In early April, an article titled “Astros Pitching Prospect Spencer Arrighetti Is All in With Analytics” ran here at FanGraphs, and given what the 24-year-old right-hander had to say, the headline was wholly accurate. In a conversation that took place during spring training, Arrighetti displayed nuanced knowledge of his pitch metrics while comfortably addressing topics like seam-shifted wake and vertical approach angle. He presented as a bona fide pitching nerd.

Four months into his rookie season — he made his major league debut with Houston on April 10 — Arrighetti is a nerd with an altered approach. The evolution of his M.O. has taken place over the course of an up-and-down campaign that currently has him on a high. Over his last two starts, the 2021 sixth-round pick out of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette has allowed just three runs while fanning 25 batters in 13 innings. On the year, he has a 5.14 ERA, a 4.18 FIP, and a 27.9% strikeout rate in 105 innings.

Arrighetti explained how and why his approach has changed when we sat down to chat at Fenway Park this past weekend. My first question elicited an expansive, five-minute response, after which we shared a handful of additional exchanges.

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David Laurila: What’s changed since we talked in spring training?

Spencer Arrighetti: “I have a much better perspective now. When we talked in Lakeland, I was speaking with three big league spring training games under my belt. This is a very different game than I thought at that time. The conversation we had, as great as it was, left out a really big piece of what successful pitching is in the modern era. Obviously, shapes and velocity are really important. Arsenal design is really important. There are people who believe those are primary, but after my time up here, I’m not convinced that chasing shapes is the way to go. Read the rest of this entry »

Thomas White is having an impressive first full professional season. Drafted 35th overall last year by the Miami Marlins out of Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, the 19-year-old left-hander has a 2.84 ERA, a 2.99 FIP, and a 29.6% strikeout rate over 76 innings between Low-A Jupiter and High-A Beloit. His late-May promotion to the higher of those two levels came for a simple reason. As our lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen explained when assigning him a 45+ in early June, White’s stuff was simply too good for the Florida State League.

I had an opportunity to talk to the promising youngster when Beloit played at West Michigan earlier this week, and one of the things I made it a point to learn about was the mindset that augments his arsenal. I began by asking him how much of a role analytics are playing in his development.

“I’m starting to learn more about the actual numbers and how all that stuff works,” White told me. “At the end of the day, I like to just go out and get outs — I’ve never been a big tech guy — but I definitely know a lot more about my pitches now that I have access to all the data. So, I’m still learning, and I want to learn, but the best measurement for me is how hitters react to them.”

The pitches that hitters are reacting to include a four-seam fastball that has been averaging, according to White, 95.6 mph and 17.5 inches of vertical ride. He is also throwing a two-seam changeup and a sweeper-slider. Currently in the works, but not yet part of his repertoire, is “a shorter gyro pitch,” either a cutter or a hard slider. Read the rest of this entry »

Austin Wells is doing more than just establishing himself as a solid everyday catcher in his first full big-league season. Thanks in part to a hot July that saw him slug five home runs and put up a .941 OPS, he’s been batting cleanup for the New York Yankees. The 25-year-old left-handed-hitting backstop isn’t exactly on his way to becoming the next Yogi Berra or Bill Dickey, but what he’s doing is notable nonetheless.

In the present-day iteration of the Bronx Bombers, slotting into the four-hole means following Juan Soto and Aaron Judge in the lineup. Is it easier or harder to hit directly behind a pair of players who are on track for the Hall of Fame? I asked Wells that question last weekend at Fenway Park.

“I think it’s easier or harder depending on the pressure you put on yourself,” replied Wells, whom the Yankees drafted 28th overall in 2020 out of the University of Arizona. “If you look at it like you’re expected to do what they’re doing, then there’s going to be a lot of pressure to perform. Being able to stay in your zone and know what you do well takes the pressure off.”

That he’s not about to match the exploits of the team’s dynamic duo is stating the obvious. Judge has 41 home runs and a 216 wRC+ in the current campaign, while comparably a mere mortal (can a superstar be a more mortal?) Soto has 27 home runs and a 187 wRC+. Wells understands that he isn’t at their level. At the same time, he’s not about to put strict limits on his long-ball potential.

“They’re going to hit 40-plus homers every single year, and that’s not never been me,” the humble-yet-confident catcher told me. “I mean, who knows? It could possibly happen, but right now my is to keep the lineup moving. That’s where I’m at right now.”

Wells’s overall numbers on the season include eight home runs, a 116 wRC+ over 253 plate appearances, and 2.5 WAR.

Eric Longenhagen is bullish on his potential. When our Yankees Top Prospects list went up in December, my colleague described a swing “beautifully connected from the ground up,” adding that the “blend of his barrel control and the natural lift in his swing gives him a potent contact and power combination.” Despite concerns about his defense — primarily his throwing arm — Longenhagen assigned Wells a 50 FV.

His work behind the plate has been more than adequate. While his throwing remains a bit below average, Wells is plus-six in Framing Runs Above Average and he has seven Defensive Runs Saved. The strides he’s made defensively are laudable.

“I believe in my ability to get better every time I catch,” said Wells. “That’s been the biggest key, just believing. It’s led me to where I’m at now, and hopefully it continues to lead me into even better catching, better numbers, and more wins.”

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RANDOM HITTER-PITCHER MATCHUPS

Bobby Richardson went 1 for 17 against Eli Grba.

Doug Gwosdz went 1 for 11 against Steve Carlton.

Mark Grudzielanek went 9 for 11 against Tim Hudson.

Doug Mientkiewicz went 7 for 11 against Bronson Arroyo.

Jarrod Saltalamacchia went 7 for 15 against Jeremy Guthrie.

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I recently talked to a pitcher who described what he considers the worst pitch he’s thrown all season, and while I haven’t yet shared his telling — stay tuned — the conversation did lead me down the same path with Tarik Skubal prior to last night’s Tigers-Royals game at Comerica Park. He cited a pitch that Hunter Renfroe stroked for a run-scoring extra-base the previous night.

“I threw a changeup that cut like crazy,” Skubal told me. “Whenever I do that, I usually throw the ball out. I didn’t throw the ball out. On the next pitch, I gave up a double down the line on a changeup that cut again. I should have thrown it out, but instead, I was like, ‘Ah, what are the odds I cut it twice in a row?’”

Skubal explained that of all his pitches, the changeup is most-impacted by a difference in baseballs. Moreover, not all baseballs are created equal. As the Tigers ace put it, “Some balls are wound a little different — the seams are a little different — so the seam effect isn’t consistent. I rely on a lot of seam effect with that pitch specifically.”

Skubal went on to say that the pitch he threw to Renfroe cut enough that it registered as a slider. In reality, it was a changeup delivered with a baseball that he normally would have thrown out — but regretfully didn’t.

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A quiz:

Fergie Jenkins has the most career wins (284) by a pitcher born in Canada. Which Canadian-born pitcher has the second-most wins? (A hint: He won a World Series ring in the current century.)

The answer can be found below.

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NEWS NOTES

A reminder that SABR’s 52nd annual convention will be held in downtown Minneapolis beginning this Wednesday and running through Saturday. Featured speakers include Bert Blyleven, Rod Carew, Tony Oliva, and Twins GM Thad Levine. More information can be found here.

Denny Lemaster, a left-handed pitcher whose MLB career spanned the 1962-1972 season, died on July 24 at age 85. LeMaster went 17-11 with the Milwaukee Braves in 1964 and later played with the Houston Astros and Montreal Expos.

Reyes Moronta, who had been pitching in the Mexican League after playing for four MLB teams from 2017-2023, died in a motor vehicle accident this past week at age 31 (per Baseball Player Passings). The Santo Domingo native made 136 of his 177 big-league appearances with the San Francisco Giants.

Jim Weber, the longtime play-by-play announcer for the Toledo Mud Hens, has died at age 78. He began calling games for Detroit’s Triple-A affiliate in 1975.

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The answer to the quiz Ryan Dempster, with 132 wins. The Sechelt, British Columbia native won a World Series with the Boston Red Sox in 2013.

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When the Seattle Mariners acquired Justin Turner at the trade deadline, they brought on board a 39-year-old veteran of 16 big-league seasons who is, for all intents and purposes, a hitting guru in uniform. Reputation-wise, he has been akin to an extra hitting coach in the later part of his career.

I asked Mariners manager Scott Servais if veterans of Turner’s ilk can positively impact young hitters when they join a new team.

“Absolutely,” said Servais. “I’ve often said that as coaches and managers you talk to players and try to lead them in a certain direction, but players are always going to listen to players more than they listen to others — and certainly to a guy that has a track record like Justin Turner has.”

Following up, I asked the ninth-year skipper if he could give an example of a player who came to one of his teams and made an especially-meaningful impact. It wasn’t a position player he named, but rather a pitcher.

“When we signed Robbie Ray [prior to the 2022 season],” said Servais. “We’re seeing the maturing of Logan Gilbert and George Kirby. A lot of what Robbie brought, those guys have taken and run with. You see it happen all over the league… It’s welcome. Players like it. I enjoy it. If you have a guy like that who carries so much respect amongst the group, it’s a way for me to funnel messaging through.”

Servais proceeded to add an entertaining caveat:

“If he agrees. If he doesn’t agree, that’s another conversation. Those have happened before too. But it is another voice.”

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FOREIGN AFFAIRS

The Kia Tigers have the KBO’s best record, at 61-42-2. The Kiwoom Heroes have the KBO’s worst record, at 45-57.

Hyun Jin Ryu is 6-6 with a 3.91 ERA in 115 innings with the Hanwha Eagles. The 37-year-old left-hander spent seven seasons with the KBO club before pitching in MLB from 2013-2023.

Mel Rojas Jr. is slashing .338/.433/.593 with 25 home runs in 480 plate appearances for the KBO’s KT Wiz. The 34-year-old former Pittsburgh Pirates and Atlanta Braves prospect last played stateside in 2017.

Jeter Downs signed with NPB’s Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks earlier this week. A first-round pick by the Cincinnati Reds in 2017 who was later part of the Mookie Betts trade between the Red Sox-Dodgers, the 26-year-old infielder was released by the Yankees on July 30.

Shugo Maki is slashing .274/.333/.482 with 16 home runs in 363 plate appearances for the Yokohama BayStars. A three-time NPB All-Star, the 26-year-old second baseman has stolen nine bases without getting caught.

The Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks have NPB’s best record, at 62-31. The Saitama Seibu Lions have NPB’s worst record, at 29-64.

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I’ve mentioned Hiroto Takahashi a handful of times this season, and for good reason: The 21-year-old Chunichi Dragons right-hander has been NPB’S most-dominant pitcher. In 13 starts, Takahashi has a record of 8-1 to go with a 0.48 ERA and 89 strikeouts in 93 innings. Moreover, he has surrendered just 58 hits, none of which have left the yard.

Wanting to know more about him, I asked one of his 2023 World Baseball Classic teammates for a snapshot scouting report.

“I haven’t faced him, but velocity-wise he throws really hard,“ Red Sox DH Masataka Yoshida told me prior to a recent game at Fenway Park. “The breaking ball is elite level, too. He’s got different [pitches] in his arsenal that can be used as a put-away pitch. He definitely has the potential to come over here in the future.”

In search of another perspective, I also checked in with my friend Jim Allen (@JballAllen).

“He’s the real deal,” the Tokyo-based baseball scribe replied via email. “He lacks the velocity that makes MLB GMs drool like they do over [Roki] Sasaki, but his secondary pitches are probably better. I don’t have his max, but my guess would be 98 mph. He sits at 95.”

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A random obscure former player snapshot:

Don Leshnock faced five batters in a scoreless inning for the Detroit Tigers against the California Angels on June 7, 1972. The southpaw from Youngstown, Ohio retired Leo Cardenas on a groundout, then sandwiched singles by Sandy Alomar Sr. and Mickey Rivers with punch-outs of Nolan Ryan and Vada Pinson. It was his only big-league game. Prior to that outing, Leshnock hurled a no-hitter while playing for the Carolina League’s Rocky Mount Leafs in 1970.

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FARM NOTES

Travis Bazzana hit his first professional home run on Wednesday as the High-A Lake County Captains lambasted the Beloit Sky Carp 17-5. The 21-year-old native of New South Wales, Australia was drafted first overall this summer by the Cleveland Guardians.

The Minnesota Twins promoted their top-rated prospect, Walker Jenkins, to High-A Cedar Rapids earlier this week. Drafted fifth overall last year out of a Southport, North Carolina high school, the 19-year-old outfielder had been slashing .273/.404/.413 with three home runs and a 139 wRC+ with the Fort Myers Mighty Mussels.

Cole Carrigg is slashing .284/.360/.472 with 10 home runs and a 133 wRC+, and has swiped 36 bases in 44 attempts, with the High-A Spokane Indians. Drafted in the second round last year out of San Diego State University, the 22-year-old infielder/outfielder is No. 25 on our Colorado Rockies Top Prospects list.

Keiverson Ramirez has a 4-1 record to go with a 0.71 ERA and a 2.39 FIP over 38 innings in the Dominican Summer League. The 18-year-old right-hander from Valencia, Venezuela was signed by the St. Louis Cardinals in January.

The Tigers won the Florida Complex League championship on Monday by defeating the Pirates 12-1. Detroit’s rookie-level affiliate was managed by Salvador Paniagua.

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My writeup of the trade deadline deal that sent a pair of New York Yankees prospects to the Chicago Cubs in exchange for Mark Leiter Jr. included reports on on the promising youngsters from Eric Longenhagen. My colleague isn’t the only source I solicited a perspective from. I also reached out to someone who has seen all of Ben Cowles’s games this season, and the majority of Jack Neely’s.

“Cowles shows confidence and comfortability at all three infield positions (other than first base),” Somerset Patriots broadcaster Steven Cusumano said of the 24-year-old infielder, who had a 140 wRC+ with the Double-A affiliate. “I wouldn’t say that he stuck out at any one over the other; he plays all three very, very well. He is as consistent a player as they come, including defensively, in spite of how much inconsistency there would be in what position he played every day. Also worth mentioning, he’s as good a baserunner as you’ll find. That quickness does show in the field from time-to-time and he has excellent baseball instincts.

“Neely profiles as a back-end reliever: big and intimidating presence with two excellent pitches,” he said of the 24-year-old right-handed reliever who had a 2.90 ERA over 31 innings with Somerset. “Fastball (94-97) and a really good slider (82-25). Huge frame physically, a lot of tenacity on the mound and one of the most confident players you’ll ever encounter.”

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I also solicited quotes for a trade that I didn’t write about. The Pittsburgh Pirates acquired Nick Yorke from the Boston Red Sox in exchange for right-hander Quinn Priester, and I asked two of the 22-year-old infield prospect’s former teammates for their thoughts on him.

“He’s a good player, man,” Boston infielder Jamie Westbrook said of Yorke, whom Eric Longehagen has assigned a 45 FV. “He’s got good bat-to-ball. He’s got some pop. He drives the ball to right field well. He plays a good second base and has also started to play the outfield this year. When I was with Yorkie for a short period of time in [Triple-A] Worcester, he had good at-bats and moved the ball around. I would hate to put a comp on him, but he’s a solid player.”

“Outside of the player he is, he is one of the best friends I’ve had in the organization,” said Red Sox infielder/outfielder Ceddanne Rafaela. “He’s’s a tremendous person. He’s always there for you as a teammate. And he’s obviously a good hitter. I’ve seen him through the years, and he’s getting better and better. Hopefully he will get the chance there to play in the major leagues.”

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LINKS YOU’LL LIKE

Over The Monster’s Maura McGurk went to a Decemberists concert and proceeded to wonder what’s next for the Red Sox now that the trade deadline has passed.

Trade acquisition Yusei Kikuchi utilized his changeup more frequently than he had in Toronto while fanning 11 batters in his Houston Astros debut. Chandler Rome has the story at The Athletic (subscription required).

The Athletic’s Zack Meisel wrote about CC Sabathia’s journey from unpolished draft pick to Cleveland Hall of Famer (subscription required).

Ron LeFlore made his major league debut with the Detroit Tigers on August 1, 1974, one year after he’d been released from Jackson State Prison, where he served a sentence for armed robbery. Adam Henig wrote about it for The Metro Times.

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RANDOM FACTS AND STATS

The Chicago White Sox have a record of 27-86 following their worst-in-franchise-history 19th straight loss last night. The 1962 New York Mets, who infamously finished 40-120, were 30-83 through 113 games.

The Milwaukee Brewers are a big-league-best 46-4 this year when outhitting their opponents. The Detroit Tigers, at 40-4, have the second-best record when outhitting their opponents.

Nine consecutive Kansas City Royals batters had hits in the seventh inning of Friday night’s 9-2 win over the Detroit Tigers. The nine straight hits tied a franchise record that had been set in a May 7, 1980 game against the Chicago White Sox.

Kansas City shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. has gone 16-for-22 in his last six games against the White Sox.

George Kirby hasn’t allowed more than three walks in any of his 79 big-league starts. The Seattle Mariners right-hander is the only pitcher in the modern era with at least 50 starts and more games started than walks allowed (56).

Max Scherzer has has 3,405 strikeouts and 112 HBPs.
Justin Verlander has 3,393 strikeouts and 113 HBPs.

In 1980, the Billy Martin-managed Oakland Athletics had five starters throw 211 or more innings and combine to throw 93 complete games. Bob Lacey, who made 46 of his 47 appearances as a reliever, threw a complete-game shutout in his lone start.

Players born on today’s date include Gabe Gabler, whose big-league career comprised three pinch-hit appearances for the Chicago Cubs in 1958. The St. Louis native fanned all three times.

Also born on today’s date was Ray Oyler, who started 70 games at shortstop for the 1968 World Series champion Detroit Tigers despite slashing just .135/.213/.186 over the course of the season. The slick-fielding, offensively-inept infielder had a sacrifice bunt in his lone Fall Classic plate appearance.

On today’s date in 1934, the New York Giants scored 11 runs in the ninth inning while routing the Philadelphia Phillies 21-4 in the second game of a Saturday double-header. Right-hander Reggie Grabowski incurred all of the damage in his lone inning of work, while Mel Ott finished 4-for-4 with two homers, a double, and six runs scored.

On August 5, 2001, the Cleveland Indians rallied from a 14-2 seventh-inning deficit to beat the Seattle Mariners 15-14. Omar Vizquel’s two-out, bases-clearing triple in the ninth tied it, while Jolbert Cabrera’s walk-off single plated Kenny Lofton in the 11th to cap the comeback.

When Dan Szymborski published his 2024 ZiPS Projections prior to Opening Day, the Kansas City Royals were penciled in for a 73-89 record and a fourth place finish in the American League Central. Coming off of a cellar-dweller season where they lost 106 games — no previous Royals team had lost more — that would have represented a clear step in the right direction.

The predicted step has materialized into a sizable stride. With two months left in the regular season, the Matt Quatraro-managed club is not only currently projected to finish with 86 wins, their postseason odds are hovering around a promising 59%, up from 13.2% at the start of the campaign. Dan hinted at that possibility in his March 27 piece. My colleague wrote that “a Royals playoff appearance would be unlikely but not unreasonably so.”

How have the Royals managed to exceed expectations? I sat down with Quatraro on the eve of the All-Star break — his team has since won nine of 13, and added Lucas Erceg, Paul DeJong, and Michael Lorenzen prior to Tuesday’s trade deadline — to get his perspective.

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David Laurila: Your team has been better than expected. Why?

Matt Quatraro: “Pitching is the name of the game. Our starting pitching has been tremendous. [Seth] Lugo, [Cole] Ragans, [Michael] Wacha, [Brady] Singer. [Alec] Marsh, as well. They’ve taken the ball. They’ve been durable. They’ve kept us in a million games. All in all, the bullpen has been pretty solid, too. There have been some ups and downs, but they’ve weathered some storms. Read the rest of this entry »

When I first wrote about him in 2017, JP Sears was a recently drafted prospect in the Seattle Mariners system who was racking up prodigious strikeout totals in the low minors. When I wrote about him for a second time four years later, he was pitching for the New York Yankees Double-A affiliate and again punching out more than his fair share of batters. Fast forward to this season, and Sears is firmly established as a member of the Oakland A’s starting rotation. The 28-year-old southpaw came to the A’s in 2022 as part of the six-player trade deadline deal that sent Frankie Montas and Lou Trivino to the Bronx, a swap that worked out better for the woebegone West Coast club than many were expecting at the time.

Sears no longer puts up sexy numbers in the K category — his strikeout rate this season is a humble 18.1% — but the overall output has been solid. His 119 1/3 innings pitched this season are the most on the team — ditto his eight wins — and his 6.5% walk rate is indicative of a strike-thrower. The 4.53 ERA and 4.60 FIP aren’t anything to write home about, but Sears is nonetheless the best starting pitcher on the A’s.

Sears, who threw seven shutout innings on Monday against the San Francisco Giants, sat down to talk about his evolution as a pitcher when the A’s visited Boston in mid-July.

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David Laurila: When we last talked, you were pitching in Double-A. Are you basically the same pitcher now, just three years later?

JP Sears: “Good question. I would say that I’m a lot different pitcher. I still use what kind of helped me get through the minor leagues, that being my fastball and the ability to locate it. But my arsenal has definitely gotten bigger. I’ve started throwing a sweeper a lot more — I really just learned that about two years ago — and I’ve also introduced the changeup as more of a pitch. In the minor leagues, I kind of just used it as a bait type of pitch, a show-me pitch, and now it’s more of an executed pitch that I can throw whenever. My average velo has increased a little bit, but the biggest thing would be adding to my arsenal.” Read the rest of this entry »

A common refrain in baseball is that you can never have enough pitching, and that doesn’t apply solely to starters. A well-stocked bullpen can be just as important to a club, which is why a lot of contenders dealt for relievers as the trade deadline approached. Two such clubs were the Boston Red Sox, who acquired Lucas Sims from the Cincinnati Reds and Luis Garcia from the Los Angeles Angels, and the New York Yankees, who acquired Mark Leiter Jr. from the Chicago Cubs and Enyel De Los Santos from the San Diego Padres.

Let’s look at two of those deals — the trades for Garcia and De Los Santos will be covered in another post — beginning with Boston getting Sims in exchange for 19-year-old pitching prospect Ovis Portes.

With setup men Chris Martin and Justin Slaten both on the injured list — their return dates are uncertain — the Red Sox have been badly in need of proven bullpen arms. Late-inning implosions contributed heavily to the team’s losing seven of 10 games coming out of the All-Star break, with Chase Anderson, Bailey Horn, and Greg Weissert among the pitchers of record in the defeats. When you’re battling for a Wild Card berth, those aren’t ideal options for high-leverage situations. Read the rest of this entry »

The Boston Red Sox beat the New York Yankees 9-7 on Friday night, and regardless of which team you might have been rooting for, the game was an absolute gem. The lead changed hands fives times, the 28 combined hits included four home runs — one of them a titanic 470-foot blast by Aaron Judge — and the tying runs were on base when Kenley Jansen recorded the final out for his 440th career save. Moreover, the atmosphere at a packed Fenway Park was electric throughout. It was as close to a postseason atmosphere as you will find in July.

The loss was New York’s fifth in sixth games, so I was admittedly a bit apprehensive about asking Aaron Boone a particular question prior to yesterday evening’s affair. I did so anyway. Prefacing it by relating a press box opinion that it had been as entertaining as any played at Fenway all season, I wanted to know if, as a manager, he allows himself to think about the aesthetics of a baseball game in that manner.

His answer didn’t disappoint.

“I always try to have a little appreciation for that,” Boone replied. “Especially with what we’ve been going through as a club. We’ve struggled. There are a handful of games where I’ve felt that way, like, ‘Man, this is a really good baseball game going on.’ When you come out on the bad end it kind of sucks, but you try to have that appreciation for ‘That was a really good one.’ Hopefully we can start to be on the right side of those.” Read the rest of this entry »

On July 27, 2018, a piece titled A Conversation With Oakland Pitching Coach Scott Emerson was published here at FanGraphs. Notable about the piece is that a question I’d asked about a particular pitcher, Daniel Mengden, ended up segueing into a variety of related topics. As I noted at the time, Emerson loves discussing his craft.

Six years later, that hasn’t changed. A few days before the All-Star break, I once again sat down with Emerson at Fenway Park. I wanted to ask him about pitch counts — the night before, A’s starter JP Sears threw 114 pitches across 5 2/3 innings in Oakland’s 5-2 win over the Red Sox — and expected our chit-chat would last roughly five minutes. Not surprisingly, we talked a good bit longer. Moreover — again not a surprise — we ended up discussing not just what I’d intended, but other aspects of the art and science of pitching as well.

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David Laurila: JP Sears threw 114 pitches last night. “What is your philosophy on starters going deep into games in terms of pitch count?

Scott Emerson: “For us last night, he had an extra day of rest, and we’re also going into the break, so he’s going to have some rest there. We wanted him to get through the sixth so we could get to [Austin] Adams, [Lucas] Erceg, and [Mason] Miller. We thought that was our best chance through their lineup.

“As for me, I like starters to go as long as they can and as hard as they can. I don’t think 114 is necessarily that high of a pitch count. I thought he was throwing the ball fine. [Mark Kotsay] and I talked about it, and [Sears] felt good about himself, so we tried to get him through [Rafael] Devers. That was the goal.”

Laurila: Generally speaking, how does a pitcher’s arm action and pitching style factor into it? Read the rest of this entry »

Bryan Woo wasn’t highly regarded when the Seattle Mariners selected him in the sixth round of the 2021 draft out of Cal Poly. That’s understandable. The low-slot righty had a 6.36 ERA in his three collegiate seasons, including a 6.11 mark in his injury-hampered junior year. After undergoing Tommy John surgery in April 2021, he made his professional debut in ’22.

Now, the 24-year-old is showing that Seattle’s director of pitching strategy, Trent Blank, wasn’t completely out of his mind when he reportedly told members of the Mariners front office prior to the draft that “this guy would be one-one for me.” While it’s unlikely that Woo is going to be as good or better than all of the 173 players drafted ahead of him, his numbers have nonetheless been impressive. Since making his big league debut in July 2023, he has a 3.60 ERA and a 3.96 FIP over 137 1/3 innings across his 28 starts with the Mariners. In 10 outings this year, he is 4-1 with a 2.54 ERA and a 3.25 FIP. It’s worth noting that this success hasn’t exactly come out of nowhere. Including four rehab outings this year, Woo logged a 2.97 ERA and 162 strikeouts over 115 innings as a minor leaguer.

Woo brought up his backstory when I asked him how he’s developed as pitcher.

“Going through the draft-and-scouting process, I feel like a lot of it was based on my potential,” Woo told me when the Mariners played in Cleveland last month. “I didn’t have great results at the time. It was based off of, ‘He could be this. It looks like he’s developing into that.’ For me, it was about believing that I could get there, that I could continue to get better. That’s kind of the story. I wasn’t too well-known. If you look at in on paper, it was never, ‘This guy is really good.’ The numbers never really showed that I was.”

Not surprisingly, Woo also brought up the fact that he’d been injured when he was drafted, and how that made for a lot of uncertainty. As he put it, “I didn’t quite know what was going to happen. It could have been a little higher. I could have gone a lot lower. I really wasn’t sure.”

He did know that his repertoire needed both refinement and enhancement. The Oakland native had a mid-90s four-seam fastball when healthy but nothing else to write home about. His slider, which he described as having been “OK,” was a pitch he’d throw here and there. He also had a changeup, but that mostly sat in his back pocket.

Developing a second heater has been especially impactful for him. He added a two-seamer to his arsenal last year while toeing the rubber for the Arkansas Travelers.

“Last year, before I got called up, our pitching coordinator came down to Double-A, where I was at,” Woo said. “He sat in on one of my bullpens and said, ‘Just try it.’ I was having a lot of high pitch count games — I wasn’t getting many quick outs — and he said that it could be a tool to use to get some quicker outs, some weaker contact. A lot of my game was strikeouts and fly balls. There weren’t many efficient outs, I guess you could say. So, we tried the two and it has progressed from there.”

So far this season, Woo has thrown 51.4% four-seamers and 27.2% two-seamers, as well as 7.2% changeups, 7.1% sweepers, and 7.0% sliders. The last of that mix, according to the righty, acts more like a gyro when he throws it low, and more like a cutter when he throws it toward the top of the zone. His circle changeup is a pitch he described as having “a little less vertical and a little bit more horizontal, as well as little bit slower, than my sinker.” Asked which of his off-speed pitches he sees as his main secondary offering going forward, he said that he’s satisfied with the progress of all three and wouldn’t take one over the other.

As for his two fastballs, the 6-foot-2 Woo wasn’t inclined to pick between them either. Instead of choosing favorites, he described why he’s had success with his heaters despite their relatively unimpressive metrics.

“Neither one plays super high metrically; the vertical and horizontal movement aren’t anything crazy,” Woo said. “I think it’s just my slot, kind of how the ball comes out, that makes them a little bit different.”

The slot is indeed different. As Pitcher List’s Jack Foley explained last summer, “At 4’11” off the ground, Woo has a release height a full foot below the average.”

Woo told me that he was more over the top in high school, only to have his arm “kind of lower on its own throughout college, post-surgery, and pro ball.” He claimed to have never purposefully dropped it down, but rather has just continued to throw in a way that feels most comfortable. Not so comfortable are opposing batters. They have just a .220 xBA and a 2.7% barrel rate against the low-slot righty this season. When healthy — he missed the first month with elbow inflammation and later was on the shelf for three weeks with a hamstring strain — Woo is hard to square up.

A more-consistent arm slot related to a move back to the third base side of the rubber has contributed to Cole Ragans’s success this season. The raw stuff was obviously already there. As Ben Clemens wrote back in March, the Kansas City Royals left-hander “looks like an absolute terror on the mound.” My colleague went on to say that if he “were designing a pitcher in a laboratory, he’d look a lot like Ragans.”

When I talked to the 2024 American League All-Star on the eve of the break, he told me that going into full attack mode following last year’s oft-reported velocity jump played a huge role in his emergence as a front-line starter. As he put it, “I kind of had to teach myself that I could get away with a little more of a miss compared to when I was throwing 90-91 [mph]. I have a good arsenal in my opinion, so I can just go after hitters.”

And then there’s the work he does in the laboratory.

“I use TrackMan in my bullpens, especially with the slider and the cutter, to kind of see where I’m at,” said Ragans, whose heater is now mid-to-high 90s. “The biggest thing for me is my release points, making sure that my pitches are in a tight cluster. I want everything coming out of the same tunnel. I don’t want to be throwing a fastball from this release height, and my slider from a lower release height.” Read the rest of this entry »