I’ve written quite a bit this year on trends in pitcher aging, specifically velocity loss and gain. In the last iteration I focused on the odds of pitchers gaining velocity back after a season where their fastball dropped by at least 1 mph.

In that piece I listed a few pitchers to keep your eye on given that their velocity was down from 2011. In June, I wrote about CC Sabathia for ESPN and noted that the big lefty is likely beginning to “age”, as the odds are quite a bit higher that pitchers over the age of 30 do not gain their velocity back once they’ve lost it.

After thinking about it a while it occurred to me that there is of course the chance that these pitchers will gain their velocity back by the end of the year (as I noted in both pieces). We know that, generally speaking, pitchers gain velocity as the season goes on. Temperatures rise, and so too do fastball velocities. If this is the case I wondered at what point in the season we can say with greater certainty that a pitcher is throwing as hard as he is going to throw. Is there a particular month where a velocity decline is more likely to translate to or predict a full season velocity decline?
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On Tuesday afternoon, the Kansas City Royals designated left-handed starter Jonathan Sanchez for assignment. The Royals, of course, acquired Sanchez and rightleft-handed pitcher Ryan Verdugo from the San Francisco Giants over the winter, in exchange for Melky Cabrera. At the time, the trade came in for criticism and praise on both sides, which suggested it was a fair deal. Obviously, it was not.

Sanchez started 12 games for the Royals this season but pitched only 53 1/3 innings, an average of fewer than six five innings per start. He was on the disabled list from early May to early June with left bicep tendinitis, the same maladay that kept him the disabled list for more than a month last season. With the Royals, Sanchez’s strikeout rate (6.08/9), walk rate (7.43/9), batting average against (.294), and WHIP (2.04) were all the worst of his career. His FIP was 6.42, the highest in the majors for starters with more than 50 innings pitched.

Throughout his career, which began with the Giants in 2006, Sanchez battled problems with his command. His walk rate never dipped below 4.00/9, even in 2010, his best season in the majors. And yet, there were games — and stretches of games — when Sanchez was quite effective. His no-hitter against the San Diego Padres on July 10, 2009 is one example, but there were others. Because even when Sanchez was wild, he still possessed — until this season — “swing-and-miss” stuff.

Let’s look at some video first, and then delve into the numbers.

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The All-Star Game is over and it’s time to turn our attention to the second half of the season. All of the teams still in contention face questions as games get underway on Friday. We will take a look at those questions in two posts. Today, we’ll discuss what to look for in the National League when play resumes. On Thursday, we’ll address the American League.

The NL East is a four-team race. The Nationals are the leader in the clubhouse at the break, with a four-game lead over the Braves (five in the loss column) and a four-and-a-half-game lead over the Mets (six in the loss column). The Marlins are nine back with the Phillies in last place fourteen games behind the Nats. For the Marlins, that is a lot of ground to make up, but the NL East teams will play a lot of games against each other just after the All-Star Break. That could solidify the Nationals’ lead or tighten the race even further.

The Braves and Mets are essentially tied with the Giants and the Cardinals for the two wild card spots, just behind the Reds, who trail the Pirates by a game in the Central. The Diamondbacks, Marlins and Brewers sit three-and-a-half, four-and-a-half, and five-and-a-half back, respectively.

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Fare thee well, father, mother. I’m off
to de-luck the f*** out of this s***.

With this All-Star break forcing to watch so little baseball, we now have a moment to drink up the frothy milkshake of statistics from the first half. So, you and I, we shall dissect the stats and find out who has been lucky, unlucky and a little of both.

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The minor leagues are a vast landscape of prospects, fillers and veterans. Each year, players from all three of those category impact the major leagues — sometimes for the better, sometimes not. But before they make their September callups or injury replacements, let us familiarize ourselves with some of the standouts.

International League (AAA)
IL Leaderboards

Brad Eldred (.374 OBP, .695 SLG, .465 wOBA, 197 wRC+)

The 31-year-old Eldred was slugging away in the Tigers minor league system (since released and playing in Japan). Like Dan Johnson (173 wRC+) with the White Sox, Eldred would have required multiple injuries before getting consideration at first base. The Tigers have both Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder, while the Sox have a trio in Adam Dunn, Paul Konerko and now Kevin Youkilis. That cavalcade of injuries never came — nor an age of enlightenment in which Delmon Young is no longer a DH in Detroit — Eldred never got a steady shot with the Tigers.

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In this, their long-overdue rebuilding year, the Chicago Cubs have redefined terrible on the North Side. They currently sport an Major League Baseball-low 24 wins and have a dreadful duo of punchless offense and impotent pitching.

But they are not without trade chips as they approach a dark second half. Bryan LaHair and Jeff Samardzija — who possess an attractive blend of affordability and upside — and Ryan Dempster, Geovany Soto and David DeJesus will all get a number of inquiries as the deadline approaches. But the team is particularly eager to sell one asset more quickly than the others. His name is Alfonso Soriano.

Signed to a double-albatross contract — awarding the 36-year-old an $18 million salary through 2012, 2013 and 2014 — Soriano has no hopes of playing at a value commensurate with his income. However, he’s not without his strengths, and for certain teams looking for a power-hitting righty, Soriano might be the right fit.
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There was no suspense as to whether Matt Cain would be the one to finally take a spot next to Johnny Vander Meer in the baseball record books with a second no-hitter in consecutive starts. Mike Trout banged a single to left on Cain’s third pitch of the night Monday against the Angels. Although Cain and the Giants won, the typically consummate righty was far from his sharpest. Cain walked four Angels and allowed six hits and three runs in just five innings. From perfect to not even quality? More common than you might think.

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On the first of June, left-hander Johan Santana labored through 134 pitches and meticulously navigated around five walks to become the first player in New York Mets history to throw a no-hitter.

It was assuredly a special moment for the organization, as well as the entire fan base. The Mets’ manager, Terry Collins, understood the magnitude of the situation. Despite the fact that Santana missed all of 2011 with a shoulder injury and had largely been limited in his pitch counts throughout the year to that point, Collins stuck with his 33-year-old veteran in an attempt to rewrite the history books.

To counteract the extra strain put on the shoulder in that no-hitter, Johan Santana received extra rest before his next start. That decision caused the left-hander to develop rust, according to his manager, and Santana was not sharp against the New York Yankees his next start — he surrendered six runs over five innings, including four home runs.

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After giving up five runs in five innings in Seattle on Saturday, Tim Lincecum’s ERA now stands at 6.19. However, his 3.87 FIP and 3.82 xFIP stand in stark contrast to that mark, and his walk rate, strikeout rate, and home run (or fly ball) rate suggest that his process and results haven’t lined up in the season’s first two months. You can essentially trace the cause of his runs allowed to a .330 BABIP and an 11.4% HR/FB ratio, both of which are categories that have wide variation and less predictive value than more core metrics. In fact, many times, you’ll hear a pitcher who is at one extreme in either BABIP or HR/FB be referred to as being either lucky or unlucky, depending on which side of the spectrum they’re residing on at the moment.

That’s no question that FanGraphs is a contributor to those kinds of statements, as we’ve long supported the idea that pitchers should be evaluated more by their ability to throw strikes and either miss bats or get batters to hit the ball on the ground than they are by the outcomes of when a batter does make contact. We’ve used the term luck to describe fluctuations in BABIP or HR/FB, so any critiques I make about the use of that word are as introspective as they are anything else. But, that said, I do want to suggest that using the word luck to describe Tim Lincecum’s early season results is probably doing a disservice his actual performance.

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A number of pitchers with noticeably lower velocity this year either have landed on the disabled list or have had their seasons cut short due to injury. The Pirates’ Charlie Morton had Tommy John surgery (age 28, down 1.5 mph). The Tigers’ Doug Fister (age 28, down 1.1 mph) and the Blue Jays’ Brandon Morrow (age 27, down 1 mph) have both landed on the DL with oblique injuries. And the White Sox’ John Danks (age 27, down 1.5 mph) just started a stint on the DL due to elbow soreness.

Previously, I found that pitchers who lose at least 1 mph of velocity have over twice the odds of not throwing at least 40 innings in the subsequent year. This could simply be due to ineffectiveness, injury or both. A steep decline in velocity can create — or be a signal for — all sorts of problems. If a pitcher loses velocity simply due to a tired arm, they can increase their chance for injury by trying to pitch through it. Losing velocity also tends to make pitchers less effective over time. And once a pitcher loses velocity, the odds of regaining at least some of it the following year are very low (more on this below).

Today, I want to look at how age impacts the chances of regaining velocity for pitchers and then highlight some hurlers who fans should keep their eyes on this year and next year.

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