Average Fastball Velocity for Cleveland Pitchers

[petes999]

Sports Coach ... Thought this deserves a thread on its own so that it doesn't get lost. I am willing to be patient but in trying to justify what BHC is saying, I like to look at the evidence (being a math/stat/science guy -- create a hypothesis but back it up with numbers)

SC Said --
@BimboColesHair has said it a few times they are being conservative with the pitching the first part of the year...

When it comes to the starters, don't worry about them until the second part of the year. Take their current numbers with a grain of salt since they weren't fully stretched in spring and will go through a low period cause of getting built up (kind of normal to have a dead arm period in spring, which they will deal with a bit in the season). We are so down on the starters right now and in my mind you are being impatient idiots (don't mean any offense, just being candid) because of the fact, they held them back a bit and you aren't going to get their best production if they are behind ya know?
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In this, there are two things to consider ....
1) Yes pitchers usually have a schedule that starts in Jan/Feb before they report to spring training to build back their arm strength. And, there is sometimes an issue with cold weather starts where a starter doesn't want to go 100% too early or too fast. However, on average velocity, there is usually .5 mph difference from April to July for the league.

Fastball Velocities Are Already Up

In the early going, pitchers are throwing hard.

blogs.fangraphs.com

This year is different in that starters did not know when to ramp up. They almost went from thinking the season would start in May to starting just a week late -- if they players took revenge on owners delaying the start for a week or two to press the players (with service time issues and a non-full season of games) to the players delaying it further to make the owners hurt in the TV pocketbook. Thus, they reported in late March vs mid February. So, I can see the slow ramp up for a month ... yet the differences like I said in Bieber should start to get back to normal starting now (as it is a month+ into the season now).

2) I can understand the Guardians point-of-view of rather be 1-2 mph slower and reduce the risk of needing TJ surgery as the health of the player is key importance. And, it is not just Bieber, but all our starters and key relievers are down in velocity except for McK....And, when you compare year to year velocity, our pitchers lead the league in this issue. Some of it maybe cold ... but that would affect 1/3 of the teams who all play in cold weather including Pitt, Det, Chi, etc... and for some this is the case but not to the extent as Cleveland ...

So for right now on 5/17 .... out of 244 pitchers tracked, our pitchers rank on FB velocity change 2021 to 2022
59. McK +.2 mph
142. Clase -.6 mph
227. Civale -1.7 mph
231. Plesac -1.8 mph
241. Quant -2.6 mph
242. Shaw -2.7 mph
243. Bieber -2.8 mph
Leader is
244. Rassmuesen -3.5 mph

Statcast Year to Year Stats

Baseball Savant

baseballsavant.mlb.com

So, we may be impatient ... but over next few weeks, these #s should start to slowly improve (as I pointed out the other day with Bieber's last start) but the reaction is due to justified #s and concerns and these are the facts that if we are just being too impatient should improve in next few weeks and revert to somewhat normal (yet will always be low as April/May #s do not go away in averages).

 

[macbdog]

The velos in baseball have gone up, but so have arm injuries. Maybe the Gs are ahead of the curve here, attempting to dial down arm injuries by dialing down the velocities?

 

[petes999]

Fair point MacbDog on arm injuries ... as I and others said, they Gs may just be slow ramp up to be cautious.

However, I did go back to baseball servant and changed the pitch tracker from yearly to monthly to compare April stats to 1/2 of May .... I assumed I would start to see a small tick up (or should soon ... if later June is when things go back to normal for second half of year) ...

No Changes (or just +/- .1 mph on fastball -- or cutter if no FB which is within rounding errors) for Bieber, Plesac, McK, Quantril

There were changes though to
Clase ... 99.7 to 100.8 (April to May)
Shaw ... 89.8 to 90.6
Civale ... 90.1 to 90.8

So back to Mac's point, if this is a permanent change in pitching philosophy then it's fair to compare results from last few year's to this year and say that our pitching stats will change to avoid injury issues. If it is just a longer ramp up (as Bimbo suggest), then we would start to see mph start to increase and pitching stats go back to historical norms as they get closer and closer to 100%.

I plan on looking back on this every two or so weeks ... and see what happens.

 

[sportscoach]

Fair point MacbDog on arm injuries ... as I and others said, they Gs may just be slow ramp up to be cautious.

However, I did go back to baseball servant and changed the pitch tracker from yearly to monthly to compare April stats to 1/2 of May .... I assumed I would start to see a small tick up (or should soon ... if later June is when things go back to normal for second half of year) ...

No Changes (or just +/- .1 mph on fastball -- or cutter if no FB which is within rounding errors) for Bieber, Plesac, McK, Quantril

There were changes though to
Clase ... 99.7 to 100.8 (April to May)
Shaw ... 89.8 to 90.6
Civale ... 90.1 to 90.8

So back to Mac's point, if this is a permanent change in pitching philosophy then it's fair to compare results from last few year's to this year and say that our pitching stats will change to avoid injury issues. If it is just a longer ramp up (as Bimbo suggest), then we would start to see mph start to increase and pitching stats go back to historical norms as they get closer and closer to 100%.

I plan on looking back on this every two or so weeks ... and see what happens.

Lets see where everyone is at in June... I believe their numbers will improve come the end of June, early July.... We will have to weather the storm until then...

Also if pretty much everyone on the roster is lower in velo, it feels like it was a FO/manager directive over anything else in my mind,

 

[KluberSociety]

The velos in baseball have gone up, but so have arm injuries. Maybe the Gs are ahead of the curve here, attempting to dial down arm injuries by dialing down the velocities?

Maybe we could take our pitchers out a bit sooner. Looking at performance vs. innings pitched per start, Guardians are a bit of an outlier in that the starters haven't done very well yet they still go deep into games. Maybe that's saying it backwards because it's when they go deeper into games that they're doing so poorly.

 

[The Oi]

What about outliers generally? Not too many guys consistently throwing OVER 100 til the 00s. Now it seems this is consistent?

 

[sportscoach]

Maybe we could take our pitchers out a bit sooner. Looking at performance vs. innings pitched per start, Guardians are a bit of an outlier in that the starters haven't done very well yet they still go deep into games. Maybe that's saying it backwards because it's when they go deeper into games that they're doing so poorly.

I think it's also the fact they need stretched out as well. I feel like some games they stayed in to get to the pitch count... Not good for winning games, but good for them long term.

 

[KluberSociety]

I think it's also the fact they need stretched out as well. I feel like some games they stayed in to get to the pitch count... Not good for winning games, but good for them long term.

Generally, I thought the theory was to get the pitch count so they could pitch deeper into games in the future. This seems like a different consideration than "long term". More pitches = more wear on the body = not good long term.

Anyway, with the way the team is set up now I'd rather quality over quantity, personally. I'm unsure of how much of a tradeoff there really is but our relievers have added 1.13 WPA so far this year so they're doing their job. Stephan is tied for 55th in the league in IP among relievers and he leads our team in IP.

I definitely wouldn't mind seeing more of Clase, Stephan, Hentges, Morgan, de los Santos, Gose, and Sandlin. Latter two haven't been impressive but I see potential.

 

[petes999]

And, if Guardians want to stretch the pitchers for pitch count there are two ways

1) Leave them in the game to get your count up to that magical number and risk the velocity or effectiveness dropping, or

2) As the reliever is walking into the game from the bullpen, the starter can sneak into the bullpen to finish his work for the day before coming into dugout to talk to the pitching coach about the day.

Yet, it all goes back to how the players are stretched

1) Is pitch count first than velocity over that pitch count duration

2) Is velocity more important than pitch count (is 100% of 60 pitches better than 95% of 90 pitches) .. this is where we should trust the analytics data from prior injuries and pitching coaches experiences...

 

[KluberSociety]

Certain pitchers are slow starters and do build up velo as the season goes on (see: Kluber). But that historically hasn't been the case for Biebs. He did in 2018, culiminating in a spike in the playoffs, but he came out of the gate strong in 2020's shortened season and otherwise had strong Aprils in 2019 and 2021.

 

[CATS44]

If there's ONE thing to trust in this org, it is the way pitching, and individual pitchers, are handled.

There is also the fact that three of our SPs had significant injuries last season, although only Biebers was arm related. Add that to the unusual circumstances of this offseason. But I think we have to consider the fact that our pitchers were totally separated from their overseers for over four months.

Not saying that our pitchers don't work hard on their own, but all the extra eyes that are usually on them weren't there to catch stuff as it happened. While we are focused on the shortened spring training, its also the previous three months that were missed.

I have no data on the MiLB pitchers, but by the results it sure looks like those not on the 40 man, who were thereby able to have a supervised off season, haven't missed a beat. The 'problem' seems confined to those pitchers who were stuck on the 40 man.

Personally, I dont have a major concern with our present pitchers yet. What I'm seeing seems totally normal. Every pitcher in this org comes stamped with...

'FRAGILE: Handle with Care'

And as we watch pitcher after pitcher on other teams hit the IL, some long term, it seems like we are in pretty good shape. I'd rather have all our guys at 80% right now than in rehab, or worse.

It looks like our pitching is being set up for August and September.

Just a note...

Plesacs velo jumped well over 1 MPH last night.

 

[petes999]

No Changes (or just +/- .1 mph on fastball -- or cutter if no FB which is within rounding errors) for Bieber, Plesac, McK, Quantril

There were changes though to
Clase ... 99.7 to 100.8 (April to May)
Shaw ... 89.8 to 90.6
Civale ... 90.1 to 90.8

So, as its been 11 days and about 2 starts, I went back to monthly averages as people have seen some improvement when watching games

Bieber is down 90.8 (April) to 90.6 May
Plesac up 91.1 to 91.7
Quantril up 92.3 to 92.9
McK up 92.3 to 92.5

Now, it is a good trend ... so wait and see about June as Plesac and Quantril were down 2 mph ... so up 1/2 mph is good start especially if its closer to 1 mph in last 2 starts. Yet, until Bieber figures things out, we wont have that Ace needed for playoffs (to go toe for toe with other teams Ace in 2 of 7 games when you need 4 to win or the need 2 of 3 game initial WC series).

 

[CATS44]

There have been a lot of very good...even ace level....pitchers that didnt throw very hard. Some never even saw 90 MPH.

The Braves won a WS with two of them as their 1-2 punch. Both are in the HOF.

The White Sox swept the 2005 WS, and they had three SPs that didnt throw as hard as Bieber.

If you are expecting to see Bieber put up a sub 2.00 every year, you are gonna be disappointed, because nobody does that every year.

Bieber has had one incredibly bad start. Bad starts count in the overall stats, but when looking at the entire picture, anomalies...good and bad...have to be thrown out.

Without that bad start, Biebs ERA is 2.34.

I think there are several things to worry about with this team...most of which are due to youth and lack of experience.

Biebs is not one of them.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

Concerned that Bieber's velocity has not picked up at all. FanGraphs looked at slow motion video of him pitching a couple of years ago and now. His delivery is faster now and his arm path has changed. They think he may be protecting his arm after the injury last year, either consciously or subconsciously.

It's stunning to see that Quantrill, Shaw, and Bieber ranked 241, 242, and 243 out of 244 pitchers in lost velocity, and Plesac and Civale were not far behind.

I saw Shaw hit 95 this week so he seems to be back. Morgan is up 1.0 mph according to FanGraphs. But I don't know if we should put relievers in the same category as starters.

Just looking at the starters they're all down except McKenzie.

 

[CATS44]

A few more thoughts...

1) If fangraphs has video of Bieber, shouldn't we think that the Guardians pitching gurus also have video?

2) If the org has what looks like the biggest group drop in velocity in MLB, that doesn't look like mere coincidence. It looks more like a plan.

What is the likelihood that FIVE of the main pitchers on a MLB roster would all have dramatic drops in velocity at the same time without it being a conscious decision to slow walk them at the beginning of the season?