Originally Posted by jd1020:
**cough** Cubs **cough**
Happens to someone every year.
Kinda think we'll see the Yankees fall victim to it this year but they've put a few guys on that roster like Gregorious and Torres that take tougher ABs. Hicks is is out for the rest of the year, IIRC, but he'd have qualified, Gardner still does.
Guys like that can form the core of a nice offense but you need complementary parts around them as well. It's what makes the Astros so damn dangerous - they have guys like Brantley, Bregman and Altuve that will wear you down around their Springer, Correa and now Alvarez types.
Interestingly the only team to do a 'ideal type' for either of those players WAS the Royals and they won consecutive pennants and a championship by having almost exclusively type B players....and of course a ridiculous bullpen. [Reply]
Originally Posted by duncan_idaho:
More fun Twitter stuff:
Keller has been working on a splitter and is starting to incorporate it/feel more comfortable with it. If he can develop that into a legit, bat-missing out pitch, he's going to give lefties just as much trouble as he gives righties.
Hey, Brady Singer. You watching?
If Singer continues to struggle with his changeup - which I expect him to do, given the arm slot - I'd love to see him try the splitter out. From experience, that low 3-quarters arm angle can be a tough one to consistently throw a changeup from (old Duncan Idaho was a low 3/4, fastball, cutter/slider guy himself, who never could quite find a changeup that worked).
Hard to stay on top of a splitter from a low 3/4 as well, though. I'd worry you'll frisbee a lot of those and those just become backed up BP fastballs, especially to like-handed hitters.
I would think that if you have the dexterity and long enough fingers to throw an effective splitter at 3/4, you'd be able to throw the change as well. And the fading action on a change would seem to work better, even from 3/4, than the dive on a splitter. You'd have a better velocity difference as well.
I'm not sure that a splitter does much to alter your arsenal if used in lieu of the change. You're still not doing much to change timing with it. At that point you may be best served to just mix up your fastball usage/location and make sure you can get your slider to both sides of the plate effectively. You lean into the 'power pitcher' mentality and just try to get off-handed hitters inside conscious. Maybe as a right you attack lefties from the 1b side of the rubber and get in their kitchen better?
If we're on the subject of dorking it up over pitching, have you read Kepner's book? Easy, interesting read. [Reply]
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
Happens to someone every year.
Kinda think we'll see the Yankees fall victim to it this year but they've put a few guys on that roster like Gregorious and Torres that take tougher ABs. Hicks is is out for the rest of the year, IIRC, but he'd have qualified, Gardner still does.
Guys like that can form the core of a nice offense but you need complementary parts around them as well. It's what makes the Astros so damn dangerous - they have guys like Brantley, Bregman and Altuve that will wear you down around their Springer, Correa and now Alvarez types.
Interestingly the only team to do a 'ideal type' for either of those players WAS the Royals and they won consecutive pennants and a championship by having almost exclusively type B players....and of course a ridiculous bullpen.
There's a pretty decent correlation between making contact and having success. Those Royals teams were truly one of the best contact hitting groups ever... relative to the rest of baseball. They had the fewest strikeouts in the league by a mile.
Funny enough, a couple years after the Royals knocked the Astros out, Houston totally did a 180 in their philosophy and put an emphasis on contact. In 2015 when they lost to KC they had the 2nd most strikeouts in the league. Two years later they won the World Series and (like the Royals) had the fewest K's in the league. That's a crazy shift considering it was pretty much the same group of star players.
Same thing is happening this year. The Astros are in 1st and have the fewest strikeouts by a pretty good margin. [Reply]
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
Interestingly the only team to do a 'ideal type' for either of those players WAS the Royals and they won consecutive pennants and a championship by having almost exclusively type B players....and of course a ridiculous bullpen.
Originally Posted by tk13:
There's a pretty decent correlation between making contact and having success. Those Royals teams were truly one of the best contact hitting groups ever... relative to the rest of baseball. They had the fewest strikeouts in the league by a mile.
Funny enough, a couple years after the Royals knocked the Astros out, Houston totally did a 180 in their philosophy and put an emphasis on contact. In 2015 when they lost to KC they had the 2nd most strikeouts in the league. Two years later they won the World Series and (like the Royals) had the fewest K's in the league. That's a crazy shift considering it was pretty much the same group of star players.
Same thing is happening this year. The Astros are in 1st and have the fewest strikeouts by a pretty good margin.
That’s why Luhnow and his crew are the best in the business. They saw the value of that grind it out approach in playoff time and overmade their complementary players to better fit it.
They are good at everything. Almost unfair. [Reply]
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
Hard to stay on top of a splitter from a low 3/4 as well, though. I'd worry you'll frisbee a lot of those and those just become backed up BP fastballs, especially to like-handed hitters.
I would think that if you have the dexterity and long enough fingers to throw an effective splitter at 3/4, you'd be able to throw the change as well. And the fading action on a change would seem to work better, even from 3/4, than the dive on a splitter. You'd have a better velocity difference as well.
I'm not sure that a splitter does much to alter your arsenal if used in lieu of the change. You're still not doing much to change timing with it. At that point you may be best served to just mix up your fastball usage/location and make sure you can get your slider to both sides of the plate effectively. You lean into the 'power pitcher' mentality and just try to get off-handed hitters inside conscious. Maybe as a right you attack lefties from the 1b side of the rubber and get in their kitchen better?
If we're on the subject of dorking it up over pitching, have you read Kepner's book? Easy, interesting read.
That’s a good point re: fingers. I do think it would differentiate again between the fastball and slider because the split is going to have fastball spin with a different velocity band than either of the other two pitches, and it should have more drop than a slider sling 3/4ers.
Originally Posted by duncan_idaho:
That’s why Luhnow and his crew are the best in the business. They saw the value of that grind it out approach in playoff time and overmade their complementary players to better fit it.
They are good at everything. Almost unfair.
But muh tanking!!!!
And man, when they strike they strike hard. None of this going out and getting Mike Leake or Homer Bailey crap.
Yeah, our pitching is okay, but it could be better. Let's go get Verlander. Oh...and Cole. Ah fuck it, we haven't won a championship in a year or so, let's get Greinke too!
God the Brantley get was inspired. You never hear anyone talk about that but the dude is just so perfect for that lineup. And the way they can kinda take it easy on him with that short porch in LF (and give him some rest with guys like Reddick and Alvarez being able to shell game over with subs like Marisnick).
That organization is just better than anyone and by a fair amount. [Reply]
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
But muh tanking!!!!
And man, when they strike they strike hard. None of this going out and getting Mike Leake or Homer Bailey crap.
Yeah, our pitching is okay, but it could be better. Let's go get Verlander. Oh...and Cole. Ah fuck it, we haven't won a championship in a year or so, let's get Greinke too!
God the Brantley get was inspired. You never hear anyone talk about that but the dude is just so perfect for that lineup. And the way they can kinda take it easy on him with that short porch in LF (and give him some rest with guys like Reddick and Alvarez being able to shell game over with subs like Marisnick).
That organization is just better than anyone and by a fair amount.
It’s rather sad when cardinals fans chalk up Luhnow’s success to the tank job.
Originally Posted by duncan_idaho:
It’s rather sad when cardinals fans chalk up Luhnow’s success to the tank job.
Nope. Not the case.
Lets not limit it to Cardinals fans. I think one of your own is playing the same tired-ass song right now.
It just requires that you ignore so many of the things they've done and how easily they could've screwed up the assets they had when they struggled. Moreover, it doesn't give Luhnow any credit at all for sticking to his guns when he was considered a laughingstock. When there were wolves howling at his door for being an out of touch computer nerd.
He could've faltered and instead he doubled down, got even more aggressive and pretty much gave everyone the bird.
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
Hard to stay on top of a splitter from a low 3/4 as well, though. I'd worry you'll frisbee a lot of those and those just become backed up BP fastballs, especially to like-handed hitters.
I would think that if you have the dexterity and long enough fingers to throw an effective splitter at 3/4, you'd be able to throw the change as well. And the fading action on a change would seem to work better, even from 3/4, than the dive on a splitter. You'd have a better velocity difference as well.
I'm not sure that a splitter does much to alter your arsenal if used in lieu of the change. You're still not doing much to change timing with it. At that point you may be best served to just mix up your fastball usage/location and make sure you can get your slider to both sides of the plate effectively. You lean into the 'power pitcher' mentality and just try to get off-handed hitters inside conscious. Maybe as a right you attack lefties from the 1b side of the rubber and get in their kitchen better?
If we're on the subject of dorking it up over pitching, have you read Kepner's book? Easy, interesting read.
Yeah...my son sits at 3/4 slot and has had more effectiveness with the change than the split or sinker. Throws a slider as well and can slurve it a bit to change speeds...but remarkably determined to keep trying the changeup. It's paying off for the most part. Not a fan of abandoning the change until it's absolutely necessary for advancing. [Reply]