Don’t blame the Dodgers. Or don’t just blame the Dodgers. While the defending champions used Corey Knebel as an opener in back-to-back postseason games to finish the Division Series and begin the League Championship Series (albeit under very different circumstances), starting pitchers throughout this postseason are throwing fewer innings than ever. Thus far this October, starts of three innings or fewer outnumber those of six innings or more by 60%! More than one-third of all starting pitchers are getting the hook before they reach double digits in outs, and even the aces aren’t pitching deep into games as frequently.

Sunday night’s NLCS Game 2 between the Braves and Dodgers provided yet another example. Before Ian Anderson even recorded an out, he was down 2-0 thanks to a Mookie Betts single and a Corey Seager homer. He faced seven batters in the first inning, and while he had a 1-2-3 second, he put two men on in the third, after which manager Brian Snitker elected to pull him for a pinch-hitter.

Opposite number Max Scherzer, after being pushed back a day due to his Division Series Game 5-saving effort, held the Braves scoreless through three innings but walked Austin Riley and then gave up a titanic game-tying homer to Joc Pederson in the fourth; when the lineup turned over after he recorded his first out of the fifth, manager Dave Roberts pulled him in favor lefty Alex Vesia — the second time in three postseason starts that Scherzer has exited before completing five innings. For as much of an affront as this might have been to purists, the 37-year-old future Hall of Famer conceded afterwards, “My arm was dead. I could tell when I was warming up that it was still tired… I wasn’t going to be able to get truly deep into a game, and I wasn’t going to be able to get to that 95, 100-pitch count.” Read the rest of this entry »

Brent Strom may or may not be calling it a career. The 73-year-old Houston Astros pitching coach said earlier this week that he’s been considering retirement, adding that a decision will be made “when the season ends.” With his team battling Boston in the ALCS, that determination could come as soon as next week, or it could extend into November. Regardless of when he ultimately steps away, Strom will have made a meaningful mark on the game of baseball.

A southpaw whose playing career saw him take the mound for three big-league teams, Strom had his best seasons in 1975 and 1976 when he cumulatively logged a 3.02 ERA over 331 innings with his hometown San Diego Padres. In 1978, he became the second pitcher to undergo Tommy John surgery.

The guidance that he’s subsequently provided is what’s garnered him the most respect. For the past three decades, Strom has tutored hurlers at the minor- and major-league levels, serving as both a coordinator and as a pitching coach. Prior to being hired by Houston in October 2013, he spent six years with St. Louis.

I asked Adam Ottavino about Strom prior to ALCS Game 1.

“We had ‘Strommy’ with the Cardinals toward the end of my time in the minors,” said the Red Sox right-hander, who spent five seasons in the St. Louis system after being drafted out of Northeastern University in 2006. “He worked with me when I was struggling in Double-A, and I really liked the way he talked about there being many different ways to go about pitching. You didn’t have to fit into some small little box. At the time, a lot of people were preaching one way of pitching — kind of pitching to contact and throwing fastballs low in the zone — and he wasn’t afraid to challenge that idea.” Read the rest of this entry »

Every now and then, something happens in a major league game that arouses my interest as a baseball physicist. In the sixth inning of the recent American League Wild Card game, the Red Sox were up 3-1. With Aaron Judge on first and one out, Giancarlo Stanton hit a laser of a shot that bounced high off the left-center field wall at Fenway, barely missing a home run. As it happened, Judge was thrown out at home plate, while Stanton took second on the throw. It was truly a game-changing play. But what I really want to talk about is Stanton’s shot, particularly the distance the ball would have gone had it reached field level unobstructed. That is the usual meaning attached to “home run distance.” Although not normally done, I want to apply it to a single.

As it turns out, there is a wealth of data available that allows us to figure this out. First, we know the Statcast measurement of the launch conditions:

The most important of these parameters, exit velocity and launch angle, are publicly available. Of lesser importance to the calculation are the spray angle, spin rate, and spin axis. Note that the ball is hit very hard and, typical of Stanton, at a somewhat low launch angle. For both those reasons, the spin rate is not particularly large and the spin axis indicates nearly perfect backspin (i.e., very little sidespin). Note also that the small negative spray angle means the ball was hit slightly to the left-field side of center. Read the rest of this entry »

Dillon Tate’s fastballs were primarily sinkers this season. Per Statcast, the 27-year-old Baltimore Orioles reliever threw 615 of them in total, versus just 16 four-seamers. Delivered with a one-seam grip at an average velocity of 95.5 mph, and with a spin rate that ranked in the third percentile, the offering has evolved into Tate’s signature pitch. Buoyed by its increased effectiveness, the right-hander appeared in a career-high 62 games, logging a 4.39 ERA and an almost-identical 4.40 FIP.

Tate discussed the evolution of his fastball(s) when the Orioles played at Fenway Park in mid-September.

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Dillon Tate: “I’d always thrown a four-seam, but the evolution of my fastball changed throughout the years. When I was in high school, I would grip a standard four-seam, like so. But the way I was grabbing it… when you grab it with the horseshoe facing in — it’s making a “C” — and you throw it, the Magnus effect takes over; it will start to bring the ball down, and more so in to a right-handed hitter. When you flip it over — make it a backwards “C” — it fights gravity a little bit more, so will stay truer. I learned that in 2017 from one of my rehab coaches with the Yankees, Greg Pavlick.

“So, I’d been grabbing it [with the horseshoe facing in], and then with the Yankees switched over. I had a little bit of success, but then towards the middle-end of 2018, my fastball was getting hit pretty hard. That’s when I started switching over to a sinker, to a one-seam fastball. On a traditional two-seam fastball, a lot of guys will split the seams. I found comfort in going across the seam, and throwing my fastball with [the pointer finger] on one seam. I started to see my groundball rate go up. It’s turned out to be pretty good movement profile-wise — it dances more than my four-seam fastball did — so it’s been a better option for me. Read the rest of this entry »

One of Dodgers’ biggest moves in last night’s must-win Game 4 came long before the players took the field, when Dave Roberts announced that he would start Walker Buehler on short rest rather than turn to Tony Gonsolin. It was a gamble necessitated by losing an extremely tight Game 3 to fall behind 2-1 in the best-of-five NLDS. Gabe Kapler, for his part, opted to stick to the script of starting Anthony DeSclafani, leaving Game 1 hero Logan Webb waiting in the wings for a potential Game 5. Let’s examine how those decisions played out.

The Early Innings

From the jump, Buehler proved he was up to the task in his first career start on short rest, not looking anything like a diminished version of himself. His velocity was up a full tick, and he worked quickly while hitting his spots.

DeSclafani, on the other hand, was unable to hold serve. His slider-heavy evening (50% usage on the night after 36% during the season) had the Dodgers sitting on the pitch. Their aggressive approach paid off; they swung at four of the first five sliders they saw, which led to three line drives and a quick 1-0 lead. The damage was limited to just the one run, as DeSclafani moved off his slider to strike out Justin Turner and end the inning. Read the rest of this entry »

For the fifth consecutive year, the Astros are headed to the American League Championship Series to face an opponent from the AL East. With a 10–1 win over the White Sox in Tuesday’s ALDS Game 4, they eliminated the Central winners and clinched a date with the Red Sox, who knocked out the Rays on Monday. Up for grabs for Houston: the franchise’s third pennant and World Series trip in that span.

Over the first two innings of Game 4, it looked as if the White Sox were going to send the series back to Houston. Starter Carlos Rodón lit up the radar gun in the opening frame, touching as high as 99.4 mph with his fastball on his 10th pitch of the afternoon. Though he had a stellar regular season overall, he struggled with diminished velocity and shoulder soreness down the stretch; starting him seemed like a gamble for the Sox, especially considering the extra day of rest afforded to them by Monday’s rainout. Even Astros skipper Dusty Baker acknowledged that the lefty’s health would play a huge role, telling reporters that Game 4 “all depends on which Rodón we’re facing.” Read the rest of this entry »

BOSTON — Unlike Sunday’s ALDS Game 3, this one wasn’t quite an instant classic. But it was nonetheless a drama-filled contest that culminated in a final swing of the bat that sent Fenway Park into a state of euphoria. When all was said and done, the Boston Red Sox had defeated the Tampa Bay Rays, thereby winning a hard-fought series in four games and advancing to the ALCS. The final score was 6-5.

Randy Arozarena led off the game by driving a 3-2 pitch from Eduardo Rodriguez up the gap in right center, the trajectory taking it close to the same spot where a pinball-carom caused controversy on Sunday night. This time, Hunter Renfroe made a clean catch, robbing the Tampa Bay outfielder of what looked like a sure double with a lunging, backhanded grab. More spectacular to the naked eye than the .500 expected batting average calculated by Statcast, the catch set the tone for the first two frames.

It was Tampa Bay’s defense that shone after Rodriquez recorded a one-two-three top half. Arozarena and Wander Franco made stellar plays in the bottom half, and Kevin Kiermaier did what Kevin Kiermaier does in the following inning, stealing a hit with a diving catch.

Rodriguez continued dealing. Coming off a Game 1 start in which he didn’t get out of the second inning, the 28-year-old southpaw fanned five over the first three frames with nary a Rays batter reaching. The last of those punch-outs, which came against Austin Meadows leading off the third, was notable for its longevity. A 17-pitch at-bat that featured eight consecutive foul balls after the count went full ended with Meadows waving at an 81.7-mph Rodriguez slider. The next two batters were retired on just three pitches. Read the rest of this entry »

BOSTON — It’s a shame that one team had to lose. In a game that will go down as a postseason classic, the Boston Red Sox walked off the Tampa Bay Rays, 6–4, on a 13th-inning home run by Christian Vázquez to win Game 3 of the ALDS and take a 2–1 series lead.

Now, on to what transpired.

The eventful first inning epitomized modern-era baseball. Red Sox right-hander Nathan Eovaldi fanned three Rays batters in the top half but also gave up an Austin Meadows home run — a 406-foot shot off the back wall of the visiting bullpen — that followed a Wander Franco single. In the bottom half, Rays right-hander Drew Rasmussen was taken deep by Kyle Schwarber — this one at 390 feet — but then fanned Rafael Devers after giving up a 104.8-mph single off the Green Monster by Enrique Hernández.

Eight batters into the game, we had four strikeouts, two home runs, and a pair of singles, one of which would have been a double in 29 other ballparks. Moreover, all four batted balls were hit with triple-digit exit velocity. Again, modern-era baseball: whiffs, dingers, and Statcast readings to measure it all. A three-strikeout, one-walk top of the second only added to the three-true-outcome mix. Read the rest of this entry »

In what might be the most-thrilling play we’ll see all October, Tampa Bay Rays outfielder Randy Arozarena successfully executed a straight steal of home in Game One of the ALDS. Moments later, I shared the following on Twitter:

“Instead of calmly throwing a ball right down the middle for strike three to end the inning, Taylor panicked.”

Journalist friend Bruce Schoenfeld responded as follows:

“That is exactly right. I kept waiting for the announcers to say it. I wrote a [Sports Illustrated] piece on straight steals of home & talked to every active player who’d done it. They agreed that nobody should ever try with two out and two strikes, All the pitcher has to do is throw a strike.”

In other words, Arozarena’s theft could have been nullified.

I checked with a rules expert to make sure Bruce and I weren’t mistaken. According to Chris Welsh — a former big-league pitcher and current Cincinnati Reds radio and TV analyst who runs the website Baseball Rules Academy — we had it right. Had Red Sox reliever Josh Taylor simply remained on the rubber and thrown a pitch that landed in strike zone, the batter would have been out and the inning would have been over. Instead, he made the mistake of stepping off, thereby making himself a fielder and not a pitcher. His hurried heave toward home plate wasn’t nearly in time.

Again, there were two outs and two strikes on the batter. Read the rest of this entry »

After finishing first or second in in the American League in scoring in each of the past four seasons, the 2021 Yankees were supposed to be yet another iteration of the Bronx Bombers. Yet this time around, they scored just 4.39 runs per game, good only for 10th in the league. When they lined up for their do-or-die appearance in the Wild Card Game behind Gerrit Cole, they did so with a lineup featuring just four hitters with a wRC+ of 100 or better, two of whom didn’t join the organization until the trade deadline. After an abrupt exit from the playoffs at the hands of the Red Sox, the question of where the Yankees go from here looms particularly large, but for all the “if the Boss were alive” shrieking from some quarters — fans and media hot-take artistes alike — a radical overhaul of the roster this winter doesn’t appear likely.

For years, the Yankees have relied upon a model of power and patience for their offense, accepting the high strikeout rates that come with it as the cost of doing business. The model worked well enough when juiced baseballs were flying out of parks at record rates; they set single-season team home run records in both 2017 and ’18 and blew past those marks in ’19 even as the Twins edged them by a single dinger.

Amid the backdrop of the de-juiced ball, the Yankees still placed third in the league in homers, but their overall offense was far less potent. Where the major league rate of home runs per plate appearance declined by about 5.5% relative to 2020, theirs dipped by 12%, and that’s with a reasonably full season from Giancarlo Stanton, who clubbed 35 homers in 139 games after being limited to 23 games in 2020. Even with that rebound, injuries deprived the team of some big bats and led to inferior replacements.

Read the rest of this entry »