For further commentary on Michael Pineda‘s velocity, check out Larry’s feed from yesterday…brilliant stuff.
As I laughed at the end of last night’s tie-game vs. the Red Sox, I got to thinking more about Michael Pineda and his velocity. You know the story by now and you don’t need me to rehash it for you. So I played a “what if” game with myself. “What if,” I said, “Pineda is no longer going to sit 95, but rather 91-93? Can he still be effective? Can he rely on his non-fastball pitches? Are they effective enough for him to use number 1 at a lower velocity?” To answer this, I went to Pineda’s page on Brooks Baseball to compare his other pitches–his slider and his emerging changeup–to those of other players.
Pineda’s slider has a solid reputation and for good reason. On the pitch, he garnered a 39.30 whiff per swing percentage. To compare, CC Sabathia‘s slider had a 40.85% W/S. Clayton Kershaw got 41.20 on his. Francisco Liriano? 42.77. Jered Weaver? 27.39. Brandon Morrow? 39.66. Zack Greinke? 41.07. Those guys have some of the best sliders going, and Pineda is knocking on their doors when it comes to hitters swinging and missing at his slider. Pineda also uses the pitch to generate grounders. Of all the sliders batters put into play against Big Mike, 51.77% of them were worm-burners. CC came out at 52.48%; Kershaw at 47.41%; Liriano at 49.5%; Weaver at 36.52%; Morrow at 46.12%; and Greinke at a ridiculous 59.38%. We always want our pitchers to generate swings and misses and get grounders, and that’s what Pineda is able to do with his slider.
As for the changeup, it’s not as good as the others. His W/S% is only 15.28%. Of the other pitchers, the lowest W/S% was Morrow’s 20.07% and the highest was Liriano’s 42.7%. His 53.66 GB/BIP% beat out only Jered Weaver’s mark, but Weaver is a notorious fly-ball pitcher (as is Pineda). While the swing and miss rate may not be all that wonderful, that’s still a solid GB% on the pitch, even if it doesn’t stack up to the big boys presented herein.
So if Pineda’s velocity is down a bit and he has to lean on his secondary stuff a bit more, will he still be successful? I definitely think so. His slider is a knockout pitch and he can turn to it for effectiveness. The changeup isn’t exactly where it needs to be, but the more he throws it, the more comfortable he’ll be and the more effective it’ll get.
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4 Responses to Pineda’s other pitches
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TIQ IQ
Sure, and I’m not worried about Pineda. But on the data you cited, isn’t the speed of the fastball part of the effectiveness of the slider? It’s easier to adjust to a slider if you’re expecting a 90 mph fastball than it would be if you were expecting a 100 mph fastball. Is there any data on how effective a pitcher’s slider is relative to that same pitcher’s fastball? Was, eg, Randy Johnson’s slider as effective after he lost a couple of mphs on the heater?
That’s not really a fair comparison because Randy didn’t lose his good heater until he was around 41, so everything about him was suppose to be in decline. There isn’t really a good comparison, a guy like Bumgarner lost velocity but his secondary offerings were never as nasty as Pineda’s slider. Joba would be a decent comparison but I’m still convinced injury took away his top heater, which effect all his pitches.
I think it will still be a plus pitch, because it wasn’t a plus pitch because he threw 97, the pitch itself was extremely nasty with tons of tilt. From what I’ve seen in ST it still looks nasty, it still has tons of titl, and he still believes in it. So from that I would think it will still be good, maybe not as good as last year, but still better than most.
Let’s just hope he can get his full velocity back at some point. I think he can be a good pitcher without it, but he can’t be an ace, maybe not even a number 2 anytime soon.
I’m not trying to find a single good comparison, just wondering if there’s some data out there on how fastball speed coordinates with effectiveness of sliders. I think it would be enlightening.
I understand the point but you need an analogous situation for the comparison to hold water. Pineda is a young pitcher in his prime, so his losing velocity doesn’t compare well with a 41+ year old Randy Johnson. By that I mean Randy was losing velocity and stuff on all his pitches because of age, Pineda may very well just be losing velocity on his fastball but still have similar bite on his slider. it’d be apples to oranges, for the numbers to apply to Pineda’s scenario you need an apples to apples comparison. You want to know how velocity on a fastball effects a slider, but you don’t need to know how age regression on stuff effects the slider/fastball connection.