At the outset of my sports writing career, I was a fantasy sports writer. In 2009, as I was starting this site, I had three sleeper aces leading my coverage at the time: Zack Greinke, Matt Cain, and a third guy I missed on that year — Max Scherzer.
Over the years, Scherzer became an ace, both in fantasy and real life. His ERA and win total in 2009 weren’t great for fantasy, but the predictive method I used to isolate the best pitchers in the game led to him. Those predictive methods were simple: I looked for pitchers who were better than average in all three of the K/9, BB/9, and HR/9 stats. Again, this was 2009, and I wanted to get an idea of which pitchers fared the best when it was just between them and the batter.
Today, there are deeper stats which tell us about the battle between the pitcher and batter. You still want a pitcher who can strike out an above-average rate, walk a below-average amount, and reduce home runs allowed. Pitching is ultimately about decision making.
The goal of a pitcher is to fool or dominate the opposing hitter. Get the hitter to exit his game plan at the plate, or be good enough that the hitter can’t even touch what you throw.
I’ve been digging through the Statcast swing rates this offseason, looking for stats that should be a strong indicator of a pitcher’s true talent. The goal here is to confirm why players are good, and where they might be able to improve. It’s also to identify guys who might be under-appreciated. Here are the stats, and the leaders on the 2023 Pittsburgh Pirates.
First Pitch Strikes
The best thing you can do as a pitcher is get ahead of the batter. A pitcher is naturally ahead, due to the fact that he knows what is coming. If you can consistently get first pitch strikes, and get off to 0-1 counts, your odds of success increase. Last year in the majors, pitchers average a first pitch strike 61.5% of the time. Here are the Pirates who fared better at getting ahead from pitch one:
- Robert Stephenson – 77.1%
- Hunter Stratton – 74.5%
- Ryan Borucki – 69.7%
- Bailey Falter – 65.1%
- Yerry De Los Santos – 64.4%
- Vince Velasquez – 64.2%
- Mitch Keller – 64.0%
- Chase De Jong – 63.3%
- Colin Holderman – 62.1%
- Duane Underwood Jr. – 62.0%
- Rob Zastryzny – 61.9%
- Osvaldo Bido – 61.9%
- Roansy Contreras – 61.6%
Chase Rates
The acts of throwing or hitting a baseball are physical, but the battle between a pitcher and a hitter is ultimately a mind game. There is a set strike zone which the batter has to defend. If the pitcher throws it outside of this zone without a swing, it’s a ball, which is detrimental for the pitcher. If a pitcher consistently gets batters to swing at pitches outside the zone, his effective strike zone is larger than most.
The average chase rate in MLB this year was 31.9%. Here are the Pirates who had above-average rates. The players in bold also graded better than average at contact outside of the zone, giving them the dangerous combination of more swings and a lower contact rate than the average pitcher.
- Hunter Stratton – 39.6%
- Ryan Borucki – 39.3%
- Thomas Hatch – 39.3%
- David Bednar – 38.1%
- Robert Stephenson – 35.8%
- Bailey Falter – 33.3%
- Duane Underwood Jr. – 32.5%
- Roansy Contreras – 32.3%
In-Zone Contact
If you can throw the pitch in the strike zone, and a hitter can’t make contact, this is the peak of pitching. There’s no fooling anyone by getting people to chase after something they can’t hit. There’s just the pure dominant act of throwing a pitch that opposing hitters can’t touch, but which they need to swing at to prevent a strike.
The average contact inside the zone this year was 85.4%. Below are the Pirates pitchers with a lower rate. The pitchers in bold also had an above-average swing rate in the zone, giving them a double-threat.
- David Bednar – 77.1%
- Angel Perdomo – 77.7%
- Dauri Moreta – 79.4%
- Vince Velasquez – 80.8%
- Jose Hernandez – 81.9%
- Ryan Borucki – 82.0%
- Rob Zastryzny – 83.2%
- Mitch Keller – 85.2%
Swinging Strike Rate
The final stat I’m breaking down is the overall swinging strike rate. This looks at how often a pitcher gets a swinging strike from all of his pitches. Keep in mind that this is different than “Whiff%”, which is the amount of swinging strikes divided by swings. The swinging strike ratio is lower, as it factors in all pitches, even if a hitter didn’t swing.
The MLB average was 11.1% last year. Below are the Pirates pitchers who were above that average.
- David Bednar – 16.1%
- Robert Stephenson – 15.6%
- Thomas Hatch – 13.8%
- Dauri Moreta – 13.8%
- Ryan Borucki – 13.6%
- Angel Perdomo – 13.3%
- Jose Hernandez – 12.5%
- Vince Velasquez – 12.1%
- Colin Selby – 12.1%
- Hunter Stratton – 12.0%
- Roansy Contreras – 11.4%
- Johan Oviedo – 11.1%
The Best of the Staff
Only one pitcher graded on all four of the above lists. That was Ryan Borucki, which is a bit of a surprise. The Pirates just signed him to a one-year deal for the 2024 season, paying him slightly higher than his arbitration estimate. One year ago, the Pirates were looking for lefty relievers. Borucki has helped to fill that role going forward.
There were five pitchers who graded on three of the four lists. David Bednar was the standout name, only falling short with first-pitch strikes. If Bednar can get to a point where he consistently gets ahead of hitters, he could be one of the best in the game.
Roansy Contreras also graded on three lists, only missing the in-zone contact list. He was on the border of a few lists. Contreras does well getting batters to chase out of the zone with his slider. His four-seam gets hit a lot and doesn’t fool anyone in the zone. He would be a perfect candidate for a two-seam fastball to pair with the slider, giving him a better weapon in the zone, which he needs.
The remaining three pitchers on three lists don’t provide hope: Robert Stephenson, Vince Velasquez, and Hunter Stratton.
Stephenson fell short with the Pirates on in-zone contact. He had an 86.8% rate, which was higher than average. After going to the Rays and morphing his slider into a cutter, all of his rates improved, but his in-zone contact dropped to 69%. Stephenson needed one adjustment to become one of the best relievers in the game this year. This move is one of the bigger red flags for the Pirates.
Velasquez went down for the year in May, so the Pirates didn’t benefit from his ability to fool hitters. He’d be a good depth option to bring back in 2024. He only missed the chase rate, doing most of his damage in the zone.
Stratton only pitched 12 innings, so the sample size is low. Swing rate stats are usually the first to stabilize, after 50-70 pitches, so he had enough innings for a reading. The first impressions from Stratton were good, with him only missing the in-zone contact rate. He’s got an effective cutter, but the fastball was hit a lot.
There are five pitchers who remain in the system among the players who appeared on two lists above. Here are the quick hits:
- Mitch Keller gets ahead with first pitch strikes, and is difficult to hit in the zone. He doesn’t get chases or swinging strikes at an above-average rate. The interesting thing about Keller’s strikeout mark this year is that he got an above-average rate of called strikes in the zone.
- Dauri Moreta and Jose Hernandez both excel at in-zone contact and swing and miss. Having two relievers who can just challenge hitters late in the game is a good thing. If they both got ahead with first pitch strikes more often, the Pirates bullpen could be nasty.
- Bailey Falter gets ahead with first pitch strikes and has an above-average chase rate. What’s interesting is that Falter allows a lot of contact outside of the zone. He allows an above-average amount of contact in the zone as well, and doesn’t have swing and miss stuff. His chase rates and high out-of-zone contact come from the sinker. His best swing-and-miss offering, and best in-zone offering are his changeup, which is his least used pitch.
- Thomas Hatch is a bit of a surprise performer. The right-hander was above-average in chase rates and swinging strikes. His changeup is outstanding, getting a 20.2% swinging strike rate, along with a lot of bad chases outside of the zone. Hatch doesn’t have a good fastball, but excels with a slider and changeup leading the way.
Finally, here are all of the pitchers who graded above-average in at least one category above, along with the category.
1st Pitch Strikes – Yerry De Los Santos, Chase De Jong, Colin Holderman, Osvaldo Bido
Swinging Strike % – Colin Selby, Johan Oviedo
I’ll be taking a similar look at hitters in the upcoming week.
