the stretch, leaving a winless August behind when batters hit .311/.389/.519 off of him. However, Lincecum turned things around in time for tonight’s game with 5 wins and a 1.94 ERA in September. It may seem that he has been a bit more hittable this season, but he’s still baffling hitters with a nasty changeup on a start-by-start basis. Take a look at his changeups this season, showing where his swinging strikes and balls put in play are located:

He uses his changeup 16.5% of the time against RHH and 25.8% of the time against LHH. Both whiff at a high rate, with 25.4% of RHH and 27.7% of LHH whiffing on his changeup this season. What’s interesting to note and adds clarity to the term ‘filthy stuff,’ Lincecum’s changeup induces swinging strikes both in the strikezone and low and out of the zone. Hitters whiff both by missing in the zone and by chasing balls.

While the Giants look to be in good hands with Lincecum facing a Braves’ lineup that doesn’t have a single standout power hitter, the Giants’ lineup, also underwhelming power-wise, looks to remain patient and draw walks against Derek Lowe. In two starts against Lowe this season, the Giants drew 8 walks in 11.1 innings, good for an OBP of .362 against him. But the orange and blackmen (black and orangemen?) slugged .308 in those two starts and would need to do major overhaul if they want to be successful against Lowe tonight. For the season, the Giants’ offense was average or below average in hitting pre All-Star (.261/.326/.406), but slumped further post All-Star (.253/.315/.411). When it comes to monthly splits, San Francisco hopes to continue one trend and improve another. Their home run rate increased from 2.8% to 4.1% between August and September/October, but their team OBP decreased from .326 to .295.

Viewers will be intrigued by both teams’ budding rookie stars, Buster Posey of the Giants and Jason Heyward of the Braves. While Heyward hit much better in the second half of the season, Posey has regressed somewhat after hitting a ridiculous .417/.466/.699 in July. Still, of any of the Giants’ batters, look to the rookie to unleash the bat and make the big play.

San Francisco’s bullpen — now this is where the team really shines — is led by closer Brian Wilson, Sergio Romo, and Santiago Casilla. The bullpen had a 2.99 ERA for the season (second in the MLB) while preventing 76% of inherited runners from scoring. Brian Wilson achieved a ridiculous 2.19 FIP, and the big three have only allowed 11 HRs in a combined 192 IP. Lincecum can go deep into the game averaging over 6 innings per start, but the Braves may not find any relief once the Giants get to their deep bullpen.

As it stands, Lincecum is heavily favored to win this game, but if Lowe continues to stifle the Giants’ power hitting, their pitching will have to be near perfect in order to win. But more often than not, great regular season pitching becomes brilliant playoff pitching. And Lincecum’s changeup and the Giants’ bullpen depth may win this one all by themselves.

A look at the pitch selection and pitch outcomes of ALDS Game Two starters. See ALDS Game One starters and NLDS Game One starters.

TEX: C.J. Wilson, LHP: 7.50 K/9, 4.10 BB/9, 0.44 HR/9, 3.35 ERA, 3.56 FIP

The left-handed C.J. Wilson throws a low-90s four-seamer and two-seamer (combined 49.2%), a high-80s cutter (18.6%), a low-80s slider (12.1%), a low-80s changeup (11.7%), and a mid-70s curveball (8.5%). This is how the classification comes out, but reports say that Wilson claims to throw the gyroball, which in reality is probably a hybrid of some of the more common pitch types. His breaking balls move toward right-handed batters, while his two-seam fastball breaks toward left-handed batters sharply. As a result, Wilson uses his two-seamer much more frequently against LHH (44.8%) than against RHH (20.9%). The changeup is utilized more against RHH (14.5%) than LHH (3.4%).

LHH struggle mightily against Wilson, and part of that has to do with not being able to put the ball in play and whiffing. The slider and cutter are his most effective pitches at getting whiffs. The two-seamer induces groundballs when put into play (52.0% for RHH and 66.1% for LHH), while the cutter results in pop-ups when thrown to LHH (16.7% of pop-ups put in play). Finally, Wilson finds himself behind in the count (31.3% of pitches) more often than ahead in the count (25.6% of pitches).

TB: James Shields, RHP: 8.28 K/9, 2.26 BB/9, 1.50 HR/9, 5.18 ERA, 4.24 FIP

The right-handed James Shields throws a low-90s four-seam fastball and a high-80s two-seam fastball (combined 46.1%), a low-80s changeup (24.9%), a mid-80s cutter (15.5%), and a high-70s curveball (13.5%). His curveballs move down and toward left-handed hitters, while his fastballs and changeups have slight movement to right-handed hitters. His changeup is excellent at getting swinging strikes (27.1% of RHH and 17.4% of LHH), a pitch that RHH especially like to chase at.

A notable split is that his curveball is put in play by RHH (19.5%) more than LHH (13.5%). RHH hit line drives off 29.4% of curveballs put in play (31.4% for LHH), while they hit groundballs off 61.5% of changeups put in play (46.1% for LHH). Finally, Shields finds himself ahead in the count (28.8%) slightly more than he does behind in the count (26.5%).

NYY: Andy Pettitte, LHP: 7.05 K/9, 2.86 BB/9, 0.91 HR/9, 3.28 ERA, 3.85 FIP

The left-handed Andy Pettitte throws a low-90s four-seamer and a high-80s two-seamer (combined 57.0%), a mid-80s cutter (20.4%), a mid-70s curveball (15.4%), and a low-80s changeup (7.2%). His curveball has horizontal movement toward RHH, but is more of a 12-6 curveball, while his two-seamer and changeup can move horizontally in the other direction. Pettitte uses his standard fastballs the same way against both RHH and LHH, but uses far more changeups against RHH (9.6% vs. never) and more cutters against LHH (31.7% vs. 16.6%).

In terms of plate discipline, batters whiff the most on Pettitte’s cutters, especially LHH (whiff on 29.9% of cutters, 17.3% for RHH), which explains the cutter usage split. The changeup is usually a pitch that gets swinging strikes, but RHH put Pettitte’s changeup in play (26.6%) far more than they whiff (9.8%), suggesting that his changeup has not been particularly useful or is more of a setup pitch. When looking at the batted ball splits, curveballs stand out as they induce pop-ups frequently (20.7% of curveballs put in play for RHH, thrown rarely against LHH). The two-seam fastball also induces groundballs. Finally, same as Shields, Pettitte is ahead in the count (28.7% of pitches) slightly more often than behind in the count (26.9%).

MIN: Carl Pavano, RHP: 4.76 K/9, 1.51 BB/9, 0.98 HR/9, 3.75 ERA, 4.02 FIP

The right-handed Carl Pavano throws a low-90s sinker and four-seamer (combined 57.1%), a low-80s changeup (21.9%), and a mid-80s slider (20.5%). His sinker is his most used pitch of all, which breaks sharply toward right-handed batters. Pavano doesn’t own a pitch that has huge break in the other direction, nor does his slider have particularly large vertical movement.

Still, Pavano has enjoyed success this season, a lot of it due to his mix of sinkers and changeups. His changeup gets 15.7% of RHH and 16.1% of LHH to whiff, while his sinker is used to pitch to contact (28.4% of RHH and 24.1% of LHH put sinkers into play). 57.1% of sinkers put in play are groundballs for RHH (45.2% for LHH). But his changeup induces even more groundballs (59.2% for RHH, 66.7% for LHH). Not only does his changeup induce the most whiffs of any pitch, but when put in play, they are more often groundballs than any other batted ball type. Finally, the key to Pavano’s revived success this season, he has steered clear away from being behind in the count (22.5% of pitches), finding himself with an advantage ahead in the count (32.5%) much more often.

Dave Allen and I broke down the best arms for each team in the playoffs over at ESPN Insider. You can see Dave’s article on the AL aces here and mine on the NL aces here.

TEX: Cliff Lee, LHP

The left-handed Cliff Lee throws a low-90s four-seam fastball and a two-seam fastball (combined 63.6%), a high-80s cutter (19.8%), a mid-80s circle changeup (9.4%), and a mid-70s knuckle curve (5.6%). His curveball has huge downward vertical movement and also moves horizontally toward RHH. The more frequently-used two-seam fastball moves in the other direction toward LHH and away from RHH, as does his changeup. Lee uses his two-seam fastball a lot more often against RHH (46.5%) than against LHH (26.5%). He also uses his changeup much more against RHH (11.9% vs. 2.6%) and his four-seam fastball more against LHH (39.5% vs. 14.7%). RHH whiff on Lee’s changeups (16.9%) and curveballs (17.8%) the most, while LHH are surprisingly more disciplined (Swing% of 48.2% by LHH vs. Swing% of 52.0% by RHH). Of all of his pitches, Lee’s curveball induces the most groundballs from RHH (72.2% of balls put in play being groundballs). Finally, Lee has extremely good control at working the count, where he’s ahead in the count 36.1% of all pitches and behind the count only 18.8% of all pitches.

TB: David Price, LHP

The left-handed David Price throws a high-90s four-seam fastball and a low-90s two-seam fastball (combined 74.0%), a high-70s curveball (15.6%), a mid-80s changeup (5.5%), and a mid-80s slider (4.9%). His curveball has more vertical than horizontal movement, which breaks in the direction of RHH. His fastballs go in the opposite horizontal direction toward LHH. Price uses his two-seamer more frequently against RHH and his four-seamer and slider more against LHH. RHH whiff 12.5% of the time against his four-seam fastball and 11.3% of the time against his slider, while LHH whiff 11.1% of the time against his two-seamer. He gets groundballs off RHH through his curveball (65.0%) and off LHH through his four-seamer and slider (53.0% and 64.3%, respectively). Finally, Price also finds himself ahead in the count (31.5%) more often than behind in the count (24.9%).

NYY: CC Sabathia, LHP

The left-handed CC Sabathia throws less pitches than the other Game One starters, throwing a low-90s sinking fastball (61.5%), a low-80s slider (21.5%), and a mid-80s changeup (17.0%). His slider has more horizontal movement than vertical movement, but his changeup might be his best pitch, combining sharp movement with sharp change in speed. Sabathia uses his slider more against LHH and uses his changeup only against RHH, who whiff 16.4% of the time. For LHH, they whiff most often against his slider (18.5%), while the sinker is put in play the most. RHH hit flyballs off Sabathia (26.3%) more than LHH (20.1%), while LHH dominate the groundball percentages (56.1% for LHH vs. 49.8% for RHH). Finally, Sabathia finds himself behind in the count (28.1%) and ahead in the count (27.3%) in about the same number of pitches.

MIN: Francisco Liriano, LHP

The left-handed Francisco Liriano also throws three primary pitches, a mid-90s fastball (48.6%), a mid-80s slider (33.8%), and a mid-80s changeup (17.6%). His slider has a little bit of movement toward RHH, while his fastball and changeup move sharply toward LHH. Liriano’s slider has regained its former nastiness, and has caused 22.3% of RHH and 21.7% of LHH to whiff this season. His fastball is put in play the most by both hitters, but LHH in particular hit groundballs off his fastball (74.2%). RHH hit groundballs off his changeup (61.1%). Finally, like Sabathia, Liriano generally sees behind-in-the-count pitches (26.2%) the same number of times as ahead-in-the-count pitches (28.4%).

Dave Allen and I broke down the best arms for each team in the playoffs over at ESPN Insider. You can see Dave’s article on the AL aces here and mine on the NL aces here.

CIN: Edinson Volquez, RHP

The right-handed Edinson Volquez throws a mid-90s fastball and a mid-90s sinker (combined 56.7%), a low-80s changeup (22.8%), and a high-70s curveball (19.1%). His sinker breaks horizontally unlike the traditional sinker, while his curveball sinks both vertically and toward left-handed batters. Volquez uses his changeup more often against LHH, while utilizing his curveball and sinker against RHH. His changeup is his best pitch at getting swinging strikes, with RHH whiffing 29.6% and LHH whiffing 22.0% of the time against. He pitches to contact with his sinker, the pitch that is put into play the most (26.7% for RHH, 17.8% for LHH). It’s actually his curveball that has the highest groundball percentage, while the sinker induces both flyballs and groundballs. Finally, Volquez’s pitches are behind in the count (31.6%) more often than ahead in the count (25.5%).

PHI: Roy Halladay, RHP

The right-handed Roy Halladay throws a mid-90s four-seam fastball and a low-90s sinking two-seam fastball (combined 37.4%), a low-90s cutter (34.2%), a high-70s curveball (16.9%), and more recently, a mid-80s changeup (11.5%). His curveball has more horizontal movement than vertical movement, but is able to break towards LHH and away from RHH, while his other pitches can go in the other direction, especially the two-seam sinker. Halladay has improved his changeup, increasing the use of it this season (from 4.6% to 11.5%). He uses the cutter and changeup more against LHH, while utilizing the sinker and curveball more against RHH. He gets the most swinging strikes from his changeup (22.4% for RHH and 17.9% for LHH) and curveball (25.6% from RHH and 13.1% from LHH) than all the other pitches. If batters want to put the ball in play, they should look at swinging at the four-seamer, two-seamer, or even cutter instead of the changeup and curveball. The sinker, however, induces the most groundballs, but LHH hit a lot of groundballs off the cutter as well. Finally, Halladay controls the count very well, finding himself ahead of the count 32.2% of the time compared to behind in the count at 22.0% of the time.

ATL: Derek Lowe, RHP

The right-handed Derek Lowe throws a high-80s sinker (60.5%), a low-80s slider (16.1%), a mid-80s changeup (15.5%), and a mid-80s cutter (4.5%). His famous sinker has sharp break, and gets both horizontal and vertical movement from his slider. Lowe uses his changeup more often against LHH while increasing the use of his primary pitch, the sinker, against RHH. RHH are much more susceptible to whiff on Lowe’s sinker (22.8%) than LHH are (3.2%), but both hitters will hit a groundball on 60% of sinkers put in play. Finally, Lowe is behind in the count (31.5% of pitches) more often than ahead in the count (23.7% of pitches).

SF: Tim Lincecum, RHP

The right-handed Tim Lincecum throws a low-90s two-seam fastball more often than his four-seam fastball (54.6%) and also throws a nasty mid-80s changeup (23.0%), a high-70s curveball (13.9%), and a mid-80s slider (8.5%). His changeup is clearly his deadliest pitch, which has movement in addition to its sharp decrease in speed. His curveball has sharp vertical drop, while his fastballs seem to ‘rise’ more than the average fastball. Lincecum mixes his changeup more often against LHH, using it 26.4% of the time compared to 16.6% against RHH. He uses his curveball and slider more often against RHH. But Lincecum gets batters to swing and miss the most by far with his changeup (24.9% for RHH, 27.8% for LHH). LHH whiff on his slider as well, but also put the ball in play. The changeup induces pop-ups quite a bit against RHH (10.8% of changeups put in play), while his slider gets groundballs (53.8% against RHH, 63.6% against LHH). Finally, Lincecum sees himself behind in the count and ahead in the count roughly the same number of pitches (29.3% and 28.6%, respectively).

Mat Latos pitched what was the Padres’ last game of the season yesterday, losing to the Giants in a game that, had the Padres won, would have forced a one game playoff against San Francisco. A triple by opposing pitcher Jonathan Sanchez led to a two-run 3rd inning, which proved to be enough to advance the Giants to the playoffs, leaving the Padres at home. For most baseball fans, the potential of a three-way tie for two playoff spots was what they were waiting for. Despite struggling in September, Latos was the best option in the Padres’ relatively unheralded starting rotation to force the crazy one-game playoff(s) scenario. Before we head into the postseason, I would like to profile just how spectacular Latos has been this season.

Latos was somewhat of a surprise young breakout pitcher, having struggled to locate the strikezone when he was first called up last season. Everyone in the National League knows his name now, as he has averaged 9.32 K/9 this season. Latos throws four distinct pitches: a mid-90s fastball, a mid-80s slider, a mid-80s changeup, and a high-70s curveball. He throws his fastball 60.1% of the time, but it’s his second most used pitch, the slider, that has been the key to his success this season, which he uses 22.8% of the time.

Of his four pitches, Latos uses the fastball, slider, and changeup the most. Let’s take a look first at his fastballs, how he locates them, where he induces swinging strikes, and where the ball is put in play:

The right-handed pitcher locates his fastball up and away to both RHH and LHH, going low and outside to LHH sometimes as well. Latos is able to get RHH to whiff more on his fastball than he is to LHH, who put the ball in play slightly more than RHH. Many of Latos’ swinging strikes are in the strike zone, but he’s able to get quite a few of them up and out of the zone. Let’s look at Latos’ slider, his second-most used pitch:

In the graphs above, we can see that Latos loves to throw the low and away slider to right-handed hitters and the low and out of the zone slider to left-handed hitters. His slider is effective against both hitters, getting 18.6% of right-handed hitters and 17.8% of left-handed hitters to whiff, as noted by the numerous red points in both graphs. Latos rarely throws an inside slider to right-handed hitters, but throws to all parts of the strike zone against left-handed hitters. What is apparent throughout all parts of the strikezone is that Latos throws sliders that are closer to the glove side to RHH than he does to LHH, whether it’s in the strikezone or low and out of the zone. Finally, let’s look at Latos’ changeup:

Latos’ changeup gets 18.2% of right-handed hitters and 12.8% of left-handed hitters to swing and miss. It’s interesting to note that Latos uses the changeup more against LHH (15.3% of all pitches) than he does against RHH (7.9% of all pitches) even though LHH put changeups in play slightly more (22.0%) than RHH do (19.1%) while whiffing less. My first thought was that maybe Latos throws the breaking ball more to LHH because he might pitch to contact in some situations. Looking at his batted ball splits by pitch type, a changeup put in play has similar batted ball outcomes for both batters, except that LHH will pop up the ball 10.6% of changeups put in play (4.55% for RHH).

The underlying reasons behind Latos’ changeup use are probably not obvious, and since he uses the pitch only 10% of the time, not much damage is done in the grand scheme of things. Perhaps the pitch outcomes and batted ball results indicate that Latos should use his changeup less against LHH, but the size of the sample precludes the necessity of a change in approach. According to Latos’ pitch type values, all of his pitches have contributed to above average run values anyway, his slider being the most valuable.

With 54 home runs in all, Jose Bautista has hit at least 11 home runs in May, July, August, and September. He is crushing fastballs in particular, with 2.63 fastball runs above average according to his pitch type values. He is doing a lot of damage against sliders and curveballs as well, both of which pitches he was below average at hitting in previous years. Say what you want about Bautista’s sudden power surge this season as he’s on his way to age 30, but his spectacular increase in wSL/C and wCB/C tells me that he has learned how to hit breaking balls better this season, which at least contributes to the increase in power in some form.

But how have pitchers responded to Bautista as the season went on? Let’s first take a look at a few of Bautista’s plate discipline and pitch outcome statistics broken down by month in 2010. (Edit: Note that I am using MLBAM data, so the following season stats are estimated differently from the ones on Bautista’s FanGraphs page, which are from BIS data.):

Since this is broken down by month, we’ll have to remember that the sample size is small, so don’t take these numbers too literally. Still, July may very well have been Bautista’s best month because of these stats. He made contact on 37.1% of all pitches, the most for any month in 2010, partly due to swinging the bat the highest percentage of the time as well. He was able to put the ball in play 20% of the time and rarely whiffed. He batted an MVP-like .347/.418/.765 in July compared to a .262/.381/.625 for the season. In the next table, let’s take a look at how pitchers have adjusted by the month in the location of their pitches, broken down by pitch type as well:

The first column shows first strike percentage by month, which has been up and down through out the the season. These don’t correlate directly with his slugging percentage though, especially when you compare April with July. However, Zone% decreased from 55.8% in April to 49.7% in August. Pitchers are throwing many fewer fastballs in the zone, in particular in September, compared to earlier in the season. Some of the other pitch types have decreased in Zone% but increased again later in the season, so I am not sure what is going here. Again, sample size is probably an issue, as Bautista has not seen more than 100 pitches of each non-fastball pitch type in any given month.

Still, it’s telling that the F-Strike% and Zone% of all pitches in September is much lower than it was in April.

The San Francisco Giants have one last game before they face their NL division rival San Diego Padres in one last three-game battle before the NL West division crown is decided (cross your fingers for a 163rd game). At this point in the season, with three or four games left on the schedule for most teams, a 2.0 game lead is an unsafe lead or a sizable mountain to climb depending on which team you are rooting for. For San Francisco, Giants fans look at this afternoon’s matchup with the Arizona Diamondbacks as a must-win if they want to put away the Padres for good. If the Giants win today and the Padres lose, San Diego will have to sweep San Francisco at AT&T Park this weekend in order to force a one-game playoff.

This afternoon’s start by the left-handed rookie Madison Bumgarner may be the most important game of the season for the Giants, at least up to this point. A young pitcher (legally allowed to drink less than two months ago) being handed the reins to a pivotal game, Bumgarner has put together quite a fine season, with a 6.71 K/9, 2.12 BB/9, 3.06 ERA, and 3.77 FIP. Bumgarner is looking for his first career win at home today, all six wins being on the road this season.

When Bumgarner was taken 10th overall in the 2007 draft, he apparently only had a plus fastball and little else. Since then, he’s quickly developed two breaking balls and a changeup, putting himself on the fast track to the Major Leagues. According to his pitch type values, Bumgarner’s most effective pitches this season have been his changeup (wCH/C of 2.88 changeup runs per 100 pitches) and his curveball (wCB/C of 1.60 curveball runs per 100 pitches).

Let’s take a deeper look at all four of his pitches and how he has fared against batters this season, looking at both swinging strikes and balls put in play. First up, let’s look at Bumgarner’s fastballs:

You’ll have to click the image to get a closer look. I’ve added the number of pitches Bumgarner has thrown for each pitch type so you can get an idea of the sample size. Bumgarner throws a 91 MPH fastball, and it looks like his fastball gets a decent number of swinging strikes. When Bumgarner throws fastballs to LHH, he goes outside a bit more, rarely throwing inside, while fastballs against RHH go down the middle of the plate. A lot of these fastballs are put in play, which may add to the fact that Bumgarner’s fastball run value is not as high as his breaking ball pitches. Let’s take a look at Bumgarner’s sliders:

Bumgarner has an 85 MPH slider with good horizontal and vertical movement. Looking at where he throws the slider, they seem pretty uniform between RHH and LHH, although it looks like he goes low and inside to RHH quite a bit, which has allowed him to get swinging strikes. Bumgarner faces much less LHH, so it’s hard to tell who whiffs more on his sliders because of the sample size. Let’s look at the curveballs:

Now this looks interesting, although a note of caution should be posted right away when looking at the sample sizes. Still, it’s interesting that Bumgarner locates his 75 MPH curveball all over the strikezone and out of the zone much more against LHH, inducing swinging strikes mostly on low and outside curveballs to LHH. Against RHH, he tends to keep the curveball over the plate or on the outside (which has more horizontal movement than it does vertical movement), sometimes going down below the zone where he’s gotten a few swinging strikes. Finally, let’s look at Bumgarner’s changeup, which has been his best pitch this season in terms of run value:

This L-R usage split is key. Bumgarner has only thrown 23 changeups against LHH all season, but has thrown almost six times as many against RHH. Granted, left-handed pitchers tend to face lineups filled with right-handed batters far more than left-handed, but it’s still quite a wide split. He has gotten quite a few swinging strikes against RHH and locates his 83 MPH changeup down and away, sometimes out of the zone on the outside to RHH or below the zone.

Against the Arizona Diamondbacks tonight, Bumgarner will face a few left-handed batters in Stephen Drew, Kelly Johnson, and Adam LaRoche. Look for Bumgarner’s curveballs against these batters, while the rest of the lineup will likely see his changeup once or twice as his punch-out pitch throughout the game.

Back in June, Tom Verducci ran an article on how Robinson Cano’s improved plate discipline has developed him into a star this season, citing that one of the goals Yankees hitting coach Kevin Long assigned Cano was not to swing on the first pitch. He also mentioned that 35-45 walks was a goal for Cano this season, with a focus on waiting for better pitches to hit and crushing them for extra bases. Identifying what is a ball and what is a strike, then putting damage on the pitch is something that Cano wanted to achieve this season.

Now that September is coming to a close, we can investigate how Cano has been able to achieve Long’s goals for him. In 2009, Cano saw first pitch strikes 62.8% of the time, but this season that number has fallen to 58.8%, suggesting that Cano is not swinging on the first pitch as much. Cano has smashed his career high in walk rate, which is at 8.2% compared to last season’s 4.5%, while he has eclipsed his walk target with 55 walks this season. All of this has resulted in a .318/.378/.530 line, MVP-like numbers and a huge improvement from .271/.305/.410 in 2008.

However, if we dig deeper into Cano’s plate discipline numbers, the adjustments made may not be so obvious. Cano is actually swinging more this season (52.2%) compared to last season (51.6%) despite seeing pitches in the strikezone much less (43.0% this season compared to 49.6% last season). Add this to the fact that he is swinging at more pitches in the zone (Z-Swing% from 72.6% to 73.7%) but also many more pitches outside of the zone (O-Swing% from 30.9% to 35.9%). It is no wonder then that his SwStr% increased from 4.7% to 6.8% of pitches while his strikeout rate increased from 9.9% to 12.5% of at-bats.

Take a look at Cano’s contact percentage off fastballs in 2009 vs. this season in 2010:

If there is one thing about Cano’s hitting that has declined this season, it has to be hitting the fastball. Cano is making much less contact against RHP fastballs this year compared to last, but that is mostly due to the fact that he is swinging less at them (compare Swing% in 2009 with Swing% in 2010). We can’t say for certain that Cano should be swinging at more RHP fastballs, because keeping the bat on the shoulder for a fastball might allow him to sit and wait for a better pitch to hit. However, Cano is definitely swinging a lot more at LHP fastballs this season (again, refer to 2009 vs. 2010 for Swing%), and the left-handed hitter is whiffing on LHP fastballs down and inside, but making solid contact on high LHP fastballs in the zone as well. Not surprisingly, Cano is not gaining run value off fastballs like he used to, with a wFB/C of 1.58 fastball runs above average last season compared to a wFB/C of 1.06 fastball runs above average this season.

But what Cano has lost in offensive value by sitting on RHP fastballs more and swinging at (and missing more) LHP fastballs, he has gained far more in every other pitch type. His pitch type values have increased for sliders, cutters, curveballs, and changeups as a tradeoff from the drop in fastball value. He sees the fastball on roughly 60% of all pitches, but has gained far more value in the 40% of the other pitch types. Most notably is how he has improved drastically against sliders, going from a wSL/C of 1.48 slider runs above average last season to a whopping wSL/C of 4.52 slider runs above average this season. Take a look at how he makes contact off sliders last season compared to this season:

What you see here is a young hitter maturing against chasing the up and inside slider from RHP, while he is making more and more solid contact against sliders that reach the middle of the strikezone against both RHP and LHP. Look at his Swing% against sliders in 2009 vs. that of 2010, and you can make the inference that Cano has adjusted against the slider greatly this season in order to attain the increase in offensive value.

As a result, Cano has become arguably the best slider hitter in the game in terms of wSL/C. Which leads me back to Cano’s increased walk rate. Cano is walking and striking out more partly due to the fact that he goes deeper into an at-bat, averaging 3.48 pitches per PA this season as opposed to 3.40 pitches per PA last season. This may not sound like a lot, but getting deeper into the count has allowed Cano to see more two ball and three ball counts. Just 22% of pitches last season were with two or three balls in the count, a number that has slightly increased to 24% this season.

To summarize the analysis above, Cano has changed his approach to at-bats this season by waiting for better pitches to hit, increasing his pitches per PA and walk rate. But he has actually swung more, despite pitchers pitching around him more often than not, causing him to increase his strikeout rate. Cano is still a beast against fastballs, just not as much as last season. But what he loses by sitting on RHP fastballs and swinging more at LHP fastballs (trying to make solid contact but whiffing against fastballs out of the zone at other times), he gains on every other pitch type, especially sliders. He is much more disciplined against sliders now, and I believe it all has to do with getting deeper into the count and diversifying his swinging tendencies by pitch type.

Matt Cain effectively eliminated the Rockies from playoff contention yesterday afternon, pitching a no-hitter into the 8th inning and finishing all nine innings allowing two earned runs with eight strikeouts and one walk. Cain has been able to keep the HR/FB ratio down from 8.4% last season to 6.4% this season, reducing his HR/9 from 0.91 to 0.77. Dropping to 7.06 K/9 from 8.45 K/9 in his first full season (back in 2006) may be a concern, but overall, Matt Cain is enjoying the best season of his career in terms of FIP, with a career low mark of 3.54. Yesterday, Cain was able to induce 13 swinging strikes using all four of his pitches: four-seam fastball, slider, curveball, and changeup.

A pitcher with a variety of pitch types like Matt Cain will mix them based on the count and the batter’s handedness. What would be interesting to investigate is how Cain uses his fastball, silder, curveball, and changeup based on the count. First, let’s look at how many pitches Cain has thrown for each count this season:

All effective pitchers will avoid the three ball count as much as possible, and Cain has thrown 38 3-0 pitches all season in 210.1 IP. Next, let’s look at Cain’s pitch selection by count by first looking at how often he throws the four-seam fastball by count, while referring to the sample size from the above table to keep ourselves honest:

Obviously, Cain uses his fastball most frequently, but notice how he uses the fastball more when there are more balls in the count. In these situations, Cain would want to throw a strike, so using a pitch that he has more control over makes sense. On two strikes against both hitters, Cain throws the fastball about or over 50% of the time. Let’s look at Cain’s slider use by count:

Cain’s slider moves away from RHH and in on LHH. As a result, he rarely uses his slider against LHH in all counts, occasionally using it on two strikes. But against RHH, Cain utilizes the slider up to 20.5% of the time depending on the count. Let’s take a look at Cain’s curveball use:

Cain uses the curveball more often on the first pitch against LHH than against RHH, but uses the curveball as much as the slider on two strikes against RHH. It seems that, in addition to the fastball, Cain likes to use both the slider and curveball as his punch-out pitch against RHH. Finally, let’s look at Cain’s changeup use by count:

Whereas Matt Cain uses his slider against RHH often, he utilizes his changeup against LHH. This is because Cain’s changeup has different horizontal movement than his slider, moving toward RHH and away from LHH instead. Pitches that move away from the batter are harder to hit, so it makes sense that Cain distributes his slider and changeup in this way based on the batter’s handedness. It’s interesting to note that Cain rarely uses his changeup against LHH on the first pitch (12.5%), but uses it more frequently in every other count (up to 33.7% with a 1-1 count) except when there are three balls.

Cain is scheduled for one more start this season — this weekend against the San Diego Padres. The Padres and Giants are locked in a battle for first in the NL West, with the Braves battling for the NL Wild Card spot, as well. For the Padres’ lineup to be successful against Cain, the right-handed hitters could either sit on the fastball or anticipate the breaking ball with two strikes, while the left-handed hitters can expect a timely changeup deep in the at-bat.

Javier Vazquez entered the 6th inning against the Tampa Bay Rays last night by walking Ben Zobrist. What ensued afterward was horrific for Yankee fans to watch, as he proceeded to hit not one, not two, but three consecutive batters, including Desmond Jennings and Willy Aybar on consecutive pitches. Here are the characteristics of the three HBPs:

1. 67 MPH curveball to RHH
2. 91 MPH fastball to RHH
3. 73 MPH curveball to RHH

It’s just been that kind of year for Vazquez. His K/9 is down from 9.77 last year to 7.10 this year. More concerning is his current 3.67 BB/9, a career high. He has also more than doubled his home runs allowed rate and increased his FIP from 2.77 last season (.297 BABIP) to 5.34 this season (.274 BABIP). Looking at plate discipline statistics, Vazquez has a career low in Zone% this season with 45.0% (compared to 49.4% from last season). Batters are also getting more contact this season when they swing (Contact% of 81.2%) compared to last season (73.3%). Both first pitch strikes and swinging strikes are down significantly.

A look at the density plots of each of Vazquez’s pitches may tell us which pitch Vazquez has lost control of this season. Vazquez throws a fastball, slider, curveball, and changeup. Let’s take a look at Vazquez’s fastballs against both RHH and LHH in 2009 and 2010:

The red points represent fastballs from all right-handed pitchers that hit the batter that season to give an idea of where the batter stands. It appears that Vazquez is throwing many more fastballs outside of the zone this season compared to last. Both fastballs to RHH and LHH are outside the zone more often in 2010. Let’s look at Vazquez’s sliders:

Against RHH, Vazquez is throwing a lot more low and away sliders, some of them presumably in the dirt. Against LHH, Vazquez is throwing a lot more inside sliders this season than last season, coming dangerously close to hitting left-handed hitters. Let’s look at Vazquez’s curveballs:

At first glance, it looks like Vazquez is hitting the strikezone more when throwing curveballs to RHH, as well as avoiding curveballs that land a foot below the strikezone. There do seem to be more high, hanging curveballs than before against both RHH and LHH. Finally, let’s look at Vazquez’s changeups:

Vazquez is hitting the strikezone more with changeups against RHH and seems to be throwing more outside changeups to LHH. A look at Vazquez’s pitch type values shows significant decreases in values for all of his pitches. With the exception of changeups, the run value of all of Vazquez’s pitches have been below average. Still, even if Vazquez is hitting the zone more often with his changeups, his wCH/C decreased from a stellar 2.56 runs above average per 100 changeups down to 0.03 runs this season, suggesting that Vazquez’s decline has more to do than just loss of control.