Cade Horton's Evolution Has Required An Old-School Approach

Following Friday night’s win in Denver, Cade Horton is now 6-1 with a 0.86 ERA since the All-Star Game. He’s asserted himself as a clear favorite for the Cubs’ postseason starting rotation and has been a bright spot in an otherwise difficult-to-watch second half for the North Siders. 

The rookie is also ninth in baseball in WAR in that same timeframe, according to FanGraphs. He’s far and away been the Cubs’ best pitcher for almost two months now. The thing is, he hasn’t quite been the exact same pitcher for this whole period of sustained success:

I was long fascinated with Horton’s inability to strike hitters out at the big league level. This is a guy who struck out 190 hitters in 151 ⅔ innings in the minor leagues. If there was one definite ability of his, it was the ability to record a punch out. Yet, for the first 14 appearances of his big league career, Horton just didn’t do much of it. His 17.3 percent strikeout rate over that period of time was just 172nd out of 207 pitchers who threw at least 50 innings. 

Before I could even figure out what the deal was, Horton suddenly started striking guys out again. It started with six in 5 ⅔ innings against the Reds on August 6. Then, eight in 5 ⅔ innings in Toronto. Three in 2 ⅔ innings in his abbreviated start against the Brewers. And seven in 6.0 innings against the Angels. 

If we crunch the numbers and do the math, that’s a jump to a 28.3 percent strikeout rate since August 6. That’s in the top 20 percent in baseball, alongside names like Paul Skenes and Blake Snell. More recently, my fascination has shifted to finding the difference between these two versions of Cade Horton. 

Disregarding his most recent outing in the high altitude of Colorado (where he notched four strikeouts in 5.0 innings), let's split the season into two periods: outings from his major league debut through his August 1 start against the Orioles, and then the four starts following that. 

The first place I always look when a pitcher is racking up strikeouts is their whiff rate, or the percentage of swings that a hitter takes that result in a swing and a miss. For Horton, it was actually better when he was striking out less guys, going from 27.9 percent to 24.1 percent during his more recent four starts.  For the rookie right-hander, it’s actually the swings that hitters aren’t taking that are benefitting him. All stats courtesy of Statcast and FanGraphs:

Woah! So Cade Horton is absolutely filling up the strike zone, which is resulting in two things: a whole bunch of called strikes, and he is getting ahead of hitters. For reference, that 60.2 percent in-zone rate, 21.5 percent called-strike percentage, and 75 percent first-strike percentage would all lead the league if it was for the full season. 

To take this a step further, let’s examine what he is doing differently to right-handed hitters, specifically. To righties, he has started sprinkling in his sinker much more often. He threw it 16.9 percent of the time against righties in his strikeout-heavy stretch, up from 8.7 percent previously. And it’s not just that he is throwing it more, it’s when he’s throwing it. From August 2 to August 28, 28 percent of his first pitches to right-handed hitters was a sinker. Only 11.5 percent were sweepers. Previously, just eight percent of first pitches to righties was a sinker, and 35.5 percent of them were sweepers. 

It’s somewhat obvious as to why. Only six of Horton’s first pitch sweepers this year have been put in play, but two of them left the ballpark for home runs. That’s usually a pitch you want to throw out of the strike zone to induce a chase. If the youngster’s goal is now getting ahead of the hitter, that’s probably not the pitch to throw in the zone to accomplish that goal. A sinker, on the other hand, if you’re executing it properly, is likely only going to get hit for a single if it's in the zone, or maybe a very-well-placed double. 

Is this a sustainable way of recording more strikeouts for Horton going forward? This is kind of a cop out answer, but: maybe! Pitchers can succeed and record strikeouts by living in the strike zone this much. Tarik Skubal comes to mind. Then again, he is literally one of the two best pitchers in baseball right now, so that’s a lofty goal for Horton.

Regardless, I’d say it’s encouraging that Cade Horton is willing to tinker and make in-season adjustments like this, especially as a rookie. His in-zone rate was back down to 44 percent against the Rockies, and he got a lot less strikes looking, and a lot less strikeouts, as a result. Will we see a return to living in the zone during his next start?