Aaron_Kennelly

Len is talking. Baseball very soon.

We're rooting for the Brewers at this point, right?

Is there an ETA on start time?

Wait, is McCarthy saying the seams on the new ball are higher? Because that is the opposite of what the research suggests, and the lowered seams are supposedly one of the main reasons the ball is flying out of the park. he's talking about the stitches keeping his skull intact hahaha... oh horsefeathers

Wait, is McCarthy saying the seams on the new ball are higher? Because that is the opposite of what the research suggests, and the lowered seams are supposedly one of the main reasons the ball is flying out of the park. i figured they were "higher" because of the ball being more tightly wound but i don't know anything about these things It's a few things. Ball is more tightly wound, but seams are lower, which lets it fly more, as the ball has less drag.

Wait, is McCarthy saying the seams on the new ball are higher? Because that is the opposite of what the research suggests, and the lowered seams are supposedly one of the main reasons the ball is flying out of the park.

Oh, I agree that the classification is significant -- as is the release point difference. I just think that it is hard to tell if he actually "changed" anything about the pitch. It is possible that he and Bosio worked on things and found his stuff played better at that angle. But I think he's slowly been drifting more towards "cutter" status. Velocity going up from start of year; movement down. Interestingly, I feel like it was more of just a nasty cutter in 2015. And by the start of this year, it was basically just a slider. Then I think it reverted back to cutter status by June (albeit a much less nasty one). And then last night was a return to near-2015 levels... which combined with release point change is significant. I was able to significantly associate his in-game release point variability with the amount of slider movement he generated in 2016. So essentially the more inconsistent he was with the pitch, the less movement it generated. That was right around the same time he started to cut his slider usage down a ton. So I think he's been fighting with the "feel" for the pitch for a while. I'm not sure that he consciously wanted to change the way the slider moved. I think it's more he wanted to change something mechanically, which resulted in the difference of pitch classification. Your point of the sinker being different too is a really good one, which is why I think it's more of a total mechanical tweak. The "cutter" is basically the same slider by velo and movement standards, it was just being thrown from a completely different tunnel. Yeah, he definitely lost the feel for it. And he completely lost confidence in it, for good reason, as the pitch has been getting hammered. And the different tunnel might be the most important thing. Maybe the mechanical tweak was because he knew his slider wasn't as nasty, so he wanted to go more across his body to make it even harder to pick up? If the stuff isn't as good, and he excels because he throws the ball weird, why not get weirder? If he can't get more out of his velocity, why not get more out of the other thing that makes him tough to hit?

For sure. But, I think it maybe (probably?) could have been for the past month +. He simply hasn't been getting the same movement on it as he used to, so it falls more on the cutter side. Since it's a hybrid, it's hard to classify. But it can lean in either direction, simply by adding more speed or taking some off to get more break. I initially thought that would be why it's classified as a cutter too, but that's not true. The movement he generated with the cutter crosses over to the movement range he generates with the slider. The trajectory at which he threw the pitch + the movement he generated was why it was classified as a cutter. It wasn't just the movement. Agreed. I'm just saying, it was more of a gradual shift to that status, as he's lost movement on it. Since it's a hybrid, he's probably been straddling the cross-over threshold. By month, velocity going up, not dropping as much vertically, not breaking as much horizontally. And, you're right, the most noticeable difference is the release point. All the other stuff will fluctuate from game-to-game. Horizontal movement has been up and down, etc. So that was most likely the tipping point. The most interesting thing to me last night was that his velocity and horizontal movement were both up from his July averages. It was definitely a better pitch last night. That much is for sure.

I wrote that Cubs Insider post and you actually brought up really fair points that I didn't consider. My main counter to your argument though is that when you evaluate the measurement error using SEM - which imo is a better way to measure variability here - and include his entire career's worth of data, the difference between the cutter and slider classification is so hard to NOT bring up. The probability that it was a random occurrence is like less than .000000001%. I agree that the single start PitchFX analysis can be tedious and most of the time it's not worth reading. But I don't think you can ignore this because of the sharp contrast. Oh, I agree that the classification is significant -- as is the release point difference. I just think that it is hard to tell if he actually "changed" anything about the pitch. It is possible that he and Bosio worked on things and found his stuff played better at that angle. But I think he's slowly been drifting more towards "cutter" status. Velocity going up from start of year; movement down. Interestingly, I feel like it was more of just a nasty cutter in 2015. And by the start of this year, it was basically just a slider. Then I think it reverted back to cutter status by June (albeit a much less nasty one). And then last night was a return to near-2015 levels... which combined with release point change is significant.

For sure. But, I think it maybe (probably?) could have been for the past month +. He simply hasn't been getting the same movement on it as he used to, so it falls more on the cutter side. Since it's a hybrid, it's hard to classify. But it can lean in either direction, simply by adding more speed or taking some off to get more break.

He was throwing his slider faster and with more movement than he was getting in July, though. So maybe it will work better from that arm angle. But who knows if that's why it was different. Or if it will stay different.

Here's that same chart, but with sinker and slider/cutter. http://i.imgur.com/Mn4Z5F6.png Doesn't look like anything has changed with slider, other than that he just was more across his body, overall.

Eh... that's a little deceptive. Every pitch that he threw was from a different arm angle. He's throwing more and more across his body as the year goes along. For instance, his last start... average sinker horizontal release point was -3.61 feet. Slider was -3.7. Last night, sinker was -3.81 and "cutter" was -3.91. It's not like he only changed the slider. I'm not saying that's not why they are calling it a cutter. But, it's not like he just changed that pitch.

Man, I hope we keep seeing that slider from Jake. Shitty way to split two games. But, big picture, if Jake's regained confidence in his slider, that would be huge news going forward.

http://imagesvh1-a.akamaihd.net/uri/mgid:file:http:shared:vh1.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/tumblr_inline_nmiehhDz1H1s13bk5_500-1430418784.gif Lost in the dong celebration, you kinda killed Lester, too. Yeah, my bad. Specifically, he didn't have command of his cutter. Missed the edges all night. http://i.imgur.com/4knJcMR.png Whoops!

Yeah, Jake was really good. Lots of swing-and-miss, plus weak contact. And his slider looked good, for once, too.

This was from July 29: http://imagesvh1-a.akamaihd.net/uri/mgid:file:http:shared:vh1.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/tumblr_inline_nmiehhDz1H1s13bk5_500-1430418784.gif

horsefeathers swing call, too.

horsefeathers zone.

Not the prettiest first AB.

I get the denial of the Cubs juggernaut. Who would want to admit that? But how any Cardinal fan could watch that team this year and have positive thoughts about their own future is beyond me.

Man, I can't wait to bounce their asses from the playoffs again.

Also, Hector's fastball velocity keeps going up. It was about 96 on average for most of the season. And then in mid-June it started creeping up and he averaged about 97 until mid-July. And since mid-July, he's averaging 98. He also hasn't given up a homer since June 14, right around when it started going up.

So those numbers are above and below league average or something? Is that how you get negative marks in movement? No. That's in inches, but not factoring in gravity. Interestingly, Hector has been increasing in velocity and movement. He fluctuates back and forth. More speed; less movement. Also he'll have his vertical and horizontal movement flip-flip some from time to time. So it will act as more like a curveball and drop more sometimes. And other times it will be more side-to-side and break further. But, right now, he's getting the same movement he has when it's about 85, except it's at 87.

Rondon's slider has been nasty lately. He got more whiffs/swing than any pitcher in the league on sliders in July: http://www.baseballprospectus.com/pitchfx/leaderboards/index.php?hand=&reportType=pfx&prp=ALL&month=7&year=2017&pitch=SL&ds=ws&lim=50 Hitters slugged .063 against his slider in July.