Quick Looks at Gausman, Carrasco, Nelson, Doubront, Turner
This is a weekly series on players I have selectively watched while exercising. Usually, I will concentrate on lesser known players or rookies just getting their first call ups.
Why I watched: A highly touted prospect.
Game Watched: 9/1/14 vs Twins
Game Thoughts
• His fastball is elite. He normally throws it around 94-95 mph, but can change speeds to launch it up to 97 mph. It sometimes has some release side run which makes it about unhittable. For a 4-seam fastball, it gets a good number of groundballs (43% on the season) mainly because he pitches low in the zone.
• Well, that is about it for good news. His other pitches, a change/splitter and slider, are horrible. He couldn’t throw either for strikes and they just don’t have good movement. His change/splitter gets a bit of swing-and-miss because everyone seems gearing up for his fastball which he throws almost all the time. He throws his fastball 72% of the time which is good for the 8th most in the league (min 80 IP).
• The Twins took a while to adjust to the fastball. The third time through the order they were able to tee off on it for three runs. With just the one pitch, he won’t be able to navigate lineups multiple times. This can be seen by how hitters have done against him each time through the lineup.
Time thru order: K/BB, AVG/OBP/SLG
1st: 3.5, .266/.309/.367
2nd: 1.7, .282/.349/.479
3rd: 2.0, .323/.365/.495
Final thoughts: He has limited value until he finds at least an average second pitch and hopefully a third one. He has been able to live off his elite heat until now, but he needs some more pitches. His place may eventually be in the bullpen.
Why I watched: Dominating since returning to the rotation (-.70 ERA, 1.60 FIP, 9.8 K/9, 0.9 BB/9)
Game(s) Watched: 9/7/14 vs White Sox
Game Thoughts
• He throws two hard fastballs (95-97 mph) with precision (59% Zone%). They get labeled as a 4-season and 2-seamer/sinker. The 4-seamer is just a straight travelling ball which he placed anywhere he wanted to. The other fastball, which is labeled a 2-seamer here at FanGraphs and sinker at Brooksbaseball.net, seems to act like a cutter. It has a nice late tailing action to the release side. These two pitches really set up his breaking balls.
• He has a slider and change. They both came at the batter around the same speed (~88mph). Then at the last moment, the change breaks down while the slider breaks to the glove side. He was able to throw the change for strikes while the slider was more of a chase pitch. Both the slider (28% SwStr%) and change (15% SwStr%) get a good amount of swinging strikes.
• With all his pitches, he is getting a high percentage of groundballs. His overall groundball rate of 54% is in the top 10% of all starters.
Final thoughts: I don’t know why he struggled early in the season, but he isn’t now. He has four pitches which are all working together. Hitters need to gear up for the heaters and then they can look lost when the two breakers are thrown. I need to go look at one of his earlier season games one day to see what chnaged. As for now, the results seem real.
Why I watched: The Brewers #1 rated prospect is up and starting in the bigs.
Game(s) Watched: 9/7/14 vs Cardinals
Game Thoughts
• He has two fastballs which both are around 93 to 96 mph. They are both above average with the 4-seamer the swing-and-miss pitch and the 2-seamer is the ground ball pitch. I can see why he gets some love.
• His slider is OK. It gets a high number of swings-and-misses (19.5 SwStr%), but it is only working off his fastball.
• He doesn’t throw many strikes. He is nibbling out of the zone a lot and was forced to throw a ton of extra pitches (averaging less than 6 IP per start). Also, he seems to throw a ton of balls, including his fastball, in the dirt.
• The main issue I saw with him was the lack of a third pitch. Hitters can basically just looking for his fastball. Like Gausman, he is basically only good for once through the lineup.
Time thru order: K/BB, AVG/OBP/SLG
1st: 4.0, .209/.273/.275
2nd: 2.6, .337/.398/.523
3rd: 2.8, .301/.363/.493
• Final thoughts: Jimmy Nelson has a place in the majors as a pitcher, I am just not sure it is as a starter. His lack of control and no third pitch will limit how far he can go as a starter. Look for a third pitch to see if he can take the next step to being one of the league’s best starters.
Why I watched: I wanted to see if the Cubs made any changes
Game(s) Watched: 9/6/14 vs. Pirates
Game Thoughts
• That was a waste of time. There is nothing to see here right now.
• The lefty threw his fastball between 86-90 mph. It had little break in any direction. When he used his cutter, it was just as useless.
• His change had no late break, just a slower fastball. He is barely getting swinging strikes. Here are his swinging strike numbers from the last 4 games.
2.5%
5.6%
2.8%
6.7%
• He has no control of any of his pitches. He seemed to always be behind in the count.
Final thoughts: I wanted to see if the Cubs could turn around Doubront like they did Jake Arrieta and Jason Hammel. Nope. He isn’t fooling anyone and really doesn’t belong starting in the majors.
Why I watched: High GB%, good pitch peripherals, new team.
Game(s) Watched: 9/8/14 vs Blue Jays
Game Thoughts
• First off, he can’t throw strikes … period. Balls in the dirt. Missing the zone by over a foot (Image).
He has always had issues with the strike zone as seen by yearly Zone% values:
Season: Zone%
2011: 42%
2012: 42%
2013: 42%
2014: 41% (same 41% with Cubs in five games)
I went and looked at the results when he started a game where he had a Zone % greater than or less than 47%. In the games when he threw less than 47%, his walk rate was 10.2%. It almost halved down to 5.8% in the games when it was over 47%.
• He has two fastballs, both with good movement. His 4-seamer he threw around 93 mph and live on release side of the plate. The pitch has some release side run. His other fastball is 93 mph 2-seamer with great sink and lived at the bottom of the zone. A heatmap showing his propensity to pound these two zones can be seen here.
• His cutter/slider wasn’t impressive. He couldn’t throw it for strikes. He threw it hoping hitters chased it.
• His change and curve looked good in the game. Decent movement. Some went for strikes.
Final thoughts: He has the pieces to be a really good pitcher, but he hasn’t put the pieces all together yet, especially the ability to consistently throw strikes. I think the Cubs will continue to work with him and I will likely be picking him up late in drafts next year hoping for Carlos Carrasco type turn around.
Jeff, one of the authors of the fantasy baseball guide,The Process, writes for RotoGraphs, The Hardball Times, Rotowire, Baseball America, and BaseballHQ. He has been nominated for two SABR Analytics Research Award for Contemporary Analysis and won it in 2013 in tandem with Bill Petti. He has won four FSWA Awards including on for his Mining the News series. He's won Tout Wars three times, LABR twice, and got his first NFBC Main Event win in 2021. Follow him on Twitter @jeffwzimmerman.
thanks, these are awesome!
finally somebody that matters agrees with me on gausman!
It is an up hill battle.
Hmmm, well Gausman has k’d 14 in his last 14 innings giving up only 2 runs. He may need some work on his consistency and his slider, but maybe you just saw him on a day where he struggled a bit? Also, I haven’t heard anyone else say his change/splitter is a bad pitch. Your argument about it only being effective because hitters are gearing up for the fastball is a bit of a weird one. Isn’t that by definition a significant portion of the effectiveness of anyone’s changeup/splitter, movement being the other significant factor? You could obviously end up being correct in the long run, but methinks you’re drawing waayy too many conclusions from watching one start.
I could be, but even it is good, it would be nice to see a third pitch. Not many starters make it on 2 pitches.
Alright but that’s a completely different point than you made in the article, which is pretty useless. I feel rude saying it, but what’s the point of writing an article on watching guys for one game on a site built around analytics? Anybody who watches Gausman for more than 1 start will realize his change is a plus pitch. His slider needs work, granted, but to call the change a horrible pitch is just ignorant.
Just to note, before today’s 7K game, gausman’s k% on the changeup/splitter is 29.6% and it’s generated a swstr% of 18.9%. That’s not too bad. I would assume that’s improved after today.
I look forward to reading of any observations you have after watching one of Carrasco’s April starts.
Zimmerman may want to check his own website’s pitch values on Gausman… 2.1 runs above avg on the splitter/change is easily the best of his 4 pitches
The Gausman comment reads almost as if you’d only ever seen him once and were making a snap judgment on the quality of his pitches based on a single look, Jeff. Oh wait, that’s exactly what this is. Gausman actually throws two changes, and has featured a plus change since he was at LSU. The slider continues to lag behind, and is still the hurdle he must cross to approach his ceiling, but calling the change “horrible” is completely inaccurate, and was an avoidable inaccuracy as has been illustrated by everyone who took a few minutes to research the pitch’s value and effectiveness. Surprisingly poor work.
Once again, thanks. This is awesome.
There’s no definitive conclusion from a one game “snapshot”, nor should there be. It’s a long season. (Why I don’t pay attention to most restaurant reviewers, either.)
You’ve pointed out the things to look for in future starts. Same kind of thing I do when I “scout” pitchers for my teams.
Turner’s only 23. If he can develop some consistency (as you pointed out and I had noted when watching him), he definitely has potential.
Still not sure about his upside compared to other kid pitchers and my “primary” league’s roster is full of them. It’s a dynasty league.
The oldest SP is 25 (Chris Sale). The rest are younger. (Wacha, Wheeler, Cole, Salazar, Odorizzi, etc.) Your thoughts?
Your Gausman assessment falls short.
There are multiple All-Star and elite HOF starters that succeeded with 2 pitches–particularly plus fastball and plus change/split combo. Alex Cobb, Cole Hamels, James Shields, Curt Schilling, Roger Clemens to name a few. If you want to get into a side argument about semantics–regarding the difference between a changeup and a splitter etc–spare me.
Secondly, for a 23-year-old pitcher with just a couple of years of pro pitching experience, Gausman’s changeup/split is already a very promising pitch. Even if you’re just judging by this season alone, it’s by no means a “bad pitch.” Additionally, the whole ‘it’s only good because batters are gearing up for his fastball’ argument is silly. Changeups, the most effective swing-and-miss pitch in the game, are designed to make batters who are expecting fastball swing and miss at the much slower velocity.
Gausman had an outstanding season with a contending club, in a hitters park, in hitters league, while being shuttled between the MLB and AAA. He’s 23. Relatively speaking, given his starting point, it’s likely he’s going to be an above-average or even star-level starting pitcher in a couple of years. And the depth of his repertoire isn’t the issue. Fans love pointing to the number of pitches that a pitcher throws as an indicator of skill, and seem to love discussing the differences between 11 types of curveballs etc. Total waste of time. If he hones his command over his changeup and fastball(s) while improving his mechanics, he’ll be a beast.