Wednesday, September 07, 2011
Strasburg returns
Posted by Lucas ApostolerisStephen Strasburg returned to the majors on Tuesday and threw five innings (only 56 pitches) against the Dodgers. He allowed two hits, walked no one, and struck out four. You could say that he was “pitching to contact” more (considering he struck out over 12 per nine innings last year), which was the report we got earlier in the year. However, the report was that he was going to move to his two-seam fastball over his four-seam fastball did not pan out in this start:
| 2010 | 9/6/11 | |
|---|---|---|
| Four-seam | 44% | 55% |
| Two-seam | 14% | 21% |
| Curveball | 17% | 13% |
| Changeup | 25% | 11% |
He threw more fastballs Tuesday than he did last year, but still, there were more than twice as many four-seamers as two-seamers, resulting in a rather airy 4:6 groundout to flyout (including one infield pop) ratio.
Now, for what many were probably looking for: Strasburg's velocity. Coming back from Tommy John surgery is commonplace these days, but it's still a serious surgery. Here we go:
| 2010 | 9/6/11 | |
|---|---|---|
| Four-seam | 97.4 | 96.4 |
| Two-seam | 96.8 | 95.7 |
| Curveball | 82.3 | 80.4 |
| Changeup | 89.8 | 89.6 |
He looks to be down about one mph, but remember that these velocity numbers are not adjusted for weather conditions (it was rainy and in the 60s on Tuesday; colder temperatures have an inverse relationship with velocity). I wouldn't be concerned about the velocity drop yet; we'll have to see a few more starts from him before we make judgments. And let's remember, throwing "only" 96 mph in the rotation isn't really so bad.
It's notable that Strasburg's velocity took a little bit of a hit after a long offensive inning during which he had to run the bases. His last fastball of the second inning was 97.5 mph, and his first fastball of the third inning was 93.2. Presumably the delay caused part of his overall velocity decline.
You can read more of Lucas's work at Beyond the Boxscore and Don't Bring In The Lefty. Also, you can contact him at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or on Twitter @DBITLefty.
So the Nats have a potentially historically good strikeout pitcher and they want him to “pitch to contact?” Didn’t Bill James prove years ago that high strikeout pitchers essentially throw no extra pitches per inning since pitching to contact leads to (shockingly) more contact, which leads to more hits, longer innings, and more pitches, etc.
Next year they’ll be telling Bryce Harper to choke up and slap the ball the other way, since that is PLAYING THE GAME THE RIGHT WAY.