A couple Fridays ago, Tyson Ross took a no-hitter against the Diamondbacks into the eighth inning. It was complicated, even as no-hitters go — no-hitters are special, and the Padres have never thrown one, but it should also be more about the team than the player. On top of that, Ross was allowed to throw 127 pitches, and he’s a guy with a record of arm problems. Even going into the eighth, Ross completing the no-hitter seemed highly unlikely. You could argue, if you wanted to, that Andy Green took too great of a risk.

Over the course of that dominant start, Ross racked up ten strikeouts. And as long as we’re here, let’s consider that record of arm problems. Ross had a miserable 2017. That followed a differently miserable 2016, in which he was able to make only one start. What that would suggest is that, these days, Tyson Ross might be fragile. On the other hand, what if he’s not? What if he’s actually all the way better? Because it’s looking to me like Tyson Ross is all the way better.

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The Pittsburgh Pirates enter play today at 17-13, just a half-game behind the division-leading Brewers and Cubs, and a similar distance from a Wild Card spot. Surprisingly, their Pythagorean record basically supports their record to date, as does BaseRuns. By whichever measure one uses, the Pirates have been good — which is no small surprise in light of preseason expectations that characterized this as a rebuilding club.

Still, the Pirates’ start, whilst evidently supportable by the play on the field, has nonetheless been the product of some good fortune. There was the Rays’ decision to offload Corey Dickerson, who has authored a 136 wRC+ and is second on the team in WAR. There’s been the sudden breakout of Francisco Cervelli, who has gone from a poor man’s Russell Martin to something more like prime Jonathan Lucroy. The pitching staff has also helped, with Ivan Nova refusing to walk anyone and Nick Kingham emerging for an excellent debut. With the Dodgers and Nationals off to slow starts and a dogfight emerging in the NL East, there’s at least a plausible path to the postseason in Pittsburgh: they have a 12% chance at a playoff spot after being in the single digits in the preseason.

And that’s why Jung Ho Kang is suddenly relevant again.

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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 fifth installment of this series, we’ll hear from three pitchers — Danny Duffy, David Price, and Sergio Romo — on how they learned and/or developed a specific pitch.

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Danny Duffy (Royals) on His Changeup

“My changeup used to be a two-seam circle. It was a really good pitch in the minor leagues because of the difference in velocity — I could get away with lack of movement — but, up here, it was starting to get ineffective.

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Between West 124th and 125th Streets on St. Nicholas Ave. in Harlem rests a street-level commercial space situated between a Dollar Tree and a Chuck E. Cheese’s, and it is where Adam Ottavino might have saved his career last winter.

The space was a solution to a problem. He lived in the city in the offseason with his wife and two-year-old daughter. In previous offseasons, he had traveled out to Long Island to work and throw at a facility, but the commute and practice time away was beginning to strain his family.

Moreover, Ottavino’s previous throwing partner, Steven Matz, had left the city and moved Nashville, Tenn., after becoming engaged. Finding a throwing partner and facility in Manhattan, the most prized real estate in the country, wasn’t easy. He knew Matt Harvey was one of a few major-league pitchers living in the city in the offseason, so he asked Harvey if he was interested in finding a place to throw, but Harvey declined.

“At that point, I was kind of screwed,” Ottavino said. “I didn’t know what to do.”

Ottavino, a Brooklyn native, required a productive offseason. He was left off the Rockies’ Wild Card roster weeks earlier after an awful 2017 season when he walked nearly seven batters per nine innings, leading to a 16% walk rate. He was in the final year of his contract. He had spent some time at Driveline Baseball after the season ended. He thought he had now had some solutions. He had bought tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment with which to try and make himself a better pitcher. But he needed a place to experiment.

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The Mariners aren’t a difficult team to understand. On the pitching side, they want to get the ball from James Paxton to Edwin Diaz. When those pitchers aren’t available — which is most of the time — the position players need to hit the crap out of the ball. To this point, it’s worked; while the Mariners have been outscored, they are in at least temporary possession of a wild-card slot, with the lineup owning a 109 wRC+. During a four-game weekend series in Cleveland, the Mariners put up 32 runs, which would be a lot of runs against anyone anywhere.

It shouldn’t surprise you to learn that Robinson Cano has been productive. He’s dramatically cut down his swing rate, causing his walk rate to double. Nelson Cruz, Jean Segura, Dee Gordon — these players, also, were supposed to be good. Yet the best hitter on the team has been none other than Mitch Haniger. In other words, Haniger is doing it again. He’s looking to cement his place as the breakout star of the Segura/Taijuan Walker trade.

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Josh Hader entered Monday’s game in the bottom of the seventh inning with the Brewers clinging to a one-run lead. Nine batters and eight strikeouts later, that one-run lead was the margin of victory. Jeff Sullivan predicted this, or something like this, more than two weeks ago in his article titled “Josh Hader Is Becoming Baseball’s Most Valuable Reliever.” You can see a lot of things coming if you read Jeff’s work, as he covered Hader’s arsenal and how the Brewers lefty is carving up hitters:

If Josh Hader isn’t baseball’s most valuable reliever, he’s close. He could get there soon, elbow willing. Plain and simple, he does everything right, going multiple innings at a time and pitching well independent of batter handedness. You could think of him as peak Dellin Betances, another non-closer who racked up strikeouts over 70 or 80 or 90 innings. Betances made four consecutive All-Star Games. Maybe his control is starting to go, but nothing is forever. Hader is that good, and he’s only improved since basically doubling the size of his repertoire.

Fast-forward a couple weeks and here’s the reliever leaderboard for April.

Hader is rightfully up top. That K/9 number is incredible and the 0.42 FIP naturally follows. Maybe most interesting is that Hader is the only pitcher on the leaderboard who has given up a home run. In small samples like what we have through one month, a homer makes a pretty significant difference. The only other pitchers among the top 20 of reliever WAR with a homer allowed are Craig Kimbrel and Bud Norris. For Hader to top the list despite allowing a home run is truly remarkable. That homer, to Tommy Pham on April 11, was very nearly not a homer considering it was called a double on the field and required a review to be turned into a home run. If that ball was a few feet shorter, Hader’s FIP for the month would have been -0.30. If you were wondering if that would have been some sort of record, the answer is yes, it would have.

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Daniel Robertson has been scorching the horsehide. With 84 plate appearances under his belt — just enough to qualify for our leaderboards — the 24-year-old Tampa Bay Rays infielder ranks fourth from the top in both wOBA (.451) and wRC+ (189). His slash line heading into the Month of May is a stand-up-and-take-notice .333/.476/.561.

He credits an adjustment for his fast start. Rightly unsatisfied with his rookie-season output — Robertson logged a .634 OPS in part-time duty — he spent the winter revamping his stroke under the tutelage of a pair of hitting gurus. No longer satisfied with a “pretty generic swing,” he’s now embracing launch angle (a term he uses cautiously) and adopting a rhythm-conscious mindset that allows him to transfer his energy through the baseball.

Robertson talked about his new mechanics and approach when the Rays visited Fenway Park over the weekend.

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Robertson on making the adjustment: “I got knocked for what I did offensively last year. I feel that I impressed with what I did defensively, but for my whole career I’ve always been a hitter. I think I’m starting to show that again this year, thanks in part to things I worked on in the offseason. I’m putting myself in a better position to hit and that’s translating into me seeing the ball a lot better, as well as doing damage rather than having a defensive swing and just slapping it around.

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