Axford Axes Save Opportunity
The defending NL Central champions played like it yesterday afternoon as a four-run 9th inning led the Cincinnati Reds to a walk-off win against the Milwaukee Brewers on Opening Day. When Jay Bruce stepped to the plate down three runs with the bases loaded, memories of the division title-clinching walk-off home run by Bruce last season were immediately conjured up.
John Axford, Milwaukee’s newly respected closer who usurped Trevor Hoffman‘s closer duties last season, had allowed a long single to Brandon Phillips, walked Joey Votto on five pitches, and allowed Scott Rolen to reach base thanks to Casey McGehee’s non-error fielding gaffe. McGehee tried to tag Phillips out as the second baseman was going from second to third, but missed the tag and took a second too long to attempt the force out at first. Boom, bases loaded.
But instead of the up-and-comer walking off with the win again, Bruce struck out swinging on a huge Axford curve ball. But on the next pitch, Jonny Gomes knocked in Phillips with a long sacrifice fly. Then it was the under-appreciated Ramon Hernandez who responded with a three-run opposite field walk-off home run. Hernandez’s two-out walk-off home run capped a 4 for 5 day, earning a ridiculous +.908 WPA per JoePawl’s Opening Day recap this morning. The Reds lineup engaged in some sweet hitting against Axford, who allowed a couple hard-hit fly balls when holding a three-run lead is the easiest situation to obtain a save.
Let’s recount Axford’s unfortunate Opening Day performance, starting with Brandon Phillips’ at-bat. In 2010, Phillips swung on 52% of all pitches, but only swung 33% of the time on the first pitch of the at-bat. So it was unexpected that Phillips swung on the first pitch in three out of five at-bats yesterday, including against Axford’s first offering, a fastball. His aggressive approach (if that’s a new adjustment for the season, we’ll come back in at least a month) rewarded him with a long fly ball single off the left-center outfield wall.
With Phillips at first, next up was Joey Votto, your reigning NL MVP. Axford came out throwing his mid-90s fastball again, which he usually uses at least 65% of the time. But Axford couldn’t find the strike zone consistently on several borderline calls as a result of pitching around Votto, with two high and outside fastballs and two low ones barely missing the zone — resulting in a five-pitch walk without Votto’s bat lifted off his shoulder.
Scott Rolen came up and served a conservative approach, but quickly fell behind 1-2. After sitting on a few fastballs again while fouling off pitches in the zone, Rolen was able to work the count to 3-2. He then grounded a 3-2 pitch toward third, resulting in a fielder’s choice due to the aforementioned McGehee defensive misplay.
Up till this point, Axford had thrown 13 fastballs and only one breaking ball, a slider. With Jay Bruce at the plate with the bases loaded, Axford got ahead with an 0-2 count on fastballs. On the 1-2 count, he adjusted from the approach he served Rolen and threw his huge breaking 80 mph curve ball, the first of the night, to get Bruce to strike out swinging. On the next pitch, though, Jonny Gomes came out swinging guessing fastball first pitch (and guessing correctly) and found deep center field, allowing Phillips to tag up for the first run of the inning.
Ramon Hernandez, the hero of Opening Day for the Reds, laid off a first-pitch slider before swinging on an outside fastball, which he promptly belted to the opposite field and into the Brewers’ bullpen. All hell proceeded to break loose at the Great American Ball Park, and a giddy Dusty Baker and his team crowded Hernandez at the plate to celebrate one of (hopefully) many walk-off wins in 2011.
All in all, Axford’s night totaled four balls put in play, three of them towards different parts of the outfield either clearing the fence, off the fence, or on the warning track. On 21 pitches, Axford threw 18 fastballs, two sliders, and one curve ball. That’s a far cry from the 65/19/16 ratio for his fastball/curve/slider repertoire that was accompanied with success in 2010. The fastballs he offered either couldn’t find the strike zone, were poorly placed, or were all too predictable for the Reds lineup, which combined aggressiveness and patience to pound Axford.
Hindsight is 20/20 of course, but what Axford should have done was trust his breaking ball stuff more during this outing. He can get whiffs with his fastball, but he’d be better served if he can mix his breaking balls with them. His slider induced whiffs 22% of the time in 2010, compared to 12% for his fastball. And he clearly had his curve ball breaking yesterday — it’s telling that the only good pitch he had of the night was the one perfectly-placed curve ball that got Jay Bruce to whiff silly. These guys are major league hitters, the Reds being one of the best projected lineups in all of baseball, and if you think you can blow away the heart of that lineup with fastballs down the middle of the plate, well, you just might get deep fly balls all over the field in a hitter’s park.
Albert Lyu (@thinkbluecrew, LinkedIn) is a graduate student at the Georgia Institute of Technology, but will always root for his beloved Northwestern Wildcats. Feel free to email him with any comments or suggestions.
I thought Baseball Tonight/ESPN actually did I pretty good job illustrating his predictable tendency to “pitch away” … problem was it was “middle away” and “up away” … This isn’t the 1960s where batters don’t drive away pitches … now, they dive into them.
“The Reds lineup engaged in some sweet hitting against Axford, who allowed a couple hard-hit fly balls when holding a three-run lead is the easiest situation to obtain a save.”
wat
In hindsight, the best thing for Axford to have done would be turn to Casey McGehee before the Rolen at bat and say “when this ground ball comes to you, you better get at least one out”
If McGehee gets that out (and everything else plays out exactly the same), then Axford walks off the mound with a 3 run win.
He still didn’t pitch well, though.
True. That kind of play is something we battle our 10yo IF’s with.
Why even try to make that tag? What are you trying to accomplish? What is the risk?
Unfortunately, “in the moment” sometimes leads to bad decisions.
Here’s what I don’t get … first off, it’s not a horrible play because McGehee is moving, into the baseline, so a potential tag play is somewhat understandable. However, if you are going to tag the runner, then dammit TAG him … put your bare hand over the ball, inside the glove, and tag the living hell out of the runner. If the runner doesn;t like it, so be it.
But, on what planet does a defender like McGehee make that tag play AND still throw out the runner at first for double play? Has he ever made a play like that? Would the 50403 DP attempt be more probable.
This is why coaches continually tell young players “know what you’re going to do if it is hit to you.”.
Even if the umpire was wrong, and he did tag him, it’s still the second best option.
Not only did Axford not pitch “well”, he looked to me like he was pitching “scared”.
This is all true but on the other hand if McGehee had known Phillips would run 4 feet out of the baseline and not be called out he probably wouldn’t have tried the tag either. Bad play, bad call, bad result.
“4 feet out of the baseline”
Um, not really. He maybe took a step out of the baseline. I was at the game and have watched the replay multiple times. If you thought that was tough you must have enjoyed the rest of the series. lol
Based on this performance will Jonah Keri change his World Series prediction?
Axford lacks anything resembling a track record of success as closer, save 2.5 months last year. This spring Axford couldn’t find the plate….
Ron Roenicke has probably never seen Axford look good, ever. If I am him, I have to ask myself, this is my team, why should I automatically declare Axford “CLOSER”….why?
To me, RR would be wise to choose K Loe or Saito to replace Axford sooner than later…..like tomorrow. RR owes Axford nothing. This is a team game.
“Let’s recount Axford’s unfortunate Opening Day performance, starting with Brandon Phillips’ at-bat. In 2010, Phillips swung on 52% of all pitches, but only swung 33% of the time on the first pitch of the at-bat. So it was unexpected that Phillips swung on the first pitch in three out of five at-bats yesterday,”
Waaait a minute. Where’s the sabermetric motto: “Sample size, sample size, and sample size”?
In the next sentence: “His aggressive approach (if that’s a new adjustment for the season, we’ll come back in at least a month) rewarded him with a long fly ball single off the left-center outfield wall.”
Harry,
I was highlighting that line ‘cuz if you read the whole article, for another example, “Up till this point, Axford had thrown 13 fastballs and only one breaking ball, a slider.”
Or this, “[…] but what Axford should have done was trust his breaking ball stuff more during this outing. He can get whiffs with his fastball, but he’d be better served if he can mix his breaking balls with them. His slider induced whiffs 22% of the time in 2010, compared to 12% for his fastball.”
See?
Axford only pitched 989 last year. We all know now that we need 3000 pitches to really get a skill summary of the guy on the mound. The author here cherry-picked this limited sample size from 2010– Not to mention that we don’t know if the relatively young Axford REALLY SHOULD actually whiffed that much with his breaking ball.
Was he trying something new? Did he lose his grip for the secondary pitch that cold night? Was there an extended spring training in that inning?
We knew not. Thus, we should rely on the inadequate sample size, but as much as possible. That means 2008, 2009, and even minor league data, even scouting reports of Axford’s ability to do this and that.
The conclusion is like beating the bushes. The direction of this analysis is sound, but the proofs are not.
From what I saw of Axford, he doesn’t threaten the inside (inside corner to batter’s belt), nor does he seem to have the stuff (running fastball, desire, etc) to do so.
So, especially Hernandez appeared to be sitting outer half and had no worries about driving an outer half pitch. That’s problematic as Greg Swindell’s pro career illustrates.
Pitching on the inner half with mediocre stuff in not desirable, but pitching inside is crucial. If Axord is going to contune to close, IMO, he’s going to have to use a cutterlike pitch that he can start inside off the plate and run it over the inside corner. Otherwise I think batters are just going to look away and guys at that level can, obviously, drive that pitch if it isn’t 96mph.
Not that everyone can be Mariano, but he shows that a closer can use the same pitch to pitch RH and LH batters “inside”.
“From what I saw of Axford, he doesn’t threaten the inside”
Agreed. He was around 94 with the FB but it was away, away, away, which is how he walked Votto. And FWIW, Axford didn’t look a whole lot better in the 12-3 blowout yesterday, giving up two more hits. For the guy recommending replacements above, I could see Saito getting some opps, but Loe is thoroughly unimpressive every time I see him and it’s hard to imagine him in high leverage situations. I like Braddock but I’m not convinced he’s closer material. If I had one major reservation with MIL coming into the year (aside from Betancourt) it was the ‘pen.
Excuse me, 2009, not 2008. Anyway, I made my point.
If he throws a slider, that would be a much prefered option, especially with runners on the corners and a slow-footed catcher at the plate.