Velocity & Pitch Mix Changes (Opening Day)
If any stat can be monitored with a small sample, it’s pitch velocity. Fastball velocity stabilized with a sample of ‘1’. Just one fastball is enough to know a pitcher’s velocity going forward. I collected the Opening Day starters’ fastball velocities and compared them to last year’s values. It’s all we can really do at this point in the season.
Additionally, I compared this year’s and last year’s pitch mix. Mainly, I was hoping to find if a starter dumped or added a pitch. I didn’t mention a pitch if its usage didn’t change by 10% points or more.
Here are the starters ordered by fastball velocity change. Also, to save space, when I mention a pitch changes a certain percentage, I mean percentage points (ex. up 10% = up 10% points).
| Name | 2018 | 2019 | Diff | Pitch Mix Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Julio Teheran | 89.8 | 91.4 | 1.6 | Fastball % down 15%, Slider up 15% |
| Max Scherzer | 94.4 | 95.1 | 0.7 | Normal |
| Hyun-Jin Ryu | 90.2 | 90.8 | 0.6 | Fastball % up 12% with most coming off his change |
| Mike Minor | 92.8 | 93.3 | 0.5 | Normal |
| Kyle Freeland | 91.6 | 92.0 | 0.4 | Normal |
| Marcus Stroman | 92.4 | 92.8 | 0.4 | Effectively dropped curve and threw slider more |
| Madison Bumgarner | 90.9 | 91.3 | 0.4 | Curve and fastball down with slider up 11% |
| Jose Berrios | 93.2 | 93.6 | 0.4 | Fastball down 11%, curve and changeup |
| Andrew Cashner | 92.4 | 92.5 | 0.1 | Fastball down 15 %, went with a slider (cutter) and change |
| Brad Keller | 93.9 | 94.0 | 0.1 | Normal |
| Jacob deGrom | 96.0 | 96.0 | 0.0 | Threw just one curve, previously 10% |
| Aaron Nola | 92.4 | 92.2 | -0.2 | Normal |
| Jordan Zimmermann | 91.2 | 90.8 | -0.4 | Fastball % down 10%, curve and slider usage up |
| Corey Kluber | 92.0 | 91.6 | -0.4 | Cutter down 15% |
| Luis Castillo | 95.8 | 95.3 | -0.5 | Fastball % down 10%, all to change |
| Jhoulys Chacin | 90.1 | 89.5 | -0.6 | Split finger up to 10%, fastball down to 43% |
| Justin Verlander | 95.1 | 94.5 | -0.6 | Brought back his change to 10% |
| Mike Fiers | 89.4 | 88.8 | -0.6 | Normal |
| Jameson Taillon | 95.2 | 94.6 | -0.6 | Fastball % down 12%, most to slider |
| Masahiro Tanaka | 91.7 | 90.9 | -0.8 | Normal |
| Trevor Cahill | 91.8 | 91.0 | -0.8 | Dropped slider down 15%, all of diff went to curve |
| Eric Lauer | 91.2 | 90.4 | -0.8 | Normal |
| Blake Snell | 95.8 | 94.9 | -0.9 | Fastball % down 10%, curve up 17% |
| Miles Mikolas | 93.9 | 92.9 | -1.0 | Normal |
| Carlos Rodon | 93.0 | 92.0 | -1.0 | Normal |
| Zack Greinke | 89.6 | 88.5 | -1.1 | Normal |
| Jon Lester | 91.0 | 89.5 | -1.5 | Normal |
| Marco Gonzalez | 90.1 | 88.5 | -1.6 | Normal |
| Jose Urena | 95.8 | 94.1 | -1.7 | Slider up 13% |
| Chris Sale | 94.7 | 92.2 | -2.5 | Fastball down 10% |
Notes
● Nine of the pitchers saw their fastball usage drop by at least 10% points while only Ryu increased by that much. If Opening Day starters (i.e aces) are dropping their fastballs to throw more breaking pitches, what will the rest of the league do? The fastball may be dying. Starters threw fastballs 54% of the time last year and yesterday that value was down to 48%. It’s a trend to track going forward.
● Julio Teheran’s value jumped the most after going through these starters. His velocity increased over 1.5 mph. Also, he dropped the usage of his faster fastball and went with his slider (23% SwStr%) instead.
● For pitchers adding or removing pitches, deGrom and Stroman dropped their curveballs while Verlander brought back his change.
● The three big value droppers are Chris Sale, Jon Lester, and Zack Greinke. Each lost at least 1 mph off their fastballs. Sale is by far the most concerning. Here is how his fastball has performed at different velocities over the years.
| MPH | SwStr% |
|---|---|
| 90 | 9.1% |
| 91 | 7.8% |
| 92 | 8.7% |
| 93 | 10.2% |
| 94 | 6.2% |
| 95 | 13.8% |
| 96 | 13.8% |
| 97 | 17.0% |
| 98 | 21.8% |
| 99 | 22.5% |
While his 92-mph fastball is not as good as one in the upper 90’s, it’s still effective. But they weren’t yesterday. He might need to be benched at this point. Maybe.
As for Zack Greinke, his fastball has always been trash in the low 90’s and high-80’s, so it doesn’t matter if he loses a tick.
| MPH | SwStr% |
|---|---|
| 88 | 4.3% |
| 89 | 4.1% |
| 90 | 4.4% |
| 91 | 4.7% |
| 92 | 5.9% |
As for Jon Lester, the results on his fastball don’t decline at the lower velocities, so the drop won’t bury him anymore.
| MPH | SwStr% |
|---|---|
| 88 | 4.3% |
| 89 | 7.7% |
| 90 | 6.3% |
| 91 | 6.6% |
| 92 | 6.9% |
| 93 | 6.1% |
| 94 | 9.7% |
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.
Hi Jeff, do you think Brad Keller can be a 6% HR/FB guy for a full season? Is his FB really that heavy?
His results after changing around his slider is like Keuchels. Worm killer
Keuchel has a career 14.5% HR/FB rate.
looking at Sale, his FB velocity was down 1.2 mph vs last year’s opening day. And his fb usage was down 22.5%. He’s definitely going to be one to watch here early in the season.
Welp…when Sale fell to me, I defiantly took him…let’s hope this is him still building up.
Could the drop in fastball usage be due to the possibility that front line starters have deeper arsenals?
Why would that be the case? Isn’t this saying their fastballs dropped relative to their own prior usage AND was lower than league average? Deeper arsenals wouldn’t explain the drop relative to personal usage
Just another comment on Sale (form someone who took him over deGrom) – his FB velo definitely started low last year and he built it up in April. Three of his 1st 4 starts last year were under 93.0 mph with 1 start at 89.5. He bumped it up over 95 on 5/6/18 and stayed over 94 until mid-Sept.
Now 2017 he was pretty much right at the 94 right away and 2016 he actually averaged 92.8 for the year (of course, he was merely good in 2016 rather than elite). 2015 and 2014 were kind of like 2017 where he built up velo into the summer, though not as pronounced.
Right now I’m wishing I had taken deGrom but I’m not panicking yet. He has a bit of a history of starting at low velos and building up so I’m hoping for that. (I mean, I kind of have to, right? Not like I’m waiving the guy and picking up Scherzer or deGrom or Verlander off the waiver wire 🙂 )
This article at least makes it sound like Sale is intentionally laying off for now, not that it’s the result of aging or him being currently injured: https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/03/11/chris-sale-doesnt-care-if-he-pitches-in-any-grapefruit-league-games/
Here’s what MLB.com beat writer Ian Browne (and LeVangie, the pitching coach) had to say after Thursday’s debacle:
“Rest assured that the radar readings were very much by design. The idea is for Sale to save his best fastball for the games that matter the most — in September and October.
“‘We’ll get back to driving the Mustang, not the Ferrari, and try to increase deception and all that,’ said LeVangie.”
https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/news/fantasy-baseball-chris-sales-velocity-was-down-but-are-concerns-overblown/
More like a Pinto.
Isn’t that what Michael Fulmer was saying, too? And Betances?
No? Every article I can find about them makes it clear they weren’t throwing slower by choice or team mandate, just that they weren’t worried about being able to ramp up in future starts. LeVangie and Sale are straight up saying his velocity is down intentionally. I don’t know if it’s true, but it’s worth mentioning.
He also only threw 9 innings in ST. Dead arm is a definitely possibility as well.
This is a fantastic idea. Looks like a lot of research, too, soo thanks!
Verlander’s changeup use is a trend that carried over from spring training. Seems like he wants to make it a larger part of his arsenal and not just a single game blip.
This was my only useful takeaway from ST. Verlander has a new changeup situation and is willing to go for it. Should complement his repertoire nicely!
Great info, Jeff. Thanks for the post
Describing ZG’s fastball as having always been ‘trash’ is poor writing and even worse analysis, aka truly ‘trash’. Worse is that his FB peaked at >95 mph, a stat I found on this very site, so unless numbers have changed recently this means you’re making up crap to suit your narrative. Just look at what he’s done you hack, but only after posting a video of you throwing a fastball on here first. Sincerely, ZG
AL Cy Young Award (2009)
5× All-Star (2009, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018)
5× Gold Glove Award (2014–2018)
Silver Slugger Award (2013)
2× MLB ERA leader (2009, 2015
By “unless numbers have changed recently” I mean unless the values of numbers have changed, not updated stats or anything. Like if 6 was really a 9
What are you talking about? It clearly says “trash in the low-90s and high-80s.” Jeff never said he only throws these velocities. In any event, Zach hasn’t regularly thrown at 95 since… 2012? (https://www.fangraphs.com/graphs.aspx?playerid=1943&position=P&pitchgraphs=true&statArr=&legend=1&split=base&time=daily&start=2005&end=2019&rtype=mult>1=15&dStatArray=FA&ymin=&ymax=)
I’m not sure he’s thrown 95 in any of the last three seasons, but, again, Jeff never said that he hasn’t thrown it 95.
While mbthomas23’s comments were harsh, I must admit that I also interpreted “his fastball has always been trash in the low-90s and high 80s” as meaning that he has always thrown it in that range of velocity and it has always been trash. If interpreted that way, the statement is obviously wrong. According to Greinke’s player page on Fangraphs, his average four-seam fastball velocity has gradually decreased from 94.8 mph in 2007 to 90.0 in 2018. During that span, the pitch value has been over 10 in five separate seasons and, as recently as 2015, it had a pitch value of 20.4 (which is fantastic).
It wasn’t until after reading your comments that I realized the “trash” sentence could be interpreted another way – that whenever his fastball is in the low 90s or high 80s, it is trash. I don’t know how Jeff intended the sentence to read. But, even if it were meant to be interpreted this way, it may be an overstep. The 2015 pitch value of 20.4 that I mentioned had an average velocity of 92.5 mph. 2014 also averaged 92.5 mph with a pitch value of 10.4, and 2013 averaged 92.4 mph with a pitch value of 11.7. Is that velocity too high to be considered low 90s? His 2017 fastball averaged 91 mph and had a pitch value 1.7. While that’s not great, it’s certainly not trash.
Bottom line: The “trash” comment really caught my attention too.
Silly troll
The quote is “always been trash in the low 90’s high 80’s”. As in when his fastball has been slow its been bad, not for his entire career. He’s basically giving ZG a compliment, by saying his fastball hasn’t been very good the last few years but he is still a good pitcher. Also, if you are trying to defend how good a pitcher is at actual pitching, citing Gold Gloves and Silver Slugger (even All-Star appearances) aren’t going to help. That Cy Young award was 10 years ago when he was throwing 5-6 MPH harder.
Fiers has two starts now. Are these numbers just for yesterday or do they include last week?
Great job! I could read this every day. Still, I am confused about what is being compared. Is it all of 2018 or just their first start in 2018 or just their last start of 2018? First start of 2018 might be the best way to avoid a selection bias…
Zimmerman is the best writer left on this roster. He is really, really, good. I read everything from him. Everything….He is to be respected for his insight and ability to communicate. That said, we don’t need to agree on everything he writes. I am in the camp, he poorly summarized ZG. It was a swing and a miss. Overall, an insightful article.
Bench sale? I’m starting him. Maybe he gets rest. It’ll be interesting to see Eovaldi after that postseason run too.
Sale was a no-draft for me. I could be wrong but he seems to be driving in the Kershaw lane.
Every pitcher does, sooner or later. Here’s hoping that Sale has a couple more good years in him!
I think the suggestion to possibly bench Sale is still a little premature.. I know Zimmerman says “Maybe”, but let’s realize that according to Brooks Baseball, Sale’s MONTH TO MONTH standard deviation on his fastball last year was 2.2 mph, which almost spans that gap between his 2018 average and just one one game we are deliberating here. As a loose reference, the chance a normally distributed variable is more than 1 SD from its mean is approximately 1/6… not overly rare….. Let’s see what is happening a month from now before hinting at benching one of the elite SPs off the board in drafts.. especially considering he has home dates with TOR and BAL in the near future.
yea plus i dont think seattle is the best place to pitch opening day although idk what the temps were. his velocity changes alot during the year, i wouldnt be super worried rn
Love this article. Please make it a regular piece.