I’ve written over the last few days about how the Pittsburgh Pirates are failing from their owner to the Dominican Academy. I’ve also written about how hitting coach Andy Haines has quantifiably made hitters worse in Pittsburgh. There are a lot of changes that need to be made in the Pirates organization.
Pitching has been the bright spot this year. While Oscar Marin isn’t on the same hot seat as Haines, there are improvements to be made. That was shown by none other than Martin Perez on Wednesday.
Perez led the Padres to an 8-2 victory over the Pirates, a few weeks after being traded to San Diego for DSL left-hander Ronaldys Jimenez. Perez allowed one run in 5.1 innings, with eight strikeouts and one walk. More performances like that in Pittsburgh may have led to a better trade return than a flier at the lowest levels — and the Pirates had to pay half of Perez’s remaining salary to get that return.
What stood out to me was that Perez did this with heavy usage of his curveball, which was a departure from his pitch usage with the Pirates.
Martin Perez With the Pirates
Perez made 16 starts with the Pirates this year, spanning 83 innings. He had a 5.20 ERA, a 6.8 K/9, and a 3.5 BB/9. His pitch usage went heavy on the sinker, followed by his off-speed and breaking stuff. Here are those pitches.
- Sinker: 641 pitches (38.2% usage)
- Cutter: 421 pitches (25.1%)
- Changeup: 369 pitches (22%)
- Curveball: 170 pitches (10.1%)
- Four-Seam: 77 pitches (4.6%)
The changeup and the curveball have the highest whiff rates from Perez this season, but were the third and fourth most frequent pitches for the lefty with the Pirates.
Let’s see how his usage with the Padres compares.
Martin Perez With the Padres
Perez has made three starts with San Diego, spanning 18.1 innings. He has a 1.96 ERA, a 10.3 K/9, and a 1.5 BB/9. He’s made a significant change to his pitch usage, which has thrown hitters for a loop.
- Curveball: 71 pitches (27.0%)
- Changeup: 67 pitches (25.48%)
- Sinker: 62 pitches (23.57%)
- Cutter: 51 pitches (19.39%)
- Four-Seam: 11 pitches (4.18%)
The curveball and changeup have been the most used pitches for Perez with the Padres. They have not only remained his best swing and miss pitches, but the rates of swing and miss have gone up with the Padres. On the season, Perez has a 34.5% whiff rate on the changeup, and a 31.4% rate on the curveball.
There hasn’t been consistency in which pitch he’s used the most. In all three starts, he’s led with one of those two pitches.
In his Padres debut, Perez threw 21 changeups and 21 curveballs as his top two offerings, accounting for 52% of his pitches and 12 whiffs combined on 22 swings (54.5%).
The next start saw him throw the changeup 26 times, along with the sinker 26 times. He also threw the curveball 20 times. The changeup and sinker led to 58% of his pitches, with the curveball bumping the total usage up to 80%. He had eight whiffs on 12 swings against the changeup (66.7%), with three whiffs on 11 swings against the curve (27.3%).
Finally, Perez shut down the Pirates with his curveball. He had five whiffs on 13 swings (38.5%). His changeup was actually the fourth-most used pitch, but had five whiffs on 11 swings (45.5%).
Whiffs Are the Most Important Stat
Baseball is nothing more than a 1-on-1 battle between the pitcher and the hitter. The pitcher knows what is coming, and the hitter reacts in the time it takes to blink. That’s a significant advantage for the pitcher.
When the hitter reacts with a swing and makes contact, the gods of chance take over.
A ball hit on the ground has a 24.6% chance of going for a hit across the league this year. Fly balls have an 11% chance of dropping in for a hit. Line drives are the cream of the crop, with a 69% chance of a hit.
The chance of a hit when a batter swings and misses is zero percent.
As far as individual pitches go, Whiff rates are pretty consistent. The changeup and curveball for Perez have always been high Whiff pitches, with the changeup consistently being his best pitch for this stat. The best season of his career was in 2022, and Perez used his changeup a career-high 27.6% of the time that year.
I was encouraged by Perez in Spring Training, when he was putting up some of the best Whiff rates of his career. This came from using his changeup as one of his primary pitches. This obviously didn’t carry into the season, and Perez didn’t continue the swing and miss.
Perez has a 29.6% strikeout rate with the Padres, which is the best mark of his career by far. The only thing that comes close is his 20.6% rate in 2022.
How Do the Other Pirates Pitchers Compare?
After watching Perez carve up the Pirates, I wanted to see how many of the Pirates pitchers were maximizing their Whiff pitches.
Mitch Keller has five pitches with a whiff rate between 20 and 30%. His best offerings are his curveball, which he uses 9.5% of the time, and his sweeper, which is used 14.6% of the time. His four-seam is his most-used pitch, and gets a 23.7% whiff rate. It was at 30.2% last year. You can’t fault him for leading with the four-seam, but Keller also throws his sinker 22.2% of the time, with an 11.4% whiff rate, which is the worst in his arsenal.
It wouldn’t hurt Keller to bump up the usage of his sweeper and curveball, taking away from the sinker, and a bit from the four-seam.
Paul Skenes has five pitches with a whiff rate between 25 and 31.5%. Good luck to opposing teams. The best pitches from Skenes are his curveball, at a 12.3% usage, and the splinker, which is used 30.2% of the time. He throws his four-seam and splinker a combined 68.3% of the time, though both have a whiff rate of 27% or higher. Surprisingly, his slider has been the worst performing pitch for whiffs, though hitters have a .197 wOBA against, making it his best performer in that category.
Skenes doesn’t really have a bad pitch. He’s a rare talent.
Jared Jones is a heavy two-pitch guy, throwing his four-seam and slider a combined 85.9% of the time. They’re also good whiff pitches, with the slider at 39.8% and the four-seam at 27.3%. He also throws a curveball (28% whiff) and a changeup (24.1%).
It’s hard to argue with the usage here, though Jones will need to turn to a third pitch more often on nights where one of the top two isn’t working.
Bailey Falter leads with his four-seam, using it 50.7% of the time. His slider gets a 32.3% whiff rate, which is by far his best. His curveball gets a 19.3% whiff rate, which is second best, ahead of the 16.4% rate from the four-seam. He also throws a sinker (13.3% whiff) and a splitter (12.5% whiff).
Falter would probably benefit from reducing the four-seam usage and bumping up the slider from a 17.2% usage rate.
Luis Ortiz already maximizes his swing and miss stuff. His slider is his most-used pitch, at 29% this year. It also has a 29% whiff rate. He follows with the four-seam, which has a 22.3% whiff rate this year, with a 25.5% usage. His sinker and cutter combine for 44.1% use, but range in the 13-17% whiff rate. What’s interesting is his changeup has produced some of his best whiff rates over the last two seasons, including 28.6% this year, but is barely used.
Ortiz could benefit from using the changeup much more often, potentially as his third pitch.
What stands out from these numbers above is that only two pitchers have offerings in the Whiff range of the curveball and changeup from Perez.
The slider from Jones is the best Whiff pitch on the team this year, and he uses that pitch often.
The slider from Falter would rank third, behind the changeup from Perez, but ahead of the curveball. Falter should definitely be using that slider more often than 17.2% of the time.
The fact that Perez had two of the best pitches on the team this year, and only used them a combined 32.1% of the time, shows the Pirates could do better with their pitch selections. The Padres have bumped those two pitches up to 52.48% usage, and the results from Perez, albeit in a small sample of three starts, speak for themselves.
Pirates Prospect Watch
Pirates fifth rounder Will Taylor picked up his first professional hit in the best way possible, with a grand slam for Bradenton. Indianapolis had ten hits combined from their top four hitters in the lineup: Alika Williams, Henry Davis, Nick Yorke, and Liover Peguero. Jase Bowen hit a walk off homer for Altoona. Read about all of Thursday’s minor league action in the latest Pirates Prospect Watch.
