Clayton Kershaw New Trick Status Update

Clayton Kershaw is starting Game 1 of the NLDS for the Dodgers, and that’ll be a welcome sight for a team that wasn’t sure if he’d even be able to make it back for the playoffs at all. There’s no replacing Kershaw’s presence, and there’s no replacing Kershaw’s stuff. When Kershaw returned from the disabled list, he brought his stuff. And it turns out he even brought something extra!

In a start against the Rockies, Kershaw twice dropped his arm slot. That wasn’t much, but it was something new, and I put something together on the subject. Kershaw was inspired to mess around by teammate/apparent superstar? Rich Hill, who’s made a habit of varying his looks. It turns out Kershaw used to throw from a lower slot in high school, so the twist didn’t come completely out of nowhere, but it was still worth wondering after that game whether Kershaw would re-visit the trick. It could’ve easily been a one-off.

We can say now the trick has been re-visited. Maybe it’ll be a two-off, but Kershaw dropped his arm five times in his last start against the Giants. This is now something for the Nationals to be aware of, and this is now something for you to look out for from home.

Time to run through all the relevant video clips. You know how Clayton Kershaw normally throws, right? Let’s say you don’t. This is how Clayton Kershaw normally throws:

Very much over the top. That style gives Kershaw a certain deceptiveness, and it’s also where he gets his true 12-to-6 curve, and straight rising fastball. If you just step outside to throw a ball around, it might hurt you to try to throw that over-the-top, because it doesn’t feel like such a natural slot, but Kershaw has made it work and mastered it over his years. Clayton Kershaw is an overhand pitcher. Here now are five pitches he threw to the Giants from more of a three-quarters slot:

I still don’t love the way Kershaw finishes this delivery. He has a lot of body momentum seemingly carrying him toward first base. But there’s no denying the velocity, and you can see how this would take a hitter by surprise. One is inclined to want to give Kershaw the benefit of the doubt. To run through a few quick observations: You’ll see that Kershaw has done this against both lefties and righties. Interestingly, all seven times Kershaw has dropped down so far, he’s done so in two-strike counts. He’s also only thrown fastballs. Three have been taken out of the zone. One was taken in the zone. One got a whiff, one was grounded out, and one was hit in the air. It’s a sample size of only seven, but it’s five in a game, after it was two in a game, after it was zero in so many games.

Through September 19, Kershaw hadn’t dropped down. Here are all of his pitch velocities and spin axes:

Here is what’s different, over the past two turns:

It’s subtle there, but it’s less subtle in the spreadsheet. Kershaw’s low slot gives him good velocity, and, most importantly, there’s this: his average fastball has 0.7 inches of horizontal break. It’s almost perfectly straight (along that plane). When Kershaw has dropped down, his fastballs have averaged 6.9 inches of horizontal break. So that’s a half-foot of run, which Kershaw otherwise doesn’t feature. The drop-down fastballs also have three fewer inches of rise, because they just move in a different direction. It is, effectively, a brand-new pitch. It’s a fastball that Clayton Kershaw has never thrown.

What you’re free to question is the effectiveness. Kershaw’s lower slot hasn’t led to pinpoint location. It still might; watch for it today! But you also wonder if it might be too easy of a giveaway. As I mentioned earlier, the seven times Kershaw has dropped down, he’s thrown seven fastballs. Rich Hill throws both fastballs and breaking balls when he drops down, so there’s nothing to predict. That just doubles the size of his repertoire. With Kershaw, you might see that arm slot and know a heater is coming, a heater with tail to it.

I can’t speak to that too much. I don’t know if Kershaw can throw a decent breaking ball from down there. I don’t know if he’s been specifically waiting to do that until a playoff game. The size of this sample is seven pitches. So I can’t wait to see what the Nationals see. And ultimately, even if Kershaw does only throw low-slot heaters, that’s still one more thing you have to prepare yourself against. You might identify a low-slot heater is coming, but up until that instant, you don’t know if it’ll be an overhand heater, slider, or curve. This is still Clayton Kershaw. Kershaw was literally the last starting pitcher on the planet who needed to do something to make himself more difficult to face.

But, you know what they say, the best players are never satisfied. Kershaw knows a new twist probably wouldn’t make him worse, and maybe it’ll give him an edge in a critical at-bat or two in the coming weeks. He might only throw low-slot fastballs, but he could conceivably mix in a low-slot slider. He might only throw low-slot two-strike pitches, but he could conceivably mix in a low-slot first pitch to steal a strike. The promise here is all about uncertainty, and this is just one more way that the Nationals might struggle to do any damage.

Or, the low-slot pitch could disappear entirely. Maybe Kershaw has already decided to put it in his back pocket. But the mysteriousness already exists, because of what he did his last two times out. Nationals hitters have now heard about Clayton Kershaw dropping down. At least for now, it might not even matter whether he does it at all. The seed has been planted, and the mind of a hitter facing Kershaw already has plenty of plants.