Throwing Heat Week 6

Baseball is happening! I decided for the entire season to run a weekly article on pitchers who have been “heating up.” I will dive into what it could mean for the pitcher and what you should do with them. This should be a captivating concept because it will be pitchers of all levels, anywhere from aces to pitchers you would have never drafted. That’s what it’s all about, catching players as they improve and acting on it before anyone else can realize. Welcome to “Throwing Heat!”

John Means
Last two weeks: 16.0 IP 1.13 ERA 40.4 K% 0.25 WHIP

John freaking Means baby! How insane is the dropped ball rule? Can we ban that already because this was truly a perfect game. For those who don’t know, John Means technically had a perfect game but in the third inning he had a strikeout where the runner reached base. Thus making it not a perfect game. Do better MLB!

Means has been nothing but fantastic this season. In his seven starts, he has managed to give up just five runs. Five. That’s good for a 1.37 ERA tagged with a 0.67 WHIP and 30.1 K%. I discussed Means in last week’s article so I won’t dive in again for the sake of repetitiveness but man he has been on fire.

Wade Miley
Last two weeks: 14.0 IP 1.29 ERA 21.6 K% 0.57 WHIP

Wade freaking Miley baby! Another no-hitter on the season. This was been a crazy season so far and I am all about it. Poor Indians fans.

Miley is giving us flashbacks to 2019 and 2018 as he currently has a 2.00 ERA with a 3.35 FIP, 0.75 WHIP, and 3.66 SIERA. Miley won’t really get you strikeouts but he has been successful at inducing ground balls this season (58.8 GB%). Most importantly he has dropped his walk rate from 13.4% last year to 5.8% this year. If he sustains that control he will sustain that ERA.

Yusei Kikuchi
Last two weeks: 14.0 IP 1.93 ERA 28.6 K% 0.64 WHIP

After two successful starts to the season, Kikuchi stumbled for the next two starts. And now he has strung together two solid starts back to back. The point I am getting at here is inconsistency. He did the same thing last season except this time he hasn’t been riddled with bad luck.

The inconsistency stems from his lack of command. Command that we had hoped would improve for this season. Last season Kikuchi added a cutter and experienced an increase in velocity. With that can come command woes because the pitcher isn’t used to the new movement. One would think after a shortened season and spring training Kikuchi would have better control for this season. Unfortunately that has not been the case. His Command+ sits at 79, that’s very bad. He isn’t hitting his spots and until he does he will never take a step forward.

Adbert Alzolay
Last two weeks: 11.0 IP 3.27 ERA 30.2 K% 0.82 WHIP

The 4.50 ERA doesn’t come close to describing Alzolay’s season thus far. In five starts he holds a 3.72 FIP, 23.0 K-BB%, 30.0 K%, and 0.88 WHIP. While he has let up hard contact at times the whiffs he is able to produce will soon outweigh it. Currently, the league average contact percentage is 75.0% for a pitcher. He sits at 70.3%. League average SwStr% is 11.6%. He sits at 13.7%. You get the picture.

Sonny Gray
Last two weeks: 12.2 IP 1.42 ERA 38.8 K% 0.87 WHIP

Sonny Gray is back and baseball is so much better with him on the mound. With one bad start against the Cardinals Gray has been solid so far this season. He has one of the deepest arsenals in the games with five pitches at his disposal. The walk rate and WHIP won’t ever be elite but Gray counters it with a high strikeout rate and low HR/9 (this year’s number will certainly drop).

Chris Bassitt
Last two weeks: 13.0 IP 2.77 ERA 30.8 K% 0.85 WHIP

Chris Bassitt is at it again. The Athletics are so good at using their pitcher’s strengths it’s extremely impressive. Bassitt relies on command and called strikes with his sinker. It technically isn’t ideal but he is so good at it that he defies that notion. What is different about Bassitt so far this season is the swings and misses.

As mentioned, last season it was all about called strikes with Bassitt. After his first two starts against tough opponents (HOU/LAD) his SwStr% in his last five starts sits at 13.7%. That is really good. Adding on to that, his strikeout rate is at 28.8%. Also really good. It’s tough to tell if the strikeouts will sustain but it very well could be from the increase in velocity of his sinker which is up about half a tick.

Moving forward I would expect the strikeout rate to dip but continued success overall for Bassitt. Baseball is weird though, so maybe he continues and becomes a strikeout pitcher as well.

Robbie Ray
Last two weeks: 12.2 IP 3.55 ERA 29.8 K% 0.87 WHIP

Okay someone tell me who switched out Robbie Ray with Aaron Nola. I need to know! What that stat line above doesn’t tell you is how Ray seems to have completely transformed as a pitcher. In his last four starts he has zero walks. Zero. I feel like we are all on an episode of Punk’d or something. I would have expected Bartolo Colon to come back and hit three home runs in a game before Robbie Ray did this.

One way Robbie Ray has improved is pitch selection. He figured out that opposing hitters knew his out pitch was his slider so he started to throw it in the zone more. In the last three seasons his slider has a zone rate of about 34%. This season he is placing it in the zone 44.8% of the time. Overall as a whole, his zone rate is at a career-high of 49.1%. Living in the zone can certainly hurt but it seems like it is really helping Ray keep hitters on their toes.

Moving forward if Robbie Ray keeps the walks down we can see a Darvish type of revelation. While I don’t mean as good as Darvish was I think we can see a massive improvement very quickly. If you have him keep holding on and enjoy the ride.