Archive for Teams

Pitchers learn and develop different pitches, and they do so at varying stages of their lives. It might be a curveball in high school, a cutter in college, or a changeup in A-ball. Sometimes the addition or refinement is a natural progression — graduating from Pitching 101 to advanced course work — and often it’s a matter of necessity. In order to get hitters out as the quality of competition improves, a pitcher needs to optimize his repertoire.

In the eleventh installment of this series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Tyler Clippard, A.J. Minter, and Seung Hwan Oh — on how they learned and/or developed a specific pitch.

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Tyler Clippard (Blue Jays) on His Changeup and Splitter

“My changeup is a pitch I’ve been throwing since I was 13 or 14 years old. It’s always been the same grip, kind of a circle change. The grip itself isn’t that unusual as far as how most people grip their changeup. The biggest thing I think I do a little differently than most guys is that I have the ability to kind of kill my lower half. That stems from a pitching coach I had at an early age. I took what he said to heart and developed a feel for not pushing off the rubber, for having a soft front side. Read the rest of this entry »

Just a few quick notes on the prospects Kansas City received from Arizona today, in exchange for CF Jon Jay. Those minor leaguers are RHP Elvis Luciano and LHP Gabe Speier.

Luciano is a live-armed 18-year-old Dominican righty who spent most of 2017 in the DSL, then came to the U.S. in August for a month of Rookie-level ball, then instructional league. I saw him during instructs when he was 90-94 with an average curveball, below-average changeup, and below command, especially later in his outing as he tired. He was an honorable-mention prospect on the D-backs list.

His velocity has mostly remained in that range this spring, topping out at 96. Luciano’s delivery has been changed to alter his glove’s location as he lifts his leg, probably to help him clear his front side a little better. He’s still had strike-throwing issues and might be a reliever, but he has a live arm and can spin a breaking ball. Though 18, Luciano’s frame doesn’t have much projection, so while he might grow into some velocity as he matures, it probably won’t be a lot. He’s an interesting, long-term flier who reasonably projects as a back-end starter.

As for Speier, he’s repeating Double-A. He’s a sinker/slider guy, up to 95 with an average slide piece. He projects as a bullpen’s second lefty and should be viable in that type of role soon.

Episode 818
Travis Sawchik, past author of one book and future author (with The Ringer’s Ben Lindbergh) of another one, recently conducted an interview in the White Sox clubhouse with a player he assumed, for good reason, was Matt Davidson. Also addressed: the competitive advantage of a multipositional catcher and Sawchik’s interview with White Sox announcer Jason Benetti.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 46 min play time.)

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The Dodgers are now back to having as many wins as losses. That’s not anything amazing — it has them tied with the Pirates — but as recently as May 16, the Dodgers were 16-26. Their most recent win was a five-run decision in Pittsburgh. Leading the way was Ross Stripling, who got the start and spun five shutout innings. He didn’t walk a batter, and he struck out seven. Back in March, the Dodgers wouldn’t have imagined they’d be here. Stripling’s start, though, was a representative one.

I’ve been on something of a Dodgers theme lately. That’s a coincidence, but then, the Dodgers’ early story is compelling. They haven’t gotten much from their supposed best players, and they’ve been lifted by a handful of surprises. The other day, I wrote about the surprising Max Muncy. Tuesday, I wrote about the surprising Matt Kemp. Now it’s time to write about the surprising Ross Stripling. When I woke up yesterday, Kemp was the Dodgers’ team leader in WAR. Stripling has now taken over the spot. Not bad for someone expected to pitch out of the bullpen.

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It’s been a rough year for AL second basemen on the wrong side of 30. Robinson Cano, 35, was recently hit with an 80-game PED suspension. Dustin Pedroia, 34, played just three games last week before going back on the disabled list with inflammation in the same knee that had sidelined him for the season’s first two months. Jason Kipnis has played more like 41 years old than 31, and fellow 31-year-old Brian Dozier has been merely average. The oldest of them all, the soon-to-be 36-year-old Ian Kinsler, has been one of the majors’ worst. It’s increasingly possible that his days as a productive regular are over.

After homering just twice in the Angels’ first 54 games, Kinsler went yard three times in a five-game span from May 29 to June 2, going 11-for-20 in those games against the Tigers and Rangers — Kinsler’s two previous teams, incidentally, both in the bottom half of the league in terms of run prevention. Even with the aforementioned hot streak, however, the returns on Kinsler have been underwhelming. He entered Tuesday hitting just .212/.279/.348. Out of 85 AL batting-title qualifiers, his on-base percentage ranked 80th, his slugging percentage 78th, his 74 wRC+ 77th, with Pedroia fill-in Eduardo Nuñez, Kipnis, and the Tigers’ Dixon Machado the only AL second basemen below him in the last of those categories. Kinsler’s glove has been strong enough (5.3 UZR) to just push his value into the black.

When the Angels traded a pair of low-level prospects for Kinsler last December, it appeared to be a worthwhile gamble. The six players who had toiled at the keystone for their 2017 squad (Kaleb Cowart, Danny Espinosa, Nolan Fontana, Nick Franklin, Cliff Pennington, and Brandon Phillips) had combined for a league-worst 63 wRC+ at the position and just 0.2 WAR. Tellingly, that sextet has combined for all of 39 big league plate appearances this year. While Kinsler was coming off a career-worst season with the bat (.236/.313/.412, 91 WRC+), his typically solid baserunning (1.5 BsR) and fielding (7.8 UZR) boosted his value to 2.5 WAR, 12th in the majors at the position. With an $11 million salary in his final year before free agency, he seemed like both a solid stopgap and an upgrade at the same time.

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CLEVELAND — Josh Hader wasn’t first.

Andrew Miller was the first elite relief arm deployed in multi-inning, non-save, high-leverage situations — at least in the current version of the game. Chris Devenski has carved out a similar role in Houston, too.

But Hader is a trailblazing figure in his own right.

What’s a little different about Hader is that, unlike so many elite relievers, he is not a failed major-league starter. Unlike Miller, for example, he assumed a relief role immediately upon reaching the majors. And unlike, say, a David Price or Chris Sale — that is, other powerful left-handed starting prospects who debuted as relievers — Hader isn’t merely biding his time until a spot opens in the rotation. Hader does not just fill a need in the Brewers’ bullpen. Instead, the club feels he has real value there. And rather than fight against the role or eye a return to starting, Hader has embraced his work.

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Managing in the majors is different than managing in the minors. In the opinion of Brian Snitker, it’s a lot different. And he should know: prior to taking the helm in Atlanta in May 2016, Snitker skippered Braves farm clubs in Rookie ball, Low-A, High-A, Double-A, and Triple-A. Interspersed with three stints as a big-league coach, he managed in the minor leagues for 20 seasons.

He’s proven to be more than capable at the highest level. Now in his second full season on the job, Snitker — a 62-year-old baseball lifer who has helped nurture countless careers — has his young Atlanta squad 11 games over .500 and in first place in the National League East.

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Brian Snitker: “Your daily norm isn’t close to the same in the major leagues as it is in the minor leagues. After I got this job, I remember telling my wife, ‘It’s like I can’t get there early enough to have any time for my myself. All I do is talk.’ I could probably change the hinges on the door once a week, because every time I turn around there’s either a player, a coach, a front-office person, medical staff, or a media person coming into my office and closing the door. You have a piece of everything that’s going on here. This is a lot more involved job than managing in the minor leagues ever was.

“I always loved having a relationship with the players in the minor leagues. I wanted to be invested in what they were doing. It’s a different relationship here, because these guys are grown men. They have families. In the minors, especially in the low minors, they’re getting their electricity cut off because they paid $300 for a pair of tennis shoes, or bought their girlfriend a dog, instead of paying their bills. You’re more of a father figure in the lower minor leagues.

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In most cases, a player’s end-of-season statistics provide a pretty decent sense of how his campaign went. Are his numbers good? Then he was probably good for most of the year. Below average? Chances are, he was generally weak.

This isn’t the case with Michael Wacha, however. Since the beginning of the 2014 season, Wacha has put up at least 100 innings and a FIP below four every single year. The fraternity of pitchers who’ve done the same is pretty select. Chris Archer, Madison Bumgarner, Carlos Carrasco, Jacob deGrom, Gio Gonzalez, Clayton Kershaw, Dallas Keuchel, Corey Kluber, Jose Quintana, Chris Sale, Danny Salazar,  Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg, and Justin Verlander are the only others ones to do it. The Cardinals right-hander has joined that group, however, not by means of consistently strong performances, but rather due to a combination of brilliant periods offset by decidedly poor ones.

After taking a no-hitter into the ninth inning on Sunday, Wacha appears to be in the midst of a good stretch currently. Wacha gained notoriety in 2013 when he finished off September with five good starts followed by an excellent run in the postseason before the Boston Red Sox got to him in the World Series. Since then, Wacha has had stretches of being a very good pitcher, but inconsistency and injuries have prevented Wacha from becoming the ace many hoped he would be after his late-season success in his first campaign. The chart below depicts Wacha’s 10-game rolling FIP since the beginning of 2014.

If there’s a pattern, it is that, at some point in every season, Wacha pitches really well for a time before things fall apart and he ends the season poorly. Wacha suffered a stress reaction in his scapula back in 2014, and has worked hard to strengthen his shoulder over the years, but he hasn’t yet found a solution to make it through the season unscathed. Last year was arguably Wacha’s best as a pro, but before a strong September, he struggled in August with a 5.24 FIP and a 6.04 ERA. While it is probably pretty easy to chalk up Wacha’s struggles to injury, breaking down his successes might be more useful in assessing his current talent level.

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Although the Nationals just lost three out of four to the Braves and are still running in second place behind Atlanta, things have generally been going Washington’s way lately. Since starting the year 11-16, they’ve gone an NL-best 22-9 (.710) with the majors’ third-best Pythagorean winning percentage (.685) in that span. They’ve dealt with a slew of injuries, but Anthony Rendon is back, 19-year-old Juan Soto has made an impressive splash, the Matt Adams/Mark Reynolds tandem has significantly outproduced the absent Ryan Zimmerman, and both Daniel Murphy and Adam Eaton could rejoin the lineup soon.

Yet Bryce Harper remains an enigma — a productive enigma, to be fair. The 25-year-old right fielder leads the NL with 18 homers. Despite a torrid start to his 2018 season, however — he hit eight homers in his first 17 games — he’s just 11th in the league in wRC+ (134, on .232/.371/.527 hitting), sixth in slugging percentage, 16th in on-base percentage, and tied for 27th in WAR (1.4). Not thrilling, but nice — after all, Harper is a career .281/.385/.516 (141 wRC+) hitter who last year batted .319/.413/.595 (156 WRC+). We all know that he’s capable of more than what he’s shown this year. Hundreds of millions of dollars, in the form of his next contract, are riding on it.

The direction of Harper’s trend this year is unmistakable:

Harper went from hitting .247/.458/.528 (158 wRC+) in April to hitting .223/.289/.563 (125 wRC+) in May, but those monthly splits conceal a more drastic falloff, albeit one that relies upon selective endpoints, which are displayed here for the purposes of rubbernecking only:

Woof. Lately, Harper’s funk is even deeper. Over his past 10 starts (plus one pinch-hitting appearance), he’s hitting .209/.271/.442 with four walks and 21 strikeouts in 48 plate appearances.

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When I wrote about Max Muncy, I pointed out how strange a season it’s been for the Dodgers. Many of the best players have been hurt, or they’ve underperformed. Meanwhile, they’ve been supported by surprises like Muncy, Ross Stripling, and Matt Kemp. Muncy has been one of the team’s better hitters. Stripling has been the team’s most valuable pitcher. And Kemp has been the team’s most valuable overall player. I mean that in terms of WAR — Kemp has the highest figure on the club. At +1.8, he’s already done more than he did in any of the previous three years.

I skipped right by that when I was writing about Muncy, because I was writing about Muncy. But it’s just as big a deal. Remember, nobody wanted Kemp. Even the Dodgers didn’t want Kemp. It appeared he’d declined into being a valueless player. When he was traded, he wasn’t traded because of his skills; he was traded because of his contract. Now we’re more than two months into 2018, and Kemp’s a major reason why the Dodgers are even alive. His present WAR alone might be the most astonishing early statistic.

I want to drill a little deeper. Kemp’s WAR is surprising. One component of his WAR is even more surprising.

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