THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Saturday, October 20, 2007

I don’t usually write things like this, but (since everyone else does) here goes…

The Cleveland starters Sabathia and Carmona have pitched, at least in this ALCS, with a decided lack of “guts.” Here is what I mean.  Both have them have thrown mostly fastballs.  With runners on base and especially with trouble brewing, they have both thrown mostly fastballs.

You cannot do that.  When you throw fastballs, you HAVE TO use the corners.  If any of you readers have ever pitched before, you know what I mean when I say when you throw a fastball, you throw to a specific exact location.  When you throw an off-speed pitch, especially a curve ball, you throw to an approximate location and often you just either throw in (as in a first pitch “get me over” curveball) or out of the strike zone (like an 0-2 curve in the dirt).  As well, when you throw a fastball, you NEVER try and throw one to the middle of the plate unless you have something like a 3-0 count.

Therefore when you throw mostly fastballs (to a fault), which both Carmon and Sabathis have both done, sometimes you will miss a lot and look like you are nibbling and sometimes you will hit your corners and look like you are pitching brilliantly, because YOU ARE ALMOST ALWAYS THROWING TO A CORNER.  Both Carmona and Sabathis have been throwing too many fastballs and both of them have been missing a lot and looking like they are nibbling or like they haven’t had any control.  I think that they have just been a little unlucky.

However, and one of the reasons why I say they have been “gutless” in their pitching, they have been pitching around the good hitters in the lineup and when they are in trouble, they are throwing too many fastballs.  A good hitter will NOT swing at a fastball off the plate, in general.  They will of course swing at off-speed pitches out of the zone (because they are often not expecting them and even if you are, i is hard to judge the break before it gets to the plate).  And they have NOT been throwing enough of those.  Even if you primarily throw fastballs, which at least Carmona does, you still HAVE to throw enough off-speed pitches to keep the batters “honest.”

Finally, we all have been hearing that Carmona needed to pitch in the middle of the zone and let his movement work for him.  Supposedly, even his pitching coach said that same thing.  That is nonsense!  That is a reaction to the fact that, as I said, both Sabathia and Schilling’s fastballs have been missing a lot of the corners for no particular reason.  Obviously a pitcher with a lot of movement can “aim” more towards the middle of the plate in order to hit a corner.  But it is not like his (Carmona’s) ball moves randomly in all directions!  It moves down and towards the right ALL the time (at least his sinker does).  To tell him to throw more towards the middle of the plate because for one or two games his fastball/sinker has been missing a lot (supposedly) is ridiculous advice.

If there is any advice to tell either pitcher (considering that they both had ridiculously good years, I am not sure I would tell them anything if I were a pitching coach) it is the following:

1) STOP being so afraid of Manny and Ortiz especially with no runners on.  They both have good eyes, but the amount of times they have been walked by CLE pitchers is ridiculous.

2) Stop throwing so many fastballs (especially Sabathia), especially in tough situations and with runners on base (and with the better hitters).  The number of fastballs (in a row sometimes) thrown by both of these pitchers, IMO, has been criminal.

3) Use both sides of the plate.

End of rant!