The Angels did some bargain shopping over the weekend, adding veteran infielders Eduardo Escobar and Mike Moustakas to the roster from the Mets and Rockies, respectively. Escobar, who has triple-slashed a .254/.305/.432 line this year and was a part-timer in New York after the team turned to rookie Brett Baty as the starter at third base, was acquired for two pitching prospects, Coleman Crow and Landon Marceaux. Moustakas has performed adequately as a role player for the Rockies this year, splitting time between first and third and pinch-hitting, and fetched minor league pitcher Connor Van Scoyoc in return.

Assuming the Angels aren’t simply quickly acquiring third basemen from 2018 as part of some mad scavenger hunt, the urgency here reflects their desperate need for infielders. In most seasons, the preseason plan to have Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani and precisely nothing else go wrong with the other 24 players has gang aft a-gley by this point of the season, like most of the best laid plans of mice and men, despite Disney selling the Angels to Arte Moreno 20 years ago. Nobody writes a paean to a team with a .537 winning percentage, but this ordinary level of respectability, if the first half ended today, would represent the franchise’s best first-half winning percentage since the 2015 season. At 42–37, Los Angeheim stands just a game out for the last wild card spot, so now is pretty important.

“Now” is also a bit of a problem when it comes to the roster. While this may be the season the Angels finally write the proof to the hypothesis “.500 Team Plus Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout = Playoffs,” parts of the roster have crumbled in recent weeks. And while the lineup has scored 5.3 runs per game in June, more than 20% of that total came in Saturday night’s 25–1 humiliation of the Rockies; the Angels are at a decidedly meh 4.4 runs per game in recent weeks otherwise. The infield increasingly looks like a rickety structure that could collapse with a firm gust of wind. Jared Walsh, who looked in 2021 as if he could hold down the fort at his peak for three or four years, struggled in 2022 with thoracic outlet syndrome, and his return this year was poor enough that he was sent down to Triple-A Salt Lake. Read the rest of this entry »

If not as momentous as the rediscovery of the coelacanth after a 65-million-year absence, the return of the knuckleball to Major League Baseball was still an occasion worth noting. On Saturday, the Padres recalled Matt Waldron to make a spot start, and the 26-year-old righty became the first pitcher to throw a knuckleball in a regular season game since the Orioles’ Mickey Jannis in 2021.

Waldron threw only 13 knucklers from among his 62 pitches, mixing the fluttering pitch into a more standard arsenal, but he got good results with the offering. All told, he performed respectably, allowing just two runs — both via solo homers off his four-seam fastball — in 4.2 innings to the Nationals. Unfortunately, the Padres didn’t score at all, and fell 2–0.

Matt Waldron, Knuckleball. ? pic.twitter.com/kpmpuXQKzB

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) June 25, 2023

Where the knuckleball generally had at least one or two standard-bearers with secure spots in the majors at any time from the mid-1960s up through 2017, the pitch has become an endangered species in recent years, as I’ve noted a few times in this space. Brothers Phil Niekro (who pitched in the majors from 1964 to ’87) and Joe Niekro (1967–88), Wilbur Wood (1961–78), and reliever Hoyt Wilhelm (1952–72) all thrived with the pitch (some for longer than others), with the elder Niekro and Wilhelm both making the Hall of Fame. Charlie Hough (1970–94), Tom Candiotti (1983–99), and Tim Wakefield (1992–93, ’95–2011) became staples of the rotation if not stars, and Steve Sparks (1995–96, ’98–2004) and Dennis Springer (1995–2002) found sporadic success. R.A. Dickey took the baton from Wakefield and gave the knuckleball its last burst of prominence. He turned to the pitch in 2008 after finding little success during his sporadic appearances in the majors from ’01 to ’06, finally solidified a spot in the majors in 2010, and two years later became the first knuckleballer to win a Cy Young Award; that year, he was the only true pitcher to throw a single knuckleball in the majors according to either PITCHf/x or Pitch Info.

Dickey lasted until 2017, when he was 42 years old, but aside from him, every knuckleballer who came and went more or less hung around on the major league margins. Steven Wright, who debuted for the Red Sox in 2013, spent parts of seven seasons in the majors, but a knee injury and a suspension for domestic violence limited him to 60 innings in 2018–19, the first years of the post-Dickey era. Since then, the pitch has become the province of position players pressed into mop-up duty, with Ryan Feierabend (2019 with the Blue Jays) and Jannis the only true pitchers to try it at the major league level. That they combined for just three appearances, allowing 14 runs in nine innings, only underscored the pitch’s decline in popularity.

Hence the interest in Waldron, whom Cleveland drafted out of the University of Nebraska in the 18th round in 2019, then sent to San Diego as the player to be named later in the Mike Clevinger blockbuster in November 2020. Waldron taught himself a knuckleball way back in Little League, figuring it out with twin brother Mike, who had this to say about it when interviewed on MLB’s broadcast:

“[It started] just out of curiosity… It was one of those things that you’re like, ‘Hey, that’s pretty cool. We’ll go ahead and see what we can do, throw it around.’

“It kind of became one of those fun pitches we’d throw around when we were at practice or something, just something to mess around with. To see it work at this level … it’s unbelievable, really.”

Waldron turned some heads in Padres camp throwing the knuckleball in warm-ups in 2021, and so the team encouraged him to feature the pitch, which sat in the low 80s and contrasted well with his 92–94 mph fastball, slider, and changeup. Exactly how much he threw it is unclear, but according to Baseball America, “As Waldron got more comfortable with the pitch, he pushed its usage over 70%.” He pitched to a 4.25 ERA, walking 35 and striking out 103, in 103.2 innings split between High-A Fort Wayne and Double-A San Antonio.

Unfortunately minor league pitch usage data for Waldron isn’t easy to come by, as the pitch is so rare that auto-tagging systems usually label it as a slider or changeup; check out his spin rates for the pitch, and occasionally you’d see one that’s 2,900 RPM or so instead of sitting in the 100–400 range, where he was in his most recent start for Triple-A El Paso on June 16. According to Synergy Sports, which manually tags each pitch, Waldron threw knuckleballs just 9% of the time last year while getting smoked for a 6.26 ERA in 113.2 innings split between San Antonio and El Paso. He walked 39 and struck out 96 but served up 14 homers, including 12 in just 69.1 innings for El Paso. This year, he was up to 22% in his knuckleball usage; based on various reports and his own comments, he was throwing it more often to lefties than righties. “I use it coming out that same tunnel [as the fastball],” he told reporters.

For as sound as his plan may be, Waldron had been rocked for a 7.02 ERA, 5.34 FIP and 11 homers in 66.2 innings when the call came. Those numbers obviously aren’t impressive, but it’s worth remembering that altitude is a significant factor in the Pacific Coast League. The Chihuahuas’ Southwest University Park sits 3,750 feet above sea level; the circuit also includes high-altitude parks in Albuquerque (5,100 feet), Reno (4,500 feet), Salt Lake City (4,230 feet), and Las Vegas (3,000 feet). Not only do batted balls carry further at such altitudes than at sea level, but knuckleballs also move less. Dickey never pitched at Coors Field (and only faced the Rockies twice) but did throw bullpens there and pitched against Triple-A Colorado Springs during his minor league years. In 2012, he explained the hazards of the knuckleball at altitude to sportswriter Dave Krieger:

“It is tougher to throw at those high altitudes because there’s not much humidity for the ball to kind of resist against. At sea level… if I throw a mediocre knuckleball, well, it’s still going to move, it just might not move as sharply or as much. If I throw a mediocre knuckleball in Colorado, it’s going to be a b.p. (batting practice) fastball right down the middle that I’m going to have to either dodge or I’m going to just put my glove up for the umpire to throw me another ball because that one just went 450 feet.

Thus the conditions make it tough to take Waldron’s numbers at face value, which the Padres surely understand when they turned to him for a spot start in place of Michael Wacha; he’s been the team’s best pitcher this year, with a 2.90 ERA and 3.78 FIP, but has also been notoriously fragile throughout his career and is currently dealing with a bout of shoulder fatigue. Waldron’s stay wasn’t expected to be a long one — and in fact, he was optioned back to El Paso on Sunday — but his outing did open some eyes.

Facing the Nationals, who rank 12th in the NL in both scoring (4.13 runs per game) and wRC+ (93), Waldron got ahead of leadoff hitter Lane Thomas using his four-seam fastball, then unveiled the knuckleball on a 1–2 pitch that Thomas fouled off; as it turned out, Thomas would be the only righty-swinger to see any of Waldron’s knucklers. Two pitches later, Waldron struck out Thomas swinging at a 93.8 mph four-seamer right down the middle. After getting Luis Garcia on a first-pitch grounder, he got ahead of switch-hitting Jeimer Candelario (who batted lefty) 0–1, then threw another knuckler, this one too low. Candelario took it for a ball, then crushed a 92.9-mph middle-middle fastball for a towering 395-foot solo homer, 107 mph off the bat, the hardest-hit ball Waldron would allow all evening. Here’s a look at the two knucklers, contrasted with the two payoff pitches:

Ouch. After the homer, Waldron recovered to strike out Joey Meneses to end the inning, using three four-seamers as well as a cutter and a slider, both of which were way outside the strike zone. He kept the knuckleball on ice until the fourth inning, after working around a leadoff single by Corey Dickerson (a lefty) in the second and serving up a solo homer to Thomas on a 92.4-mph first-pitch fastball in the third; he also issued a one-out walk to Garcia but stranded him.

In the fourth, Waldron threw back-to-back knuckleballs to Dickerson, who had fallen behind 0–1; he fouled off both, took a fastball for a ball, then grounded to shortstop on yet another knuckler. Waldron went back to the pitch for three out of the four offerings to the next batter, switch-hitter Keibert Ruiz (batting lefty), who finally grounded one to second base. Here are the floaters from that two-hitter sequence:

While it would have figured that Waldron might throw a knuckleball to lefty Dominic Smith, he didn’t need to, as Smith grounded out on an 0–2 fastball. In the fifth, righty Derek Hill grounded to short on a fastball after laying off two cutters well outside the zone. Lefty CJ Abrams, on the other hand, saw nothing but knuckleballs, flying out to right field on the fourth one.

That swinging strike had 20 inches of horizontal movement, Waldron’s highest measure of the game and one of four in double digits. Here’s a slow-motion view:

Matt Waldron, Knuckleball Movement. ?

20 Inches of Run. pic.twitter.com/oS3dce5VPd

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) June 25, 2023

Thomas took Waldron’s final knuckler for ball one before singling off a slider, at which point manager Bob Melvin pulled the rookie in favor of veteran lefty Tim Hill, who struck out Garcia. The Padres bullpen didn’t allow another run, but the lineup couldn’t muster any kind of heat, managing just four hits, all singles, and failing to take advantage of an additional four walks against starter Josiah Gray. The Nationals bullpen retired all 11 batters it faced, six by strikeouts.

All told, Waldron threw 27 four-seamers, 14 sliders, seven cutters and a sinker to go with his 13 knuckleballs. He got five whiffs and 10 called strikes with the four-seamer, which averaged 92.3 mph and topped out at 94.4. He got just one whiff out of seven swings via the knuckler, whose velocity ranged from 76.3 mph to 84.2 mph, as well as two called strikes; he had a 23% CSW for that pitch, compared to 37% for the fastball and 29% overall. Batters did chase three of the eight floaters he threw outside the strike zone (37.5%, and it’s worth noting that none of them escaped the reach of catcher Gary Sánchez, who was handling the pitch for the first time), but they also made contact with all five in the zone, though the only ones they put into play were the outs of Dickerson, Ruiz, and Abrams. Those three had an average exit velocity of 89.7 mph, an xBA of .137, an xSLG of .160, and an xwOBA of .125, though his overall marks — 92.2 mph exit velo, .294 xBA, .574 xSLG, .383 xwOBA — obviously weren’t as good. As his 50% hard-hit rate and 6.35 xERA attests, Waldron needs to do a better job of limiting hard contact if he’s to survive.

As for the knuckleball itself, the total of 13 that he threw on Saturday was fewer than those of seven position players who have broken it out for their mound cameos during the pitch-tracking era (2008 onward), not to mention all nine of the other pitchers who did so. Excluding the bastard sons of Wade Boggs, here’s how they stack up:

Waldron’s knuckler rates as the fastest in terms of average velocity, faster even than Dickey’s “angry knuckleball.” It’s mid-pack in terms of vertical movement, but tops in terms of horizontal movement. Unfortunately, I don’t have much in the way of direct comparisons for spin rate, since it wasn’t until Statcast switched to the Hawkeye cameras in 2020 that spin could be measured directly; Waldron’s knucklers averaged 295 RPM, which is lower than Jannis’ average of 407 but about double the ideal of 150, which translates into about one to one and half rotations from the mound to the plate. Neither Stuff+ nor PitchingBot even scored Waldron’s knuckleball, though both models really liked his slider (whose usage rate matches up with Gameday, which is to say the pitches aren’t being conflated), and PitchingBot found his other pitches to be at least average, though it didn’t score the cutter. Stuff+ saw his other pitches as pedestrian, which I believe better matches up with the general scouting perception. Small-sample caveats abound:

All told, I think it’s fair to say that Waldron demonstrated some promise with the way he used the knuckleball to keep hitters off balance, but that unless he can hone his arsenal and find a way to miss more bats, he’s likely destined to remain on the fringe of the majors rather than securing a regular job. I would absolutely love to be wrong about that, because even in his one-night cameo, Waldron’s knuckleball was a most welcome sight.

It’s not crazy to see someone make the jump from a great reliever to an elite reliever. Every year, there are a handful of stellar relief seasons that we simply just did not see coming. I was a fan of Alexis Díaz after his stellar 2022 debut (1.84 ERA, 3.32 FIP, 32.5 K%), but I did not expect him to be this dominant, as he’s taken big steps forward in more or less every stat. What’s behind it?

When it comes to pitching development, it’s important to be unique; you don’t want to look like or throw like anybody else. If you’re going to be elite, you must find what makes you special and lean into it. For Díaz, his outlier skill is his ability to release the ball closer to the plate than anybody in the world from an unorthodox angle. He doesn’t have overwhelming velocity, yet his four-seamer is one of the best in the game, and the extension is a huge reason for it. It’s as if the ball is being shot at you from a little league distance by a softball pitching machine.

Here’s how Díaz’s release point compares to other pitchers with comparable extension:

Focusing first on release point, you’ll see that none of the other four pitchers in this small cohort gets their arm as low as the Reds closer. Combine this with top-tier extension and consistently being up in the zone, and you have the explanation for how Díaz’s Vertical Approach Angle (VAA) is so flat compared to those on this list. Horizontally speaking, only Jordan Romano is as far toward the third baseline, but Díaz’s low slot arm angle is very different for hitters compared to Romano’s. In terms of spin axis, only Devin Williams is somewhat close to Díaz. The other three pitchers are more over the top. From a pitch design perspective, that would be ideal for building the perfect four-seamer, but as you can see, being different is exactly how Díaz has been successful. Read the rest of this entry »

An empty major league stadium can evoke some unsettling sensations. I’ve been behind the scenes at numerous ballparks before, of course, but usually in the lead-up to or aftermath of a game. I know the low-grade background patter of concessions workers setting up and taking down stalls, the thump of the grounds crew packing the dirt around home plate, the smell of smoked meat on the grill.

During the week of the third annual MLB Draft Combine, Chase Field was a little different. The Cold Stone on the first base-side concourse still smelled delightfully of freshly-baked ice cream cones, even though the stall itself was buttoned up. The whizzing of an MLB Network camera drone was audible throughout the first two days of the combine, as was every crack of the bat and pop of the glove from batting practice, bullpens, and infield drills — even from a suite situated behind the right field foul pole on the stadium’s second level. A vivid palette of ambient noise, because a crowd of dozens, mostly scouts, wasn’t drowning it out.

Of the big four American men’s pro sports leagues, MLB was the last to organize a scouting combine for its draft-eligible prospects. While the NBA and NHL combines have their moments in the sun, the NFL’s is the cream of the crop, an event with almost four decades’ worth of folklore that generates a week’s worth of live TV content for the league’s cable channel, followed by months of buzz afterward. It is said to make and break prospects.

Baseball is a different beast than football; its schedule is unique, its athletes measured and evaluated differently. But 2023 represented a concerted effort by the league to attempt to make the combine into an event. Read the rest of this entry »

Buck Farmer is flying under the radar while making an impact in Cincinnati. Baseball’s hottest team went into yesterday having won 12 straight games, and the 32-year-old reliever had pitched in seven of them. Moreover, the Reds had been victorious in 14 of the last 15 contests he’d appeared in. Over those outings, Farmer was credited with two wins and a save while allowing just a pair of runs in 15 innings.

He’s been solid from the start. On the season — his second in Cincinnati after eight in Detroit — the Conyers, Georgia native has held opposing hitters to a .188 average while logging a 2.41 ERA over a team-high 35 appearances. Consistently pounding the zone with a three-pitch mix, he’s issued just 10 free passes while fanning 33 batters in 37-and-a-third innings. By most statistical markers, he’s never been better.

Farmer credits Cincinnati’s pitching program for much of his success.

“I think it’s the development here,” Farmer replied when asked what differentiates his current and former clubs. “[The Tigers] were starting to change over to a more analytical approach before I left, but I don’t think they’d quite made that adjustment yet. When I came here, they were already tuned in. DJ {Derek Johnson] and the other coaches are fully invested in us. They want us to grab a little bit more here and there, and that includes taking what we’re good at and trying to make it great.”

For Farmer, that meant reworking a pitch that has become a lethal weapon. Augmented by a four-seam fastball and a changeup, his slider has flummoxed hitters to the tune of an .091 average and a .212 slug. His whiff-rate with the offering is a heady 45.3%. Read the rest of this entry »

Earlier this week, my colleague Ben Clemens wrote about Marcus Semien and his impressive durability. As Ben pointed out, Semien leads the majors in plate appearances over the last five seasons, which has helped him to be one of the most valuable players in the game despite his relative shortage of standout skills.

The most productive catcher during that same time period has been J.T. Realmuto, who leads his fellow backstops by more than 5 WAR. He’s also way ahead of the pack with 2,147 plate appearances; Willson Contreras ranks second with 1,879. On the defensive side, the Phillies catcher is similarly outpacing his peers. He has played 4,084 innings behind the dish, 397.2 more than Martín Maldonado in second place. That’s the equivalent of 44 full games, or Austin Hedges‘ 2023 season to date. Much like Semien, Realmuto encapsulates the popular aphorism “availability is the best ability.” He isn’t the best defender or the best offensive catcher, but he’s good at everything he does, and he does it more often than anyone else. Read the rest of this entry »

On Sunday in Oakland, with the A’s trailing the Phillies 3-1 and lefty José Alvarado on the mound, A’s manager Mark Kotsay sent the right-handed Esteury Ruiz to the plate to pinch hit for lefty Seth Brown, hoping to use a platoon advantage to mobilize some sort of comeback. After falling behind 1-2, Ruiz turned on an Alvarado cutter and sent a 94.1-mph grounder past the third baseman and into left field, giving his team some hope:

Ruiz would come around on a Carlos Pérez single, but the rally would ultimately fall short as the A’s extended a losing streak that has since run to eight games. But Ruiz had done all he was given the chance to do. Read the rest of this entry »

So here’s what happened. I was watching the MLB game highlights of Tuesday’s Marlins-Blue Jays matchup. I like MLB’s game highlights; in order to keep all the quick cuts from feeling disjointed, they kind of just plop some music on top everything unceremoniously, and sometimes the music can really color your perception of the game. This Mets-Padres game from April is a great example. It was a nailbiter, but it lost some of its nerve-wracking heft thanks to a soundtrack that’s a cross between John Coltrane, Kool & The Gang, and Super Mario 3.

Two on, two out, bottom of the ninth, and it sounds like the monologue is about to start on Saturday Night Live. Anyway, I was watching Tuesday’s Marlins-Jays highlights (the soundtrack for which sounds like The Living End on their union-mandated lunch break), and I noticed this single from Luis Arraez.

Normally, a single from Arraez is about the least remarkable thing in baseball. He is the game’s preeminent singles hitter (and depending on your worldview, perhaps the game’s preeminent hitter, period). What caught my eye was how quickly Daulton Varsho managed to cut this ball off, considering that Arraez slashed it just a foot inside the left field line. Varsho gets fantastic jumps, but I figured he also had to be playing extremely shallow. It occurred to me that maybe every outfielder is playing right on top of Arraez this year, seeing as dumping liners right in front of the outfielders for singles is his superpower. Read the rest of this entry »

As one would expect, records and milestones often reflect the eras in which they’re achieved. Pitching records tend to be set in low-offense eras, while offensive milestones rack up more quickly at times when runs are plentiful. As the game ebbs and flows, certain benchmarks that are achievable in one era become far more difficult, or even impossible, in another. One of these achievements, which has long fascinated fans, is hitting .400. Even as batting average became a less relevant number in the post-Deadball era (and even less so as front offices gravitated toward other metrics 75 years later), baseball observers have still rooted for someone to hit .400. I’m one of them; not everything that’s fun has to be an amazing analytical tool, and vice-versa. Hits are, for lack of a better word, cool, and the ability to rack up value primarily via batting average has become far rarer than it used to be. And if hits are cool, Luis Arraez is in super-rad territory, as the Marlins second baseman is currently sitting at .398 as we approach the season’s halfway mark.

Whether you think the most recent .400 hitter was Ted Williams, who put up a .406 average in 1941, or Josh Gibson, who put up an impressive .466 for the Homestead Grays in 69 games a couple of years later, there are very few baseball fans remaining who have a living memory of a .400 hitter. After the Splendid Splinter hit .388 in 1957, it was another 20 years until anyone came that close (Rod Carew in 1977). There were always scattered attempts, such as George Brett‘s effort to sneak up to .400 when he hit a stunning .421 in the second half of the 1980 season (he ran out of calendar, finishing at .390). The offensive outburst of the 1990s wasn’t just in home runs, but in batting average as well, and there was another mini-run of .400 attempts. From 1993 through 2000, there were a surprising number of first-half hitters above .380: Tony Gwynn (twice), Larry Walker, Nomar Garciaparra, John Olerud, Darin Erstad, Todd Helton, Frank Thomas, and Paul O’Neill. Nobody’s been at .380 in the first half more recently, and since 2010, only Justin Turner’s gone into the All-Star break with a batting average north of .370. Read the rest of this entry »

Charlie Blackmon is heading down the home stretch of what has been a productive career with the Colorado Rockies. A little more than a week away from his 37th birthday and in his 13th season with the club that drafted him out of Georgia Tech in 2008, the left-handed-hitting outfielder has stroked 1,646 hits, 572 of which have gone for extra bases. Boasting a .296 career batting average — Coors Field has certainly benefitted him — he topped the Senior Circuit in that department in 2017, when he hit .331. Only Todd Helton has played more games in a Rockies uniform.

Blackmon, who is currently on the injured list with a fractured hand, sat down to talk hitting when Colorado visited Boston earlier this month.

———

David Laurila: Prior to the 2017 season, I talked to you and one of your then-teammates for a piece titled “Charlie Blackmon and Chris Denorfia on Launch Angles.” What are your thoughts on that subject six years later?

Charlie Blackmon: ”Yeah, so launch angle is something people were really excited about a little while ago. I think that’s a way to reverse engineer a really good hit or a home run, right? It’s taking a dataset and saying, ‘Guys have a higher slugging percentage when they hit the ball in the air,’ and then basically find out that 31 degrees is their optimal angle. I mean, it’s like taking something you already knew was good and saying, ‘Well, now I’m going to try to hit it 31 degrees.’

“Adding lift to your swing is going to put the ball in the air, but I didn’t really like how people were going about it. Now I’m seeing that change. I think where the game is from a pitching perspective, even compared to five years ago, is very different. If you look across the league, I would bet that the amount of strikes thrown in the upper third of the zone has more than doubled. I would say that 70% of the pitchers in the league consistently throw high fastballs, whereas it wasn’t long ago that everybody was trying to throw down and away. There has been a big shift in pitching philosophy and fastball-location philosophy in the past few years.” Read the rest of this entry »