Sunday Notes: Tribe’s McKenzie, Mariners’ Motter, Barnette on the Shuuto, SSS Match-up Comps, more

Triston McKenzie has a big arm. He’s also charismatic with a big heart, which helps make him a natural fit for the team that drafted him 42nd overall in 2015. As much as any organization in baseball, the pitching-rich Cleveland Indians value character and makeup.

McKenzie has all the makings of a role model, but at 19 years old, he is hesitant to set it as a goal. He would nonetheless embrace that sort of reputation.

“I wouldn’t try to put myself in that position, but if that’s what happens, that’s what happens,” said McKenzie, who has a 2.84 ERA this year with high-A Lynchburg. “I always try to set a good example for my younger (16 year old) brother, and I guess it would stem from there.”

McKenzie pays attention to players he can look up to, and model his game after. He feels that athletes who set good examples are not only “good for the culture of baseball,” they also “open eyes for a lot of people outside the game.”

His father isn’t a pitching professional — McKenzie’s parents are both physical therapist assistants — but he does have insights on the craft. Pitchability is considered one of the youngster’s strengths, and paternal advice is part of the reason.

“From a young age, my father has always preached to me that I don’t want to be a thrower, I want to be a pitcher,” explained McKenzie. “So when I go out there, I’m not looking to just mow guys down. That might work at the lower levels, but at the higher levels you can’t get away with simply knowing that your stuff is good. You have to pitch.”

Right now, the 6-foot-5 right-hander is doing his pitching at a long-and-lanky 165 pounds. Putting more meat on the bones is an objective, but it’s far from an obsession.

“With time and with age, the weight is going to come,” opined McKenzie. “It’s not something I’m stressing about. It is something I’m working towards, but it’s not anything I’m killing myself over..”

Saving lives is something he’s long aspired to do. Cleveland’s top-rated pitching prospect intends to one day further his education — he would have attended Vanderbilt had he not signed with the Indians — and his studious pursuits could land him in an operating room.

“I’m definitely going to back to school,” said McKenzie. “My interests might change, but (my major) would probably be business-related or medical-related. I’ve always been interested in the heart. That’s been my dream since I’ve been a little kid: I want to be a heart surgeon.”

———

One month ago, Jeff Sullivan wrote an article titled Is Baseball’s Most Improved Hitter…Taylor Motter? At the time, it looked like he was. The Seattle Mariners infielder-outfielder had a 179 wRC+ and his exit-velocity and launch-angle gains were notable. Also capturing Sullivan’s attention was his pull rate, which was a whopping 72%.

Since that time, things have gone south for the former Tampa Bay Ray (and Coastal Carolina Chanticleer!). Snakebitten by whiffs and at-em balls, Motter is now slashing a woebegone .206/.283/.397.

All things considered, he’s not chagrinned. When I talked to him on Friday, Motter told me the slump is something he “has to fight through this little time, get to June, and let June take off.”

As for his scorching April, Motter doesn’t feel he was doing anything markedly different.

“That’s my swing,” said Motter. “I have a pull swing. But most of it was just putting good swings on good pitches and finding barrel, whereas now I’m missing pitches. And when I do make contact, it’s right at someone.” (As though he wanted to prove a point, Motter smoked a line drive directly at the left fielder in his first at bat that night.)

Prompted by a question about launch angles, Motter proceeded to at least somewhat substantiate Sullivan’s premise about an altered approach. Interestingly, it was multi-pronged in terms of direction.

“I tweaked over the offseason on my own, and then I came in here and they corrected some tweaks,” Motter told me. “I brought my hands off my shoulder. I got them a little more relaxed and loose, with a good bat angle going toward the ball, which helps me get barrel, and creates a better launch angle.”

Asked what he meant by “they corrected some tweaks,” Motter said Seattle’s hitting instructors, including Edgar Martinez and Scott Brosius, were nuanced with their suggestions.

“It was ‘this is really good, but let’s try this little thing,’” explained Motter. “Little tiny things. They kept the outer shell of what I fixed, but they kind of tweaked it a little bit.”

———

Tony Barnette doesn’t throw a shuuto, but having played in Japan from 2010-2015, he’s familiar with the pitch. A number of NPB hurlers have one in their repertoire, including one of Barnette’s former Yakult Swallows teammates. He brought up the unique-to-MLB offering when I spoke to him earlier this week.

“It’s a two-seam type of pitch that has a flat movement,” explained the Texas Rangers reliever. “You always hear about getting depth on your pitches, but if you can get a pitch to side-to-side… it kind of rides in on you, like a cutter does, except in the other direction. It goes arm side. Most of the guys I’ve seen throw it have that lower angle.

“I played with (Shohei) Tateyama, and he said it’s about eye levels and just the way the ball moves in the air. If you can throw a ball that moves a bunch of different ways, why would you not use that to your advantage? I remember it riding along the top part of the zone for him. He’s been really successful for a long time with that pitch.”

———

Eno’s recent piece on Jeff Samardzija served as a reminder that I had an unused Shark quote waiting in the wings. Last summer, I asked the Giants righty if pitchers should generally throw their best pitch a higher percentage of the time.

“They should if it’s good that day,” answered Samardzija. “Where you’re going to see a higher percentage of a pitcher’s best pitch is in tough situations, but there are definitely pitches that some guys will throw at any time, no matter what. If they give up a hit, they’re OK with it. They’re willing to die with that pitch.”

———

HISTORICAL SNAPSHOT

Duke Snider is generally considered the third wheel of the “Willie, Mickey, and the Duke” trio. By and large, he was. Mays and Mantle were superior players. Even so, Snider was a stud.

In his prime — 1949-1959 — Snider slashed .306/.387/.562, and homered 349 times. Over that 11-year-period, the Brooklyn Dodgers legend made seven all-star teams and amassed 58.6 WAR.

———

Hall of Fame pitcher, and former United States senator, Jim Bunning died yesterday at age 85. Pitching primarily with the Detroit Tigers and Philadelphia Phillies from 1955-1971, Bunning threw a no-hitter in both leagues, one of them a perfect game on Father’s Day, in 1964. At the time of his retirement, he ranked second all-time in strikeouts, behind Walter Johnson. Bunning had 224 wins, 2,855 strikeouts, and exactly 1,000 walks.

———

MAY TIDBITS

So far this season, Phil Hughes has 30 strikeouts in 47 innings, and Jordan Zimmermann has 31 strikeouts in 50-and-two-thirds innings. Over their careers, Hughes has 1,000 strikeouts in 1,251-and-two-thirds innings, and Zimmermann has 1,000 strikeouts in 1,250 career innings.

Right-handed hitters are 0 for 39, with two walks, against Craig Kimbrel this season.

On Thursday, Odubel Herrera became the first player in Phillies history to strike out five times in a game while hitting third in the order. It was the 20,499th game in franchise history. (per BBTN and SportsCenter researcher John Fisher.)

Also on Thursday, Takahiro Norimoto of the Rakuten Eagles tied an NPB record by striking out 10 or more batters for the sixth consecutive game. Hideo Nomo’ turned the trick in 1991 with the Kintetsu Buffaloes.

Arizona Diamondbacks prospect Jon Duplantier, who was featured here earlier this month, has 56 strikeouts and a 0.56 ERA in 48-and-a-third innings for low-A Kane County.

As of Saturday, the West Michigan Whitecaps, the low-A affiliate of the Detroit Tigers, had the best record of any team in professional baseball. The Midwest League club was 33-14 (.702). Meanwhile, the Winston Salem Dash, the high-A affiliate of the Chicago White Sox, had the worst record of any team in professional baseball. The Carolina League club was 14-35 (.286).

———

When Eric Longenghagen did his Seattle Mariners Top Prospect list last month, 24-year-old reliever Dan Altavilla came in at No. 6. A fastball that flirts with triple digits is one of the reasons. So too is a slider that Longenhagen described as “exceptionally hard at 87-90 and touching 92.”

The righty has been working to tone it down.

“I’ve actually taken some velo off of it,” Altavilla told me yesterday. “It was somewhere between 89-92, and more like a cutter. We’ve been doing a lot of work in the bullpen, trying to get more shape and spin to it — more depth to get more swings and misses. I think it was around 85-88 last night.”

Altavilla fanned three of the six Red Sox batters he faced on Friday, Per Brooks Baseball, his slider averaged 87.2 MPH. His fastball topped out at 97.7 MPH.

———

Jeff Banister addressed match-ups and sample size prior to Tuesday’s game. The Texas Rangers manager brought up a salient point when doing so. When there’s not much of a history between a particular hitter and a particular pitcher, introducing comps to the equation can help.

“(You’re) finding like pitchers, like hitters, like stuff, matching them up and extrapolating them out to come up with a better predictor,” explained Banister. “So when you get that 15 to 25 at-bat matchup, which you go, ‘it’s a little light’ — if you can find comparables, and predict that out, there’s maybe a little more feel-good on decision making. But that’s challenging.”

———

Seattle’s Scott Servais had a similar take when I asked him if his club uses match-up comps when putting together their lineups.

“Quite a bit,” said the Mariners skipper. “Every team uses a different formula, or matrix number — whatever you want to call it — to line up. We certainly have one. Our analytic guys produce that number for me on a daily basis. I don’t go with it all the time, but the majority of time I do. It’s based not on just the handedness of the pitcher, but kind of what his fastball does, what his repertoire is, what our hitter does. It’s kind of a complex formula.”

——

An uncommon-yet-obvious call was botched by arbiters in both Boston and New York on Thursday. Here is what happened.:

In the ninth inning of a game at Fenway Park, Red Sox reliever Craig Kimbrel threw a big-breaking curveball, on a 2-2 count, that hit Texas Rangers outfielder Nomar Mazara on the back foot. Unfortunately for Mazara — at least in terms of the rule book — he’d swung at the pitch, and thus should have been called out. That didn’t happen.

The pitch caromed away after hitting Mazara, and he ran to first base on the false assumption that it was your typical strikeout-wild pitch. The home plate umpire, failing to see baseball contact ankle, thought the same. Ditto the rest of his crew, which prompted Boston manager John Farrell to challenge the call.

New York wouldn’t take the call. Misinterpreting the challenge, the replay officials erroneously said the play wasn’t reviewable. The call on the field would have to stand.

Thanks to the error, both Kimbrel and the Red Sox ended up in the record books. Kimbrel fanned the next three batters, making him the fourth pitcher in history with multiple four-strikeout innings. (A.J. Burnett, Chuck Finley, and Zack Greinke are the others.) It was the 20th strikeout of the game for Boston pitchers, which also tied a record.

———

Here’s a quick one from Dave Burba, who currently serves as the pitching coach for Colorado’s Double-A affiliate, the Hartford Yard Goats. The anecdote dates back to when Burba was a young pitcher for the San Francisco Giants.

“One time I wasn’t doing very well,” recalled the 50-year-old Burba. “The pitching coach comes out to the mound. He says, ‘Hey, how are you doing?’ I told him ‘I’m getting my bleep, bleep, bleeping butt kicked out here.’ About the time I’m delivering the speech, per se, the umpire comes walking up. He starts laughing so hard at what I’m saying that he has to turn around and walk away.”

———

LINKS YOU’LL LIKE

In the opinion of Bill Shaikin of The Los Angeles Times, the Padres hitting rock bottom is a good thing, and not necessarily for their NL West competition.

At Bill James Online, Rob Neyer opined that this is the Golden Age of baseball writing.

ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick is one of the best baseball writers around, and he shows it here with a look at the relationship between Larry Bowa and Cesar Hernandez.

The Yankees are winning, but they’re not selling a lot of tickets. Billy Witz has the story at The New York Times.

RANDOM FACTS AND STATS

Since the beginning of last season, Clayton Kershaw, Ivan Nova, and Josh Tomlin have combined to walk 96 batters in 673-and-two-thirds innings. Over that same period, Edinson Volquez has walked 105 batters in 236 innings.

On May 29, 1921, Pittsburgh Pirates third baseman Clyde Barnhart homered off Cincinnati Reds left-hander Eppa Rixey. It was the only home run Rixey allowed that season in 301 innings of work.

Babe Ruth hit three home runs on May 25, 1935. They were the last of his career. Ruth played his final game five days later.

Barry Bonds played 22 seasons, and with two different organizations. Bobby Bonds played 14 seasons, and with eight different organizations (including the Rangers and Yankees twice each).

Per Nick Cafardo of The Boston Globe, the San Francisco Giants will travel a total of 47,877 miles this season, the most of any team. The Pittsburgh Pirates will travel 21,854 miles, the fewest of any team.

This year’s SABR National Convention includes a Changing State of Sabermetrics Panel, featuring Mark DeRosa, Vince Gennaro, Brian Kenny, Mike Petriello, and Joel Sherman. The convention will be held at The Grand Hyatt, in New York City, from June 28-July 2.