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 this installment of the series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Tony Barnette, Ryne Stanek, and Nick Tropeano — on how they learned and developed their split-finger fastballs.

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Tony Barnette, Chicago Cubs

“When I was in Japan, I had a changeup as a starter. It was getting hit. Working on it in bullpens, I remember a couple of Japanese coaches, through a translator, asking me, ‘Why do you throw that pitch?’ I told them that I needed something off-speed, something to use away to lefties. They were like, ‘You’re right, you do. But that’s not it. It’s awful. You need to get rid of it.’

“A lot of guys in Japan throw a split, so they got me on that. I started playing with different grips, and found one that worked for me. If you look at a baseball, the seams are crazy. They go all over. Basically, you split your fingers and find seams. You find seams that fit your hand. Then, one day you have that ‘aha’ moment where it’s ‘Oh my god, this works.’ From there, you working on it more. Read the rest of this entry »

The majority of Mike Scioscia’s coaches accompanied him out the door when the Angels made a managerial change after last season. Their replacements came both from other organizations — pitching coach Doug White (Astros) being notable — and from internal promotions.

I’m not privy to the conversations GM Billy Eppler and/or new manager Brad Ausmus had with the outgoing staff members, but they likely uttered some form of “We’ve decided to go in another direction” when passing out the pink slips.

According to Eppler, the revamping of the staff wasn’t reflective of a philosophical shift. The decisions were driven by a desire to travel north in the standings.

“I wouldn’t say that anything changed,” Eppler told me recently. “When we came over here in 2015, we implemented philosophies throughout the organization — how we’re valuing players, how we want to coach players, and so forth. Nothing new was implemented this year.”

The characteristics Eppler is looking for — not just on the coaching staff, but throughout the organization — can be encapsulated in a single, hyphenated sentence: Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh and Sam Miller banter about Max Scherzer’s supremacy and the changes coming to the Atlantic League in 2019 as part of its partnership with MLB, include an altered base size, mound distance, strike zone, and more, then preview the 2019 Nationals (29:00) with Washington Post columnist Barry Svrluga, and the 2019 Seattle Mariners (1:04:16) with Seattle Times Mariners beat writer Ryan Divish.

Audio intro: Pixies, "Debaser"
Audio interstitial 1: Grateful Dead, "He’s Gone"
Audio interstitial 2: The Baseball Project, "Ichiro Goes to the Moon"
Audio outro: Chip Taylor & Carrie Rodriguez, "Play it Again Sam"

Link to Kershaw/Scherzer article
Link to Atlantic League-MLB press release
Link to Sam on Hamilton and Bolt
Ben’s article on moving the mound
Link to Cooper article about moving the mound
Link to Jeff on banning the shift
Link to Barry’s book, The Grind
Link to preorder The MVP Machine

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FanGraphs is headed to Arizona for spring training, and we want to share a few drinks and some baseball talk with our readers. So come join us today, Friday, March 8 from 7 to 10 pm at the Two Brothers Scottsdale Tap House & Brewery. We’ve reserved the upstairs loft, and will have appetizers for everyone. It’s a great chance to meet other baseball fans and chat with a bunch of your favorite FanGraphs writers.

If you plan on joining us, we would appreciate you RSVPing using this handy Google form, so we know how much food to order.

Details
Friday, March 8 from 7 to 10 pm
Two Brothers Scottsdale Tap House & Brewery, upstairs loft
4321 N. Scottsdale Rd, Scottsdale

FanGraphs/RotoGraphs Attendees

• David Appelman
• Alex Chamberlain
• Sean Dolinar
• Craig Edwards
• Dylan Higgins
• Jay Jaffe
• Brad Johnson
• David Laurila
• Eric Longenhagen
• Kiley McDaniel
• Al Melchior
• Meg Rowley
• Paul Sporer
• Rian Watt
• Jeff Zimmerman

We hope to see you there!

Rowan Wick has a short, quick arm and plus velocity. He also has a good backstory. The 26-year-old right-hander didn’t begin pitching until 2015, three years after he was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals. Four years and two organizations later, he’s currently competing for a spot in the Cubs bullpen. Chicago’s North Side club acquired Wick from San Diego over the offseason in exchange for Jason Vosler.

A lack of power isn’t why he failed to make the grade as a position player. The problem was contact. In 2014, Wick swatted 20 home runs in just 298 plate appearances between short-season State College and Low-A Peoria, but he also fanned 94 times. He then ventured even further into blind-squirrel territory the following year. Prior to being converted, Wick went down by way of the K a staggering 50 times in just 133 plate appearances.

Midway through May of that 2015 season, Wick was informed that he would henceforth be standing on a bump. Given his travails with the stick, he was in no position to argue.

“When they told me I was going to pitch, it was kind of, ‘OK, this is my last shot,’” Wick recalled thinking. “At that point, you’ve got to buy in, right? I’d started as a catcher, then went to the outfield, and now I was a pitcher. After that, you really can’t make any more moves. It was either pitch or go home.” Read the rest of this entry »

Ben Lindbergh (re)introduces new co-hosts Sam Miller of ESPN and Meg Rowley of FanGraphs. Together, they explain the show’s new format and schedule, pay tribute to departed co-host Jeff Sullivan, and answer listener emails about a team made of clones of Ken Griffey Jr., how to reacclimate to baseball after taking an offseason off, and what they’re most anticipating about the 2019 season.

Audio intro: The Frames, "New Partner"
Audio outro: The Lemon Twigs, "As Long As We’re Together"

Link to Griffey clone commercial
Link to Ben’s Griffey scouting report article
Link to Sam’s Belt/beer vendor article
Link to Sam on position players pitching
Link to Sam’s Bartolo article
Link to preorder The MVP Machine

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The Yankees got a bit of a nasty surprise this week when their ace, Luis Severino, felt a twinge of pain in his right shoulder after throwing a slider while warming up for an exhibition game against the Atlanta Braves on Tuesday. The team immediately shut down Severino for the next two weeks, meaning that Opening Day is out, and even if everything goes smoothly, he’s looking at a mid-to-late-April return to the rotation.

The team reported nothing of concern from Severino’s MRI, but I think that the situation is scary enough that the Yankees need to move more urgently in the direction of acquiring short-term rotation help. Severino is the one pitcher the Yankees cannot afford to lose, as he is both their best starting pitcher and their most durable one.

Since Severino’s 2017 emergence, he’s been responsible for 35% of the rotation’s WAR and has thrown 50 more innings than the runner-up, Masahiro Tanaka. Severino is also not the only Yankee starter with concerns; James Paxton is a terrific pitcher, albeit one with a significant injury history, and CC Sabathia is coming off heart surgery and really just a five-inning starter as he enters his grand farewell season. Without making an additional free agent signing, the Yankees already faced pretty good odds that they’d have to turn to one of their in-house options already, even if we no longer consider Tanaka’s elbow a ticking time bomb as we did a few years ago.

There are three pitchers the Yankees are likely to turn to as their Plan Bs: Jonathan Loaisiga, Domingo German, and Luis Cessa. Loaisiga was ranked as the No. 2 prospect by my colleagues Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel in their recent review of the team’s top prospects, and the ZiPS projections for Loaisiga agree that he’d be a capable fill-in, with a projected ERA+ of 96 as a full-time starter. He also pitched better than his 5.11 ERA in his brief major-league stint suggested, striking out 12 batters per nine for a 3.53 FIP (it’s extremely unlikely he’s actually a .383 BABIP pitcher). Read the rest of this entry »

Sunk costs are difficult for all of us. We might keep a gym membership longer than we should hoping to get some value out of it despite not going for months. We might finish a meal that was terrible from the start because we cooked it or paid for it. We finish movies and books we know we will not enjoy. Once some of our money or time has been spent, there is a pull to keep spending or wasting that time and potential enjoyment because we’ve already started. Sometimes, baseball teams are just like us. Once a big contract is handed out, teams feel compelled to continue to provide playing time past the point of utility or give a roster spot to a player whose play doesn’t merit it. That’s not always the case, though. Sometimes teams move on, and when they do, they end up with dead money on their payroll.

This is my fourth year tracking dead money on payrolls and while the amount fluctuated greatly from 2016 to 2017, going from under $150 million to $300 million, last year it was back around $200 million, and it remains the same this season. As to what counts as dead money, this is what I said in last year’s post:

Dead money is generally any money a team is paying out to a player who no longer appears on their 40-man roster. There are three types of dead money:

1. Money paid to players who have been released. Those players are free to sign with other teams, but the team releasing the player still owes the money remaining on the contract.

2. Money paid to other teams as compensation for players who have been traded. Generally, we see teams cover a portion of a contract to receive a better return in trade.

3. Money paid to players who are still in the organization, but who have been removed from the 40-man roster. Any team could have claimed these players if they were willing to take on the contract, and the player probably could have elected fee agency, but then he would forfeit his right to the guaranteed money.

While Jacoby Ellsbury’s salary sits on the Yankees payroll with no expected contribution, that money is only mostly dead. As far as which team has the most money this season, that honor, or dishonor, goes to the Los Angeles Dodgers. These numbers were compiled from Cot’s Contracts.

The Dodgers have been first or second on this list every year I’ve done this exercise, spending close to $140 million since 2016 on players not on their roster. This year’s big expenditure comes in the form of Homer Bailey, who the team acquired from the Reds in order to move Matt Kemp’s contract as well as acquire a few prospects in the deal that sent Yasiel Puig and Alex Wood to Cincinnati. The Blue Jays come in just behind the Dodgers as the team that decided to cut bait with the oft-injured Troy Tulowitzki as well as trade Russell Martin to the Dodgers. The moves by the Dodgers and Blue Jays illustrate contrasting styles when it comes to dead money on the roster. Los Angeles acquired Homer Bailey to drop him in a move designed to save tax space as they exchanged Kemp’s bad contract. For the Blue Jays, who are not expected to compete for the division this season, giving playing time and roster spots to aging veterans doesn’t help the club’s future as those resources can be better utilized by providing meaningful experience to younger players. Nearly one-third of Toronto’s payroll won’t even be on the team and the club’s on-field roster is set to make under $80 million this season.

Breaking the money down, here are the players who have been released by their teams.

In Prince Fielder’s case, the Tigers are paying some of his salary and a discount for insurance proceeds has been taken. It would be useful to do the same with David Wright, though those numbers are a bit more murky. We know that Wright restructured his contract with some deferrals so that he will make $9 million this year. It’s possible that insurance proceeds, estimated at $12 million by Ken Davidoff over the next two seasons might mean the Mets aren’t actually paying any money to Wright this season. The Padres essentially bought a draft pick by taking on some of Phil Hughes’ salary last year, while also taking on Olivera, who they immediately released, allowed them to get out from under Matt Kemp’s money.

As for trades, here are the players for whom teams are paying some or all of their salaries this season. There are a few repeat names from the list above.

Most of these deals are pretty straightforward, with the old team offsetting some salary to get a deal done or receive a better prospect return. The Edwin Encarnacion situation is a bit complicated. Cleveland and Seattle swapped Carlos Santana and Encarnacion with Seattle actually sending a couple million dollars to Cleveland for this season and $4 million next year. That was not the entirety of the deal; Tampa Bay sent $5 million to Seattle as part of the deal with Cleveland that sent Jake Bauers to the Indians for Yandy Diaz and Cole Sulser. It’s fair to think of that $5 million as shipped through Cleveland, which is how Encarnacion ends up with $3 million from Cleveland this season.

There are just a few more players with payroll qualifying for dead money.

We have multiple, big contracts for Cuban players who haven’t quite worked out. Tomas’ deal couldn’t even be made under the current rules, while Castillo suffers, in part, because adding him back on the roster would result in more competitive balance tax payments. Tomas didn’t make enough contact despite swinging a lot. Castillo has played well in the minors though still wouldn’t be a starter for Boston even if they did bring him up to the majors. Sierra is still in the Dodgers’ system and could be a reliever at some point.

Having a bunch of money on the payroll devoted to players who won’t contribute to the MLB team isn’t a great situation to consider; most of the decisions made above were done to help teams reach some goal, now or in the future. Teams have finite roster space and using that space on players who can contribute is better than using it on a player just because they have an expensive contract. Sometimes teams save money in the present, but have a bigger cost later on. While teams have gotten more frugal about long-term deals, we haven’t yet seen the amount of dead money on MLB rosters decrease significantly.

On Wednesday, the Texas Rangers agreed to a four-year contract extension with closer Jose Leclerc worth $14.75 million with two additional option years worth $6 million and $6.25 million, respectively. Leclerc, 25, was one of the most pleasant surprises on a rather dismal Rangers team in 2018 and ranked fourth in baseball among in relievers in WAR, behind only Blake Treinen, Edwin Diaz, and Josh Hader. Among all pitchers with 30 innings pitched in 2018, Leclerc ranked fifth in ERA (1.56), fifth in FIP (1.90), and 11th in strikeout percentage (38.1%).

Given Leclerc’s lack of leverage with four years until free agency, the contract is unsurprisingly not for a princely sum, and isn’t even in the same galaxy as the four-year, $42 million extension Craig Kimbrel signed with the Braves before the 2014 season. The extension buys out all of Leclerc’s arbitration years, possibly resulting in a six-year deal with the options. These types of arbitration year extensions may be rarer for relievers than you think; to my surprise, after a quick perusal of contracts, I only found seven pre-free agency relievers whose current contract involved a multi-year extension with option years: Brad Hand, Nate Jones, Chris Devenski, Sean Doolittle, Jeremy Jeffress, Tony Barnette, and Felipe Vazquez. While it’s certainly possible I missed a contract or two, showing this type of commitment to a reliever prior to free agency is not a run-of-the-mill occurrence.

[Adam Morris of has reminded me that Tony Barnette signed as as free agent from Japan – DS]

One thing notable about Leclerc is how quickly he went from being an interesting-but-very-wild pitcher to one of the elite relievers in baseball. The ZiPS projection for Leclerc going into 2018 was a 4.22 ERA, 107 ERA+ season with an abysmal 51 walks in 70 1/3 innings, and ZiPS was not an outlier here. Now, in a sense it’s impressive that a pitcher forecast for that many walks could still have a projection that placed them around league-average, but baseball history is full of hard-throwing young relievers who never get over their propensity to issue free passes. A 5.1 BB/9 in the minors isn’t generally conducive to a long major league career. Read the rest of this entry »