The Learning and Developing a Pitch series returned this summer after being on a year-long hiatus due to the pandemic. Each week, we’ll hear from three pitchers on a notable weapon in their arsenal. Today’s installment features a pair of right-handers, Joe Barlow and Bailey Ober, and a southpaw, Alex Young, on one of their breaking balls.

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Joe Barlow, Texas Rangers

“I was a fastball-curveball guy until last year. The pandemic happened, then I went to Driveline to see if there was an opening for a better pitch… not even a better pitch, just any pitch in general to add to the repertoire. That way, if my curveball wasn’t on, I wouldn’t just be throwing fastballs.

“I played with changeups, two-seamers, sliders, and cutters. The pitch that I could seemingly best repeat was the slider. Even though it wasn’t good, it seemed like there was an opportunity to grow on that and get it to be a pitch that I could use. So, I went into the offseason and started throwing it. It was meant to be a third pitch — behind the curveball, behind the fastball — but I ended up getting a good feel for it and now it’s almost 50-50 with the fastball. Read the rest of this entry »

I am not going to beat around the bush: Luis Castillo had a miserable start to the season. On Opening Day against the Cardinals, he allowed 10 runs (eight of which were earned) and recorded zero strikeouts in just three and a third innings of work. He bounced back about a week later against Pittsburgh, tossing seven innings with five strikeouts versus one walk without surrendering a run. But despite that showing, Castillo’s Opening Day struggles proved to be more than a blip on the radar for a pitcher who ranked among the top 20 in baseball over the three seasons prior to 2021. At the beginning of May, Castillo still had an ERA above six (6.07); it would not dip below that mark until his June 15 start against Milwaukee. His ERA peaked (apart from the stretch between his first and second start) at 7.61 on May 23. As of this writing, his ERA is 4.20; he has accumulated 3.0 WAR over 163 innings, placing him 26th in the majors among qualifiers.

So what has changed? Back on May 18, Justin Choi wrote about Castillo’s performance through his first eight starts, attempting to diagnose what plagued the Reds right-hander. Justin first looked at Castillo’s changeup, which had long been his most effective offering but which was generating far fewer whiffs than before. Justin found that the pitch was dropping more than it had in the past, though Castillo was still able to locate it just below the lower edge of the strike zone. The rest of Castillo’s repertoire (a sinker, four-seamer, and slider), on the other hand, was being placed right down the pipe. Justin concluded that the location of Castillo’s changeup were so different from that of the rest of his pitches that batters were either laying off the changeup or swinging at the few that landed closer to the heart of the zone.

Since Justin published his analysis, Castillo has compiled a 3.15 ERA and ranks 10th in WAR. Let’s try to locate the difference. Year-over-year, his pitch mix is largely the same:

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Position: Director, Baseball Research

Location: Minneapolis, MN

Position Overview

As Director, Baseball Research, you will serve as a key leader in the Twins organization, overseeing the development of analytical solutions that improve the Club’s baseball performance. You will set the overall vision for Baseball Research and manage the team leads for Core Research, Sports Science, International Amateur Scouting, and Domestic Amateur Scouting (“Baseball Research Subgroups”). You will partner closely with the Director, Baseball Systems to shape the Twins’ internal baseball system. You will communicate findings with coaches, scouts, and front office executives. Read the rest of this entry »

The Class of 2020 has had a long wait for induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, and not just because the coronavirus pandemic set the festivities back nearly 14 months. While Derek Jeter was resoundingly elected in his first year of eligibility, the road to Cooperstown for the other three honorees — Ted Simmons, Larry Walker, and the late Marvin Miller — was more like a maze, full of wrong turns and apparent dead ends. That road finally ends on the afternoon of Wednesday, September 8, when all four will be inducted into the Hall. As somebody who has been deeply invested in the careers and candidacies of all four, I couldn’t bypass the midweek trip, even under pandemic conditions.

“There was never any thought in my head that [my election] was going to happen. So to be completely honest, I didn’t pay much attention,” said Walker during a Zoom session with reporters last Thursday, referring to the annual BBWAA voting. During his first seven years of eligibility, he maxed out at 22.9% of the vote (2012), and dipped as low as 10.2% (2014).

Even those meager showings surpassed Simmons, who received just 3.7% in 1994, his first year of eligibility. “Back then, you were literally off the ballot. And you know, there was really no vehicle at that time that I knew of or heard of that would enable you to come back,” he said during his own Zoom session, referring to the so-called “Five Percent Rule” that sweeps candidates who fail to reach that mark off the ballot.

Simmons could be forgiven for not knowing the ins and outs of the Hall’s arcane election systems. That he even made it onto an Era Committee ballot to have his candidacy reconsidered for the first time in 2011 was itself groundbreaking. As longtime St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Rick Hummel, who has served on several iterations of the Historical Overview Committee that puts together such ballots, said in 2015, “The first question these Hall of Famers ask you is, ‘How many ballots was he on for the writers’ election? One? They must not have liked him very much.’” Read the rest of this entry »

Title: Coordinator – Scouting Operations

Summary
Assist the Domestic Scouting Department with operational tasks as directed. Work with resources across the department, the organization and outside to ensure the smooth operations of the Domestic Scouting Department, with special focus on the Rule 4 draft and Pro Acquisition contexts. Work closely with the R&D and Systems teams to ensure that all data needs are met for Domestic Scouting. Read the rest of this entry »

Please note, this posting contains two positions.

Position: Developer – Baseball Systems

Summary
The Developer – Baseball Systems will collaborate with the Manager and rest of the Application Development team to develop exciting user-facing applications for platforms within Baseball Operations. This position requires strong software development skills and experience, as well as a demonstrated ability for independent thought and the willingness to work within a team framework.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities
Essential duties and responsibilities include the following. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. Other duties may be assigned. Read the rest of this entry »

Brett Baty has a bright future, and he’s showing glimpses of why in his first full professional season. Just 21 years old, the left-handed-hitting third baseman is slashing .291/.378/.471 with 12 home runs in 378 plate appearances between High-A Brooklyn and Double-A Binghamton. Moreover, he’s doing so with a first-round pedigree. Baty was drafted 12th overall by the New York Mets in 2019 out of an Austin, Texas high school.

On paper, he’s a slugger. Ranked No. 2 on our updated Mets Top Prospects list, Baty was described by Eric Longenhagen prior to the season as having “light tower power.” His M.O. differs from that description.

“I like to say that I’m a hitter before the power, and the power is just going to come,” said the 6-foot-3, 210-pound Baty. “I’m just trying to hit the ball hard, wherever it’s pitched. I don’t want to get too pull-happy — try to hit pull-side home runs — so I’m up there thinking ‘line drive to left-center, line drive up the middle.’ Basically, I’m trying to stay within myself at the plate and hit balls hard, wherever they might land.”

Watching balls land over the fence is a thrill for any hitter, and that’s especially true for prospects looking to validate their first-round bona fides. But again, Baty shies away from the bopper label. Read the rest of this entry »

The Twins came into 2021 with postseason aspirations, ones that were quickly dashed by an atrocious start to the season. By the trade deadline, they were dealing for the future; Nelson Cruz, Hansel Robles, and J.A. Happ were all rentals, but José Berríos, who was dealt to the Blue Jays, looked like a key part of the team for both this year and next. Trading him was a calculated gamble that they could sacrifice some certainty next year for future value. Now, 2022 is in even more jeopardy: Kenta Maeda, the team’s best pitcher, will undergo Tommy John surgery and miss a good chunk of next year.

For the Twins, this is obviously brutal news. This season was already a write-off, but they had mostly done a good job of building for next year even as they disappointed in the present. Cruz aside, the team will retain most of its offensive core next year, and while Andrelton Simmons will hit free agency, with Jorge Polanco and Luis Arraez still in the fold, they’ll have a huge array of options for how to replace him. Heck, reunite with Cruz on another one-year deal, and they could field a solid team without any further infield starters needed (Josh Donaldson to third base, Arraez to second, and Polanco to short). Austin Martin, the centerpiece of the team’s return for Berríos, might be ready to bolster that infield depth as soon as next year, as well.

The lineup, however, isn’t the Twins’ biggest problem. It’s underperformed this year, no doubt, but their pitching has been disastrous. They’ve allowed 5.3 runs per game, the third-worst mark in the majors. It’s no sequencing fluke, either: by BaseRuns, they also have the third-worst pitching staff in the big leagues. You won’t win a lot of games if you allow so many runs, regardless of how many bombs you’re hitting on the other side of the ball.
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It’s already September, and maybe you’re still processing that fact. I’ll do you one better by pointing out that the Dodgers and Giants are about to play each other for the final time in the regular season. This is the earliest in the year that these rivals’ last series has occurred since way back in 1968, when Willie Mays and Don Drysdale were fixtures of the rivalry.

With Los Angeles and San Francisco tied atop the division and both teams on pace for 100 wins for the first time since 1962, I thought it prudent to break down what we might expect in this big weekend series.

The Series So Far

The Dodgers and Giants have split their 16 games so far (with San Francisco winning five of the last seven), featuring stellar pitching, unlikely heroes, home run robberies and blown saves. A four-game series in mid-July was full of drama, including Tyler Rogers giving up a walk-off homer to Will Smith, his second three-run outing against the Dodgers this season.

The very next night — actually the next two nights — it was Kenley Jansen who was handed a ninth-inning lead but walked off to a booing home crowd both times after giving up seven combined runs.

That’s just how this series has gone; no lead is safe from a disaster.

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The Yankees snapped a four-game skid on Wednesday against the Angels to avoid a sweep and stay two games ahead of the Red Sox in the AL wild card race. Gerrit Cole was brilliant, striking out 15 en route to his 14th win of the season. Two-out singles from Luke Voit in the third inning and Brett Gardner in the fourth plated most of the runs for the Yankees, with Aaron Judge adding insurance with a solo shot in the eighth.

Perched atop the lineup was DJ LeMahieu, who reached base three times and scored the first run of the game. It’s been a bit of a down year for the veteran second baseman, who earned MVP consideration in the 2019 and ’20 seasons. Not known for his power before that former season, he caught the power bug immediately after joining the Yankees, slugging 36 home runs in 871 plate appearances, good for one home run every 24 trips to the plate. Those aren’t huge power numbers in today’s game, but it’s a much higher frequency of home runs than he managed hitting in Coors Field half the year — three times as often, in fact.

This season has gone very differently in the home run department. LeMahieu leads the team in plate appearances (575) and games played (126) but has gone deep only nine times, a rate that’s much more in line with how he hit prior to coming to New York. So what about his performance has changed?

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