Article: Jordan Wicks is a Grown-Up Now, and He Needs a More Mature Pitch Mix

[Matthew Trueblood]

With spring training on the horizon, many Cubs pitchers and catchers are already congregating in Arizona. One hurler, in particular, should be hard at work already, because he needs to make a few changes in order to have a successful 2024.

Image courtesy of © Allan Henry-USA TODAY Sports

We'll have a full preview of the battle for the fifth spot in the Cubs' starting rotation later this week, but for today, let's talk about Jordan Wicks, and only Jordan Wicks. Almost a month ago, our Jason Ross broke down the shift in the way Wicks attacked hitters that took place when he matriculated to the majors last September. It was a good look, focused especially on the location of the young southpaw's fastballs, and it's worth a revisit.

Let's turn our attention in another direction, though. Is Wicks throwing too many fastballs altogether? And more broadly, does he need to streamline his arsenal to tap into his potential as a mid-rotation starter?

Last year, Wicks made 14 starts after his promotion to Triple-A Iowa, evenly dividing them between that level and MLB. In those outings, he threw a total of 1,117 pitches. Of those, 583 (52.2%) were either four-seamers or sinkers, with roughly a 60/40 split in favor of the four-seamer. His four-seamer sat at 92 miles per hour on average (with a 93.4-MPH 90th-percentile reading), and his sinker was a tick lower (91, and 92.4 for the 90th percentile).

By Stuff+, both Wicks's fastballs graded out south of 80 (where 100 is average and higher is better). Based on the pitches' movement, velocity, and release points, they're considerably worse than the league average. That's probably a bit too unkind an assessment. Factor in location, and his four-seamer is nearly average. The sinker still lags, at a 90 Pitching+ mark, though.

For years, the league trended away from sinkers. It was a phenomenon I covered closely at Baseball Prospectus. At the heart of the issue was the fact that the pitch doesn't set up any other offering very well, save perhaps a cutter (if a pitcher has exceptional command of both pitches, and is thus able to locate each on either side of home plate) or a slider (against same-handed batters). The pitch is making a comeback in MLB very recently, but in a limited and focused role. Increasingly, hurlers only throw sinkers when they have the platoon advantage, because that's when the pitch is truly helpful.

Wicks, however, is a left-handed starting pitcher. Seventy-three lefties made at least five starts last year, and they faced a total of 27,875 batters. Of those, just 5,413 (19.4%, for those not gifted at quick mental long division) batted left-handed. For a lefty starter, roughly four of every five pitches thrown will be to a righty hitter. Given that information, it doesn't make much sense for Wicks to hold onto his sinker, except to the extent that he needs it to set up his other offerings. Here's his movement chart, by pitch type, from the pitcher's perspective.

That chart is a bit of a mess. Wicks threw six different pitches in 2023, but some of them overlapped pretty significantly in terms of movement (and often, thus, of location). Of course, no pitcher uses their arsenal the same way regardless of handedness. Wicks threw his four-seamer or change roughly two-thirds of the time against righties, and divvied up the rest between the sinker (about 16 percent of the time), the cutter, and the curveball (roughly 9 percent each). Against lefties, though, his sinker led the way, and he was pretty much just sinker-fastball-slider; his usage of each of the other three pitches was minimal.

The sinker is around, then, because it drives Wicks's approach against lefties. Is it genuinely necessary, though? If only a fifth of opposing batters will be lefties, is the sinker valuable enough to keep around, given the fact that its value against righties is minimal and that it might compromise the command and execution of his other weapons? 

Based on what Wicks did in 2023, yes, it was probably necessary to have the sinker sinkin'. As the scatter pattern of those green dots above shows, Wicks's command of the slider is a bit shaky, so far. Long-term, though, that pitch has potential. It had a 105 Stuff+ last year, so if he could start spotting it better, it would take off.

What's the key to controlling the slider better? It's getting rid of the curveball. Consider the spin rate and tilt of his pitches last season.

He's not throwing a slider that's materially different from the curve. It's more like they're two variants on the same breaking ball. We can see this even better by examining the difference between the direction of the spin he imparts on release and the tilt of the actual break on the ball as it flies toward the plate.

We can not only see, here, that the curve and slider move differently based mostly on the orientation of the seams, but that the sinker and changeup are really just different-speed versions of the same pitch. They come out of the hand with very similar spin; they actually run more to the arm side and have heavier action than that spin tells the hitter. These are two sets of pitches that, while engineered for opposite sets of opponents (the sinker and the slider for lefties, the change and the curve for righties) do pretty much the same things. We can see, too, that the cutter is not one of those especially slider-like ones; it's mostly a pitch that plays off the sinker.

If Wicks isn't going to see many left-handed batters anyway, the sinker just interferes with things. His fastball already has some cut-ride action, so he really doesn't need the cutter for righties. Therefore, he doesn't need the sinker to set it up. He should scrap that pitch, and get used to commanding the four-seamer all over the zone. If he can't do that, nothing else is going to matter. Last year, he showed plenty of ability to work toward the glove side with that four-seamer, anyway. 

On the other hand, keeping the slider makes sense. If he's going to scrap the sinker, he needs a pitch that works off the fastball to attack the few lefties he will see. Just as importantly, though, the slider can work fine against righties. He just needs to become adept at backfooting it. That battle is more mental than physical, since that's where a lefty wants to throw their slider most naturally. There's merely a hurdle to clear when you're throwing it close to an opposing hitter, and risking a free base. Wicks is famously mentally tough, and he has Justin Steele on whom to rely for advice in this very specific, very familiar regard. He should be fine.

Here, with the pitches colored by velocity instead of type (because velocity differential matters a lot when you're trying to fool batters and get whiffs), is Wicks's muddled 2023 arsenal.

Now, here's the same chart, with the pitches tagged as sinkers, cutters, and curves taken out, leaving only the four-seamer, changeup, and slider.

To really bring the 2024 approach I'm recommending into focus, you need to tighten and enlarge that righthand cluster, where the sliders are. He'll be able to manipulate and modulate that pitch, as this spray pattern shows, but he'll eventually command it much more neatly. There are fewer fastballs in this mix, by a wide margin. There are more changeups to righties, and a few more sliders. There are a lot more sliders to lefties, and probably a few more changeups: get them looking away, let that pitch sink under their hands.

This isn't the set of changes someone would advocate in the pursuit of turning Wicks into an ace. He would need four pitches for that, and it's probably plausible for him to hold onto either the cutter or the curveball, albeit with a few tweaks. Realistically, though, Wicks probably isn't ace-caliber, and that's ok. With many savvy teammates, good coaches, his own superb athleticism and a poise that shined through in his brief stint with the team last fall, Wicks should be able to contribute as an average or better starter for the team for much of 2024. He just needs to get some of the stuff that doesn't match his role, his velocity band, or his motor preferences out of the way, so he can do more with the things that make him a top prospect within the organization.

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What are your hopes for Wicks in 2024? How would you tweak his game in order to ensure he can stick as a valuable starting pitcher? Let's discuss his rookie season more in the comments.

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[CubinNY]

well done.