A Great At-Bat for DY and a Win in NY

Delmon Young’s 8^th inning double that drove in three runs to tie the game at four and eventually lead to the Twins 5-4 win over the Yankees shows just how far he’s come at the plate in the last couple years.

The image to the right shows the pitch sequence of the at-bat. The first pitch was an outside fastball that Delmon was able to lay-off. I think it’s important to mention how significant it is that he took that pitch for a ball, because I believe that the Delmon Young of 2008 and 2009 probably swings at that pitch.

Here’s the reason: In 2008 Delmon had 623 plate appearances. Of those, he was started off with a ball in 281 PA’s. And of those, he swung and missed or hit a foul 60 times. This means that Delmon swung and missed or hit a foul on the first pitch of an at-bat 21% of the time when that first pitch was a ball. In 2009, that same ratio declined to 14%. And in 2010, it was down to 9%. DY has definitely improved his eye at the start of at-bats, and it was shown again last night against the Yankees.

The second pitch was a strike that was almost down the middle (just slightly up and in), and Delmon took a good cut at it and fouled it off. The third pitch was close to the location of the first pitch, but a little less outside. Delmon again was able to layoff of this pitch and get up in the count. The fourth pitch was a borderline pitch up and in that DY didn’t swing at, putting him up in the count 3-1. The fifth pitch was a strike on the outside part of the plate that Delmon again took a good cut at and  fouled off.

The sixth pitch, with a 3-2 count and the game basically on the line, was a borderline fastball up and out of the strike zone. However, with Delmon having to protect the strike zone at this point, he was able to do just enough to muscle the ball into short right field, driving home the game-tying runs.

To summarize, Delmon Young took three pitches in a clutch situation in Yankee Stadium that were borderline strikes and definitely pitches that he would’ve swung in ’08 or ‘09. Taking those pitches enabled him to get good pitches to swing at, eventually leading to his three-run double. It was a very good at-bat that led to a win and that could help the Twins psyche in facing the Yankees not only in this series, but later in the season and possibly the postseason as well. This may end up being one of the most important at-bats of the Twins’ 2011 season.

And there’s one last point about Delmon that needs to be made. Every year of his career he’s put up a positive value in Fangraph’s “Clutch” statistic. Even with how bad he was in ’08 and ’09, he’s come through in the tight situations more often than not. As a point of comparison, Joe Mauer has put up a negative clutch value in four of his seven seasons, while Justin Morneau has negative clutch values in four of his eight seasons. So I think it’s fair to say that although Mauer and Morneau are better overall hitters, Delmon may actually be the guy you want up there with the game on the line, especially considering his maturation as a hitter. 

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Tags: Delmon Young, Minnesota Twins Blog, New York Yankees

Scott Baker and the Importance of Pitch Location

Scott Baker’s overall decent start against the Yankees on Monday night was defined by two bad pitches to two great hitters. I’ve taken four screen captures of each home run to show how Baker’s miss with the intended pitch location led to the Yankees’ home runs and eventual win (click on the images for a larger version).

Alex Rodriguez’s Home Run

Frame 1 – Mauer is calling for the pitch on the outside part of the plate, about knee-high.

Frame 2 – Baker delivers and the ball is headed for the outside part of the plate, however it’s mid-thigh high instead of knee-high. Mid-thigh high is a much more dangerous location, especially once you get to frame 3…

Frame 3 – The movement on the pitch has taken it from the outside part of the plate, across the middle, and moving towards the inside part of the plate. Pitches that are middle-in, mid-thigh high lead to the type of contact you see in frame 4.

Frame 4 – As you can see by the final location of Mauer glove behind A-Rod’s bat, the pitch didn’t end up anywhere close to the originally intended location. Sometimes a pitcher gets away with that type of miss. However, the odds of getting away with middle-in, mid-thigh high pitch to a hitter like A-Rod are much lower. On this night, Baker wasn’t able to get away with it.

Jorge Posada’s Home Run

Frame 1 – Mauer’s calling for the pitch to be middle-in, knee-high to Posada. As the pitch is delivered, Nick Swisher, the runner on first, is attempting a steal. You’ll see Mauer slightly rise out of the crouch over the course of the four frames in anticipation of making a throw.

Frame 2 – The pitch starts out inside. However, like the pitch to A-Rod, it’s mid-thigh high instead of knee high

Frame 3 – Again, like the pitch to A-Rod, the ball begins to move across the middle of the plate, making it the perfect type of pitch to be hammered for a home run.

Frame 4- You can see where Posada makes contact and where Mauer’s glove ends up. The original location was middle-in, knee-high. This pitch is hit by Posada when it’s thigh-high to belt-high, almost dead-center of the plate.

Obviously most pitchers are going to make mistakes during a game, and Baker is no exception. These two pitches to A-Rod and Posada show how important it is to either (a) not miss location on pitches; or (b) miss to the right hitters or in the right count. This is especially true for Baker, who is a fly ball pitcher. Baker left these two pitches up and over the plate and, as a result, lost the game.

Tags: Alex Rodriguez, Joe Mauer, Jorge Posada, Minnesota Twins Blog, New York Yankees, Scott Baker

An Ugly Opening Day Start by Carl Pavano

That was no fun. Living in Toronto, I unfortunately witnessed that ugly opening day loss in person. Well, at least the first seven innings, until I decided that I couldn’t take watching that performance any longer. The defense was flat-out bad. The offense never got rolling early on, as the Twins first couple hits came with two outs in different innings. However, I’m most disappointed in Carl Pavano. Yes, the defense killed him, but he wasn’t great either.

Unless the Pitch f/x readings are off in Rogers Centre, Pavano/Mauer’s pitch selection was very odd. In total he threw 64 pitches, with 46 of those (72%) being change-ups. Last year, on average, 25% of all of his pitches were change-ups. From my seat, I couldn’t tell whether Mauer was calling that many change-ups or if Pavano was shaking off other pitches to get to the change, but either way throwing that many change-ups was a problem for a couple of reasons:

1.     Little Differentiation between the Change-up and Fastball

Pavano had very little differentiation between his change-up and fastball last night. The average velocity of his change was 83.5 mph while his fastball averaged 88.6 mph, only a 5.1 mph difference. Last year, Pavano averaged an 8.4 mph difference between his fastball and change-up. A five mph difference between the change-up and fastball might be ok if the fastball averages 95 mph and the change-up 90 mph, as at least the velocity could be difficult to hit. But mixing a fastball that’s less than 89 mph with a change that’s 84 mph is just too easy for major league players to hit, especially when they’re seeing the 84 mph change-up 72% of the time.

2.     Little Command of the Change-up

From the Pitch f/x data, it appears that Pavano had very little command of the change-up last night. Last year Pavano’s change-up averaged 5.96 inches of movement right to left (from the catcher’s perspective) and 2.1 inches of upward movement. Last night his change-up averaged only 1.75 inches of movement right to left and 10.14 inches of downward movement. Obviously, with the sample size of the 2010 data combined with the good year Pavano had last year, this is not the movement that we should expect on his change-up. It looks like he just had absolutely no command of it last night.

Hopefully this start against the Blue Jays was an aberration in Pavano’s season. It’s just one game, and almost every starting pitcher is going to have a couple bad starts during the season. It was just disappointing to see the Twins offense, defense, and pitching come out so flat to start a season that has high expectations.

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Tags: Carl Pavano, Minnesota Twins Blog, Opening Day 2011

Nick Blackburn and Pitch Movement

I hate that Ron Gardenhire has already given Nick Blackburn a spot in the rotation. Blackburn had a terrible year in 2010, one that included a trip down to AAA. However, his first five innings of spring training baseball were good, so that erased it all. Here’s what Gardy had to say:

“I’d say Blackie is in the rotation,” Gardenhire said. “I like that sinkerball. I like the way that he goes about it. He’s pretty good. If he’s healthy, he’s going at it pretty good. I like what we’re seeing. I don’t count him as one of the guys left out. He’s one of my guys.”

There was also an interesting comment made by Blackburn:

“This is probably the best I’ve felt in the last several springs, with knees and everything included,” Blackburn said. “I’m finally getting out there to run a little bit. My legs feel stronger, which carries over to my delivery, too. My elbow feels great. I can’t remember having as much freedom in my elbow as I’ve had.”

“I don’t know if this is necessarily true, but I feel like when my mechanics are off, I’m in way more trouble than a lot of guys,” Blackburn said. “I depend so much on movement, and I lose every bit of my movement whenever my mechanics get out of line.”

So to complete Blackburn’s comment, he believes: mechanics are off = less pitch movement = getting hit and giving up runs. However, does the data back this up?

I looked all pitches Blackburn threw from 2008 to 2010 and split out two groups of data: (1) pitches on which he gave up a double, triple, or home run (generally harder hit balls); and (2) all pitches thrown for a called or swinging strike (generally some of his better pitches).

What I found for the pitches that were hit for extra bases, in comparison to the strikes, is the following:

• The largest loss in movement was on his two-seam fastball/sinker, with a 9% decrease. In real terms, he lost 0.6 inches of vertical movement with a slight decrease in horizontal movement. Since it’s a sinker and the pitch he threw most often, it’s obviously the loss in vertical movement could have a significant negative influence on performance.
• His change-up had slightly less movement (-5%)
• The cut-fastball (+98%) and change-up (+38%) both had significantly more movement and likely are the result of difficulty in controlling them.
• The four-seam fastball (+6%) and the slider (+4%) both had slightly more movement.

What does this all mean? Well it’s not necessarily true that a loss in movement leads to worse results for Blackburn. However, considering that he throws the two-seam/sinker most often, the loss in movement on that pitch could result in him getting hit harder…like in his most recent spring training start. Here’s a comment from Gardy regarding that start against the Blue Jays:

“He didn’t throw the ball well, but he’s been throwing the ball so well that it just was one of those days where he didn’t get it where he wanted to,” Gardenhire said. “[They] actually hit a couple balls where it looked like they golfed them. But it wasn’t one of his better days. The ball was up, just got it up, and they whacked it. They’ve always been a good fastball-hitting team, and it looks like it goes all the way through the system.”

I think it’s risky for the Twins to have a guy like Blackburn in the rotation, as slight changes in movement on his pitches have horrible results. If he’s not completely on, the Twins throw away runs with him on the mound. With Kyle Gibson likely ready to help out the Twins at some point during this season, I wouldn’t expect the team to give Blackburn as long of a leash as last year. That said, Gardy was quick to say that Blackburn’s “…one of my guys,” so Twins fans may have to put up with more than a few bad starts before any changes are made.

And, speaking of Blackburn, here’s a clip of Joe Mauer (in his first catching duties of the spring) catching Blackburn’s bullpen session today.

Tags: 2011 Spring Training, Minnesota Twins Blog, Nick Blackburn, Ron Gardenhire