Swinging Strike Benchmarks for Pitch Types

I’m always talking about how good a pitch’s peripherals are, on our podcast, or on the radio, or on twitter, so I thought I’d help you get a sense of makes a good off-speed pitch, when it comes to whiff percentages. Since some of the listings in different places are whiff per swing (more here), and yet our site uses swinging strike rate (swSTR%), I thought I’d make the benchmarks in swinging strikes. You can see the whiff benchmarks in this oft-linked post here. You’ll also get ground-ball rates there, which is an important pitch peripheral that I won’t talk about much today.

So what makes a good pitch, swinging strike wise?

Pitch	League swSTR%
Sinker	5.4%
Four-Seam	6.9%
Cutter	9.7%
Slider	15.2%
Curve	11.1%
Change	14.9%

Obviously, the two- and four-seam fastball is important for things other than whiffs. They have the lowest ball rates, and decent ground-ball rates. And they help set up the off-speed offerings. And since this is PITCHf/x data, it all comes with a bit of a grain of salt. I didn’t put up split-fingers as their own group (they probably have an average whiff rate over 16%) because they are often identified as change-ups. Cutters could be sliders, too. But, since this came from the entire population, it still serves as a good guide.

I thought I’d give you some mini-leaderboards of the best and worst for each off-speed pitch, with high minimums for pitches thrown. These are important pitches for these pitchers, and sometimes they’re good and sometimes you wonder why they even throw them.

The Best Sliders

Pitcher	Sliders Thrown	swSTR
Patrick Corbin	702	0.274
Greg Holland	420	0.264
Tyson Ross	637	0.248
Derek Holland	783	0.236
Al Alburquerque	557	0.233
Mat Latos	787	0.227
Clayton Kershaw	830	0.222
Matt Garza	591	0.217
Nate Jones	521	0.215
Max Scherzer	585	0.214

We know Patrick Corbin has an excellent slider. It’s nice to see Tyson Ross up there — he doesn’t have a change-up, but his slider might be good enough (and his home park enough of an aid in suppressing lefty homers) that it might work out. Al Alburquerque could never harness the arsenal, but Nate Jones — provided the glute is fine — might have the arsenal to close.

The Worst Sliders

Pitcher	Sliders Thrown	swSTR
Ryan Vogelsong	430	0.040
Eric Stults	540	0.061
Bruce Chen	508	0.067
Mike Minor	453	0.075
Jeremy Guthrie	688	0.077
Kevin Correia	808	0.078
Nick Vincent	407	0.089
Ubaldo Jimenez	718	0.095
Jarrod Parker	442	0.097
Yovani Gallardo	774	0.098

A quick glance at some of these pitchers and you’ll see that many of these bad sliders are actually cutters. And look above to the benchmarks and see that even if they are bad cutters, it’s a little less embarrassing to have those kinds of whiff rates on a cutter instead of a slider. That might be true of most of these pitchers, actually. Except Jarrod Parker, Ubaldo Jimenez and Yovani Gallardo. They have sliders and they aren’t very good. Parker’s used to be vaunted — it was a big part of why he was drafted — so perhaps he makes good on that one eventually. Jimenez has seen the whiff rate on his slider tank over the last few years, and if he didn’t have the new splitter (17.5% swSTR), things might look more dire for him. Gallardo’s curve actually gets more whiffs than his slider, which you can see is strange from above.

The Best Curves

Pitcher	Curves Thrown	swSTR
Paco Rodriguez	324	0.228
David Hernandez	341	0.205
Corey Kluber	283	0.191
Manny Parra	265	0.185
Mike Minor	270	0.182
Cody Allen	293	0.181
Roy Halladay	248	0.177
Doug Fister	676	0.176
Clayton Kershaw	428	0.173
Cliff Lee	254	0.169

You can forgive PITCHf/x for calling Kluber’s slider a curve. After all, Kluber’s slider has eight inches of horizontal movement and that’s not normal for a slider. The rest of the list doesn’t contain too many surprises. Cody Allen could figure in for saves in the Cleveland bullpen if/when John Axford falls apart, so it’s nice to know he has this weapon, and that it’s equally effective against batters of both hands.

The Worst Curves

Pitcher	Curves Thrown	swSTR
Miguel Gonzalez	218	0.023
Eric Stults	370	0.030
Bronson Arroyo	356	0.031
Phil Hughes	229	0.035
Chris Tillman	300	0.040
Jason Hammel	246	0.045
Marco Estrada	339	0.047
Joel Peralta	295	0.048
Andy Pettitte	366	0.049
J.J. Hoover	239	0.050

A curve can be used for ground balls, and at its best it’s not the best pitch for whiffs anyway. Tillman’s curve, for example, has re-affirmed my life choices, and also gets 64% ground balls, so it’s still a good pitch, just not for whiffs. The big bend, maybe. Estrada’s curve gets 59% ground balls, it’s his change that he uses for whiffs. These curves, though, are a little worse than most at getting whiffs. Perhaps this is the reason why Phil Hughes mostly dropped his curve for his slider last year. His curve wasn’t that good.

The Best Change-Ups

Pitcher	Changes Thrown	swSTR
Kris Medlen	697	0.297
Cole Hamels	855	0.269
Jarrod Parker	624	0.247
Joaquin Benoit	292	0.247
Fernando Rodney	429	0.235
Michael Wacha	252	0.234
Stephen Strasburg	461	0.228
Marco Estrada	480	0.227
Tim Lincecum	578	0.227
Chris Capuano	504	0.222

Told you Estrada’s change was good. And there’s Cole Hamels. And there’s Michael Wacha. And There’s Tim Lincecum. And Medlen, and Rodney… all the names you think of when you think of the pitch. If you’ve only got one great pitch, it really looks like this is the one to have. Your fastballs all have natural platoon splits — they’re all better against same-handed hitters — so you *could* just use a change and your fastballs to make it.

The Worst Change-Ups

Pitcher	Changes Thrown	swSTR
Aaron Harang	203	0.010
Kevin Correia	396	0.040
Mike Leake	369	0.043
Jeremy Guthrie	686	0.053
Scott Feldman	234	0.064
Bud Norris	308	0.065
Madison Bumgarner	312	0.067
Joe Saunders	628	0.069
Scott Diamond	253	0.071
Bronson Arroyo	504	0.073

Before rounding, that change-up from Harang actually had a .0099 swinging strike rate. Wow. You can use your change for ground-balls, too, so Bumgarner’s 50% ground-ball rate on his change-up is *slightly* redeeming, but mostly this is just a list of bad change-ups. And take a look at the platoon splits for most of these pitchers. Not good. If anyone ever tells you that I talk too much about arsenals and that it’s not that important to have a good change-up, well… just point them to this list. If they point to Bumgarner, you can check the splits on BrooksBaseball and tell them — Bumgarner’s change gets 17% whiffs against lefties, and anyway his curve is great against both hands. You can’t say that about Bronson Arroyo or Bud Norris, for example, and that’s meaningful.