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PITCHING TALK: Inside The Analytics Of Some Of The Leagues Best · Halo Territory: A Los Angeles Angels Podcast

0:09
Speaker 1: Hello, Territory fans, Welcome back. I'm going to be flying
0:13
Speaker 1: Solo day as the host of the show, joined by
0:15
Speaker 1: ex teammate and good friend Richard Blier, who is an
0:19
Speaker 1: expert on pitching. I am a former hitter. Richard is
0:24
Speaker 1: a former Big League successful relief pitcher. I had a
0:28
Speaker 1: career three point two seven ERA, and he is my
0:31
Speaker 1: go to for pretty much every question I have on
0:35
Speaker 1: the pitching side of it. He understands the modern game,
0:38
Speaker 1: the analytics, the grafts, the charts, what's trendy, and I
0:42
Speaker 1: always appreciate the help. And today he's going to come
0:45
Speaker 1: on and talk about some of the things broad spectrum
0:49
Speaker 1: stuff throughout the game and a few of the Angels pitchers,
0:52
Speaker 1: the usual suspects that Halo fans will be familiar with
0:56
Speaker 1: and read Detmer' Jose so onor Soriano excuse me, and
1:00
Speaker 1: Walbert urin ya. So, Richard, thanks for coming on. You
1:03
Speaker 1: want to talk just briefly about how the game has
1:06
Speaker 1: changed in the last three to five years, some of
1:08
Speaker 1: the things that you've seen and taken notice of.
1:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that analytics peaked a few years ago,
1:18
Speaker 2: and I think that it's settled down so in the
1:20
Speaker 2: last three to five years there's really been a nice
1:23
Speaker 2: balance of the feel and analytics being implemented of the players.
1:29
Speaker 2: With that being said, there has been some new trends.
1:32
Speaker 2: I think probably closer to the five year mark, that's
1:34
Speaker 2: the sweeper, maybe a little bit longer. Mark's favorite pitch
1:38
Speaker 2: has been introduced. It's actually a slider, but we're creating
1:42
Speaker 2: more horizontal break rather than depth, so we want flat
1:47
Speaker 2: plane that way with a sweeper, and that pitch, you know,
1:52
Speaker 2: kind of really went crazy. I think like a chaz
1:57
Speaker 2: Row Evan Phillips throws a good one just but then
2:02
Speaker 2: lately it's been more of the splitter. That seems to
2:05
Speaker 2: be everybody is on board with a lot of guys.
2:09
Speaker 2: You'll notice that teams are having an easier time identifying
2:14
Speaker 2: who will throw what pitch more successfully. Whether that's maybe
2:18
Speaker 2: they're just not able to throw a good breaking ball
2:22
Speaker 2: because of the way they throw, whether it's pronating the
2:25
Speaker 2: baseball or it with supernation, which usually like pronators will
2:30
Speaker 2: be able to throw a better change up or a
2:32
Speaker 2: better running or sinking fastball, where supernators traditionally have better
2:36
Speaker 2: breaking balls, and you see that often with pitchers who
2:41
Speaker 2: are more change up dominant rather than breaking ball dominant.
2:45
Speaker 2: And rarely do you see guys with an elite breaking
2:49
Speaker 2: ball and an elite changeup. You know, those kind of
2:53
Speaker 2: guys like a mac Suerser type are max Suersers. So
2:56
Speaker 2: I think that it with that, with those things being identifiable,
3:01
Speaker 2: then you can say, like, this is in you and
3:04
Speaker 2: we just need to get it out of you. And
3:05
Speaker 2: so the splitter is an easier way to throw a
3:08
Speaker 2: change up, I think, And it's just a it's a
3:11
Speaker 2: grip change and then you just let it rip. It's
3:13
Speaker 2: not a new pitch. I think it's just kind of
3:16
Speaker 2: making a comeback where you know, you saw Roger Clemens
3:19
Speaker 2: throw a splitter years ago and obviously with tremendous success.
3:23
Speaker 2: And I think now it's just trying always, you know,
3:28
Speaker 2: changing speed east to west, front to back. It's just
3:31
Speaker 2: getting hitters off balance. And so this is organizations trying
3:35
Speaker 2: to find ways to create that.
3:38
Speaker 1: Do you think good or the best pitchers get hitters
3:41
Speaker 1: out in the strike zone.
3:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's I think in order to maintain
3:47
Speaker 2: prolonged success in the big leagues, you need to be
3:50
Speaker 2: able to get out in the strike zone and so
3:54
Speaker 2: I remember I was talking with Wade Miley one time
3:57
Speaker 2: when he was at the Orioles and he was really
3:58
Speaker 2: struggling and he was walking a lot of guys, not
4:00
Speaker 2: giving up a lot of hits, but walking a lot
4:02
Speaker 2: of guys. I said, well, what are you trying to
4:03
Speaker 2: do with these pitches? And he's like, well, I'm looking
4:06
Speaker 2: for swinging miss chase, and it just it's just like, well, like,
4:10
Speaker 2: why don't you try throwing them for strikes? You like
4:12
Speaker 2: get in the zone. And you know, I think the
4:16
Speaker 2: cut for him specifically, he's developed a cutter and that
4:19
Speaker 2: gave him a little bit more confidence to get outs
4:21
Speaker 2: in the zone. But you just see, like, yes, guys
4:24
Speaker 2: get chase, but a lot of people will come and
4:30
Speaker 2: go if they're not able to get consistently swing and
4:34
Speaker 2: miss or at least generate weak contact in the strike zone.
4:38
Speaker 1: I think that's great. Another thing is everyone throws a million,
4:42
Speaker 1: even these three guys, Debt Meers, who I think as
4:45
Speaker 1: a well above average fastball at least velocity wise in
4:48
Speaker 1: today's world. You know, he's about ninety five. That is
4:52
Speaker 1: closer to average than not Urania and Soriano, both guys
4:57
Speaker 1: with tremendous sinker balls are upper nineties. I mean, those
5:01
Speaker 1: fastballs are routinely sitting ninety seven ninety eight. They don't
5:05
Speaker 1: necessarily they're not blown by guys, but there's serious weapons
5:09
Speaker 1: paired with, in Soriano's case, an improved knuckle curve, which
5:14
Speaker 1: is interesting because he has to actually get on top
5:16
Speaker 1: of that more. And I think he fits the mold
5:18
Speaker 1: that you were talking about possibly with the Supernator being
5:21
Speaker 1: a sinker ball first pitcher over the years, he ran
5:24
Speaker 1: a big sinker and he throws a nice change up
5:27
Speaker 1: off of that, both moving down and into right handed
5:29
Speaker 1: hitters being right handed pitchers, where Debtmers is a guy
5:32
Speaker 1: that throws more of a four seamer with an elite
5:36
Speaker 1: slider and a curveball paired off of that, and that
5:40
Speaker 1: would be more the pronator side of it.
5:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it's funny with Soriano, Well, I guess we'll
5:49
Speaker 2: get into them a little bit, but yeah, you know,
5:51
Speaker 2: Debt Meers is definitely, you know, a supernator with a slider,
5:56
Speaker 2: and I think he did a good job of proving
6:00
Speaker 2: the slider and those other guys the change ups. It's
6:02
Speaker 2: it's funny where you say, like you're specific, Like Urania
6:08
Speaker 2: has a good sinker and if you look at his
6:11
Speaker 2: his movement plot, it it's not it it's a runner, right,
6:16
Speaker 2: and and so I think a running fastball is more
6:20
Speaker 2: horizontal than actual sink. You know, like he's no but
6:24
Speaker 2: he throws the ball with angle, he has a he
6:26
Speaker 2: has a higher release point. And if you watch his video,
6:29
Speaker 2: so if you think about throwing a fastball downhill with run,
6:34
Speaker 2: that will be a perceived sinker from the hitter, right,
6:37
Speaker 2: Like you're seeing this ball coming down at a downward
6:39
Speaker 2: angle and it's moving away, it's moving into you. And
6:42
Speaker 2: so that's what he does really well. And I think
6:44
Speaker 2: there's good examples of guys that do that, where like
6:47
Speaker 2: that's where analytics isn't everything. You would you know, if
6:49
Speaker 2: you look at his stuff on paper, you'd say, don't
6:52
Speaker 2: throw yours, don't throw the sinker. It's not it doesn't.
6:55
Speaker 2: The movement plot isn't great, but when you pair it
6:59
Speaker 2: with his a proach angle, it's you know, it's obviously
7:03
Speaker 2: performing very well. And the change up as well, so
7:06
Speaker 2: he's getting he's able to get under bats with those pitches.
7:11
Speaker 2: But there's so that's why I think like I said earlier,
7:15
Speaker 2: analytics is kind of you have to keep those kinds
7:19
Speaker 2: of things in mind, like keep an eye, like see
7:21
Speaker 2: how the pitch performs. In the minor leagues, you're projecting
7:24
Speaker 2: how it can perform. But in the big leagues, if
7:26
Speaker 2: something's working, like it's working for a reason, and it's
7:30
Speaker 2: easier to you know, like you can you don't need
7:33
Speaker 2: to project.
7:35
Speaker 1: Everyone wants to know exactly why and how, and sometimes
7:40
Speaker 1: that that has nothing to do with the field side
7:42
Speaker 1: of it, and I think guys that generally take off
7:45
Speaker 1: or able to combine both elements of it. You can't
7:48
Speaker 1: just be a robot out there and you're just chasing,
7:52
Speaker 1: you know, stuff that data driven entirely. You can give
7:57
Speaker 1: it a bit confused. They have an Angels have a starter,
7:59
Speaker 1: Jack Honowitz, it's now injured. That was chasing whiffs with
8:03
Speaker 1: a new addition of a change up being a sinkerballer.
8:07
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have thought that would have put a lot
8:08
Speaker 1: of pressure on his arm, but maybe the way he
8:10
Speaker 1: was trying to release it it rated poorly analytically as well,
8:15
Speaker 1: which was the conundrum for me. He kept trying to
8:17
Speaker 1: lean into it, but none of his other pictures generated
8:19
Speaker 1: a lot of whiffs and unfortunately he is now hurt.
8:22
Speaker 1: So it's one of those things that there's a fine balance.
8:26
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8:28
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9:37
Speaker 1: All right, welcome back. So one of these things that
9:41
Speaker 1: I see all the time, everyone sees if you're kind
9:43
Speaker 1: of digging in, especially on social media and whatnot, or
9:47
Speaker 1: some of these graphs. So I'm going to throw one
9:49
Speaker 1: up right here, and this is per baseball savant comparing
9:55
Speaker 1: two pitchers here one. I put the eras up to
10:00
Speaker 1: signify who's having success who isn't. The pictures are anonymous.
10:04
Speaker 1: Those that are on the visual side. YouTube can probably
10:08
Speaker 1: guess who's on the left by the average one hundred
10:11
Speaker 1: mile an hour one hundred point two mile an hour
10:13
Speaker 1: four seemer of brewers. But what do you see when
10:18
Speaker 1: you look at these grafts? I put the arm slots
10:21
Speaker 1: as well with the horizontal or I guess, diagonal line.
10:26
Speaker 1: But what separates a good chart from a bad chart?
10:31
Speaker 1: Do these charts make sense to you when you look
10:33
Speaker 1: at the plots on them and the statistical eras that
10:38
Speaker 1: go along with them.
10:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think these charts are I think
10:44
Speaker 2: the first thing that sticks out, like you said, is
10:46
Speaker 2: one hundred mile an hour, four seam and sixty four
10:50
Speaker 2: percent usage. So with that, that's you know, this guy
10:54
Speaker 2: has the picture on the left, has two elite pitches
10:57
Speaker 2: that he leans on for the majority of his usage,
11:01
Speaker 2: right and the other stuff eleven is just is supplemental,
11:06
Speaker 2: where the pitcher on the right doesn't have an elite
11:09
Speaker 2: pitch at all in my opinion based on I mean,
11:12
Speaker 2: he's got a slider they call that like a bullet
11:15
Speaker 2: spin slider right there is like on this you know
11:18
Speaker 2: X and Y axis right in the middle. So that's
11:21
Speaker 2: that's not really doing a whole lot. That's just kind
11:23
Speaker 2: of dropping and not really a lot of movement there.
11:27
Speaker 2: But the fastball is not is not overly dominant velocity
11:33
Speaker 2: wise or vertical break. So it's he's very there's a
11:39
Speaker 2: there's a dead zone area where kind of like it's
11:43
Speaker 2: like that that forty five degree kind of right around
11:45
Speaker 2: the arm slot there that you really want to stay
11:48
Speaker 2: away from. You want to be above or below that line.
11:50
Speaker 2: And he's got quite a few pitches that are near
11:52
Speaker 2: that line, and that's that's considered good hitting. So if
11:56
Speaker 2: you're there, you can still get outs, but you really
12:00
Speaker 2: need to mix up, mix and match and be throwing strikes,
12:04
Speaker 2: you know, where when you have elite stuff like the
12:07
Speaker 2: picture on the left, you can get away with a
12:08
Speaker 2: lot more obviously, you know. So there's there's that, but
12:11
Speaker 2: the picture on the right has to be a lot
12:13
Speaker 2: more particular in not only his location but his sequencing
12:18
Speaker 2: to have results, and it doesn't seem like that's happening,
12:23
Speaker 2: and by the era at least.
12:26
Speaker 1: That's really good explanation. Could you explain briefly what is
12:29
Speaker 1: this pitch tunneling? What does that mean?
12:32
Speaker 2: If you they they demonstrate that quite a bit in
12:35
Speaker 2: on broadcast coverage. Just where you you want your pitches
12:40
Speaker 2: to look the same as long as possible and then
12:45
Speaker 2: they do different things. Right, So you think about as
12:49
Speaker 2: the pitches travel to the plate, they are on the
12:51
Speaker 2: same trajectory for as as long as possible until they
12:56
Speaker 2: do they you want late movement, and you want, for instance,
13:00
Speaker 2: you want a four seam fastball at the top of
13:02
Speaker 2: the zone, and then you want to throw your knuckle
13:04
Speaker 2: curveball at the off that same line and then it
13:08
Speaker 2: goes down, and that's kind of tunneling simplified. I guess
13:12
Speaker 2: where you want to think about a sinker and a
13:14
Speaker 2: cutter on the same line, but one goes left, one
13:17
Speaker 2: goes right. Those kinds of things. Is as a hitter,
13:21
Speaker 2: I'm sure you're well aware of. If you're swinging at
13:25
Speaker 2: a pitch thinking it's a fastball and it goes the
13:27
Speaker 2: other way, you're either going to swing and miss or
13:30
Speaker 2: miss the barrel and you're going to hit the ball weekly,
13:34
Speaker 2: which you don't want to do. But as a pitcher,
13:37
Speaker 2: that's what we're looking.
13:38
Speaker 1: For you in particular, I think you get a kick
13:43
Speaker 1: out of whatever my career numbers were against you. But
13:46
Speaker 1: to be honest, you were with the Yankees at the
13:49
Speaker 1: time when I first faced you. There were a lot
13:52
Speaker 1: of guys. I mean, Chapman was on the team, betansis
13:57
Speaker 1: severin oiler the Big Three, but I mean just a
14:03
Speaker 1: giant group of guys in stature. But also it was
14:06
Speaker 1: stuff hard throwers everywhere, and I think in your case,
14:12
Speaker 1: it was a little bit easy to underestimate you. I mean,
14:14
Speaker 1: unless you're doing a lot of digging. I probably approached
14:20
Speaker 1: it as a standard lefty and you know, kind of
14:23
Speaker 1: a change up. You didn't throw one, And I think
14:25
Speaker 1: that that was one of the weapons that a lot
14:27
Speaker 1: of pitchers, younger pitchers today, if they were to watch you, No,
14:31
Speaker 1: you didn't, didn't light up the radar gun. It's not
14:33
Speaker 1: a dist it's just the reality. But you got a
14:36
Speaker 1: lot of outs, and you could do it even if
14:38
Speaker 1: you fell behind in the count, because of the movement
14:42
Speaker 1: you had on the ball, the appearance of it being
14:44
Speaker 1: a better pitch than it ended up being. Where guys,
14:47
Speaker 1: you know, it looks like a meatball, they put their
14:49
Speaker 1: normal swing on it and it just smothered into the ground.
14:52
Speaker 1: A lot of ground ball outs, a lot of quick outs.
14:55
Speaker 1: Pitch efficiency. If starters want to go deep into the game,
14:58
Speaker 1: you can't have fifty two pitches after two innings. That's
15:02
Speaker 1: not a great recipe. So I think it kind of
15:04
Speaker 1: circles back to pounding the strike zone, trusting your stuff.
15:08
Speaker 1: It helps in the case of Soriano and Urania. These
15:12
Speaker 1: guys throwing nearly one hundred miles an hour, So if
15:16
Speaker 1: you're not confident when you have that kind of fastball
15:20
Speaker 1: and that kind of velocity detmares as well. The guys
15:23
Speaker 1: that have floundered a bit seems to be the ones
15:26
Speaker 1: at least with the Angels. Aldagary is going to be
15:28
Speaker 1: tonight's starting pitcher. He's a left hander. You know, he
15:31
Speaker 1: doesn't look like Deptmer's stuff wise really at all. He
15:35
Speaker 1: has his own mix of pitches. He's leaning on the
15:38
Speaker 1: cutter more. I think, let's talk about the cutter briefly.
15:41
Speaker 1: That seems to be kind of a pitch that used
15:44
Speaker 1: to be, in my opinion, trend here, but it seems
15:47
Speaker 1: like kind of a last ditch effort. Now it's kind
15:49
Speaker 1: of gone out of fashion for some reason. You have
15:51
Speaker 1: any idea why.
15:53
Speaker 2: I think that the cutter is a great weapon for
15:57
Speaker 2: opposite sided batters that prolonged my career tremendously, in my opinion.
16:03
Speaker 2: I think as a lefty, getting lefties out was never
16:07
Speaker 2: a problem for me. I always that was fine. It
16:10
Speaker 2: was the ability to get righty's out which kept me
16:14
Speaker 2: in the big leagues, and the cutter I contribute a
16:16
Speaker 2: lot of success to. And I think that whenever you're
16:20
Speaker 2: able to throw a ball that starts on the plate
16:25
Speaker 2: and works off the plate, is a lot better than
16:27
Speaker 2: starting a ball off the plate working it towards away
16:30
Speaker 2: from the barrel, if that makes sense, right. I want
16:33
Speaker 2: to throw a ball that is you think is going
16:36
Speaker 2: to be in the middle of the plate, and by
16:38
Speaker 2: the time it gets to you, it is out of
16:40
Speaker 2: the zone, off the plate, and so I've already got
16:42
Speaker 2: you committed to swinging because you thought it was a
16:46
Speaker 2: hit able pitch. And so that's what the cutter really does.
16:49
Speaker 2: It look, especially from my arm slot, which if you
16:52
Speaker 2: don't know, I was on the first base side and
16:54
Speaker 2: I was three quarters, So I'm throwing out of the zone,
17:00
Speaker 2: cross the plate, and then into a righty for a cutter,
17:03
Speaker 2: so at some point this ball is crossing the plate,
17:05
Speaker 2: so you have to make a decision whether it's going
17:07
Speaker 2: to stay on the plate or continue to go in.
17:10
Speaker 2: And that that cutter. For me specifically, I got a
17:13
Speaker 2: tremendous amount of swings out of zone because it was
17:16
Speaker 2: hard to not commit to it as a right handed batter,
17:18
Speaker 2: it seemed. And then for in general, the cutter is
17:23
Speaker 2: a great pitch to get off of the fastball. You
17:29
Speaker 2: know you're get off the barrel. As a perceived fastball,
17:31
Speaker 2: it's a harder pitch.
17:33
Speaker 4: Uh.
17:34
Speaker 2: The I think where guys find problems with their cutter
17:38
Speaker 2: is when they have a hard they try to throw
17:40
Speaker 2: a hard slider uh and call it a cutter and
17:43
Speaker 2: try to use it as a cutter, and it just
17:45
Speaker 2: ends up being a bad slider that's really hittable. So
17:48
Speaker 2: for me, like I never I wanted to throw this
17:50
Speaker 2: pitch up in the zone, up in into a writy's
17:52
Speaker 2: attack the hands, And I think for right handed pitchers
17:56
Speaker 2: it really helps get lefties out up and in on
18:00
Speaker 2: the hands. It's a great pitch, you know, but when
18:02
Speaker 2: when you try to use it on when like Wrighties
18:05
Speaker 2: use it to Mike Wright, one of our former teammates,
18:09
Speaker 2: really leaned on his cutter to writings and it just
18:12
Speaker 2: doesn't have enough movement to have to have the margin
18:14
Speaker 2: for error you need. You need to be extremely precise
18:17
Speaker 2: with it. And so I think for that it's easy
18:19
Speaker 2: for pitchers to move on from when they see not
18:23
Speaker 2: great results, but improper usage more so than the pitch itself.
18:28
Speaker 1: That makes a lot of sense. The Angels bullpen has
18:30
Speaker 1: been they haven't had a lot of success this year,
18:34
Speaker 1: comically low number of saves, a lot of blown saves.
18:38
Speaker 1: Ryan Zephyr John is a guy that the cutter is
18:41
Speaker 1: something he's leaned on a lot and hasn't unfortunately translated
18:47
Speaker 1: to a lot of success. He's changed his pitch rapertoil
18:49
Speaker 1: a bed. He's another guy that throws up her nineties,
18:53
Speaker 1: but the era is usually has a five in or around.
18:56
Speaker 1: He's shown some improvement recently. Sam Bachman picked up Save
19:02
Speaker 1: Sunday Nights Game, Sunday Day Game. He's got the best
19:05
Speaker 1: stuff in my opinion, and they chase Silseth. But Kirby Yates,
19:09
Speaker 1: for example, next teammate of years, has had he's tremendous
19:15
Speaker 1: numbers against right handed batters and lefties have an ops
19:18
Speaker 1: well over eight hundred. What kind of guy like that?
19:22
Speaker 1: I guess you kind of touched upon it. Maybe if
19:24
Speaker 1: they don't have the ability to mix in a cutter,
19:26
Speaker 1: how can you limit the damage against a certain side
19:31
Speaker 1: of pitching or at a hitter? Excuse me? What can
19:35
Speaker 1: a pitcher do to combat a weakness. Let's say a
19:37
Speaker 1: right handed pitcher and a left handed hitter. That matchup
19:40
Speaker 1: is giving him a ton of trouble.
19:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that I have a few good examples
19:47
Speaker 2: of that. One of my former teammates Anthony Bass was
19:50
Speaker 2: really he's a right handed reliever, you know, just had
19:53
Speaker 2: a nice career or whatever, but really struggled with lefties
19:57
Speaker 2: to the point where I mean, it just couldn't get it,
19:59
Speaker 2: don and was it was because he was throwing his
20:02
Speaker 2: two seam as a sinker, but it was just a
20:05
Speaker 2: it was extremely flat running fastball that was just staying
20:09
Speaker 2: on the same plane, and lefties were not not having
20:13
Speaker 2: any problems with it. And so he switched to a
20:15
Speaker 2: four seam, very similar to what Soriano has done. You know,
20:21
Speaker 2: you're starting pitcher. He was more sinker heavy in previous
20:25
Speaker 2: years and started now he's more for seam heavy, and
20:29
Speaker 2: that that change, coupled with a knuckle curve, like you said,
20:32
Speaker 2: has really helped with his tunneling and his opposite side
20:35
Speaker 2: of batters, and I think his results are showing that
20:38
Speaker 2: the force seam is really playing, and I think opposite.
20:41
Speaker 2: Traditionally you would want to throw more four seam fastballs
20:46
Speaker 2: if you have an average or below average sinker. You
20:48
Speaker 2: really don't. It's it's an easy pitch for an opposite
20:51
Speaker 2: batter to hit, like lefties hit marginal sinkers very well
20:57
Speaker 2: from ridy's like a running fastball. So unless you have
21:00
Speaker 2: unless it truly has bottom like a sinker, should depth
21:06
Speaker 2: you you you want to throw a four seam and
21:09
Speaker 2: uh and curveballs do well against opposite opposite hitters, you know.
21:15
Speaker 2: So like with going back to baths, he started using
21:21
Speaker 2: the slide he was. He reshaped his slider to get
21:24
Speaker 2: a little bit more depth to use to the lefties,
21:27
Speaker 2: to get that downward action more so than the sweeper
21:30
Speaker 2: the sweeping action. Like I said, I think depth seem
21:34
Speaker 2: in my experience, depth works more experience works better than
21:39
Speaker 2: east west movement, horizontal movement to opposite battles. But yeah,
21:45
Speaker 2: I don't know in your experience. Do you feel like
21:47
Speaker 2: that you saw that?
21:48
Speaker 1: I did? I think what comes to mind? David Price,
21:52
Speaker 1: uh right, When I saw him early on in my
21:56
Speaker 1: career with the Rays, I much preferred hitting against that
21:58
Speaker 1: version of him. He was throwing harder than he did
22:03
Speaker 1: with with the Red Sox when I faced him later on,
22:08
Speaker 1: and the raised version was was mid nineties with a
22:12
Speaker 1: little bit of a slider. I mean it was a
22:13
Speaker 1: power pitcher, two pitch guy. And then I see him
22:16
Speaker 1: with the Red Sox. He's now gone to three pitches,
22:19
Speaker 1: totally different repertoire pounding me in with cutters throwing change
22:23
Speaker 1: up off of that, and it was like, man, I
22:26
Speaker 1: don't want to I don't like this at all. And
22:28
Speaker 1: that just personally that matchup for me became I went
22:32
Speaker 1: from somebody who I had success against to I got
22:35
Speaker 1: to figure out a way to do something with this.
22:37
Speaker 1: And I think that you know, hitters, you get an
22:40
Speaker 1: idea pretty quickly. Do I see this guy? Well, you know,
22:44
Speaker 1: am I having success? Am I barreling balls up? Or
22:47
Speaker 1: am I going to need to make an adjustment because
22:49
Speaker 1: this isn't working at all? And I think, you know,
22:52
Speaker 1: for pitchers, they're the ones out there dictating the action.
22:55
Speaker 1: So the quicker some of these guys can probably clue into, hey,
22:59
Speaker 1: you know, you gotta be honest with yourself, be a
23:02
Speaker 1: good self evaluator. This pitch is either us you know,
23:04
Speaker 1: it's working and it's headed in the right direction, or
23:07
Speaker 1: you know what, maybe it's not. And I want to
23:10
Speaker 1: talk about three pitches in particular. In a second. We
23:13
Speaker 1: gotta hear one more word from our sponsor and we'll
23:15
Speaker 1: be right back.
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24:19
Speaker 1: And we're back. I think it's time that we talk
24:22
Speaker 1: a little more specifically about these angels. Guys. I gave
24:26
Speaker 1: you a heads up on a couple of them and
24:29
Speaker 1: not looking for anything super specific. If you do have that,
24:34
Speaker 1: that's great, But Reed Demers, I think you trained with
24:36
Speaker 1: them one offseason two. Read has taken a big step
24:40
Speaker 1: in the right direction. He did have a stint in
24:43
Speaker 1: the bullpen last year where he was dominant, I mean
24:46
Speaker 1: he was attacking hitters. It looked like a different mindset
24:49
Speaker 1: and he's been able to carry that over back in
24:51
Speaker 1: the starting rotation. Apparently there's no interest from the Angels
24:55
Speaker 1: in trading him, So that's a positive for the Halo
24:58
Speaker 1: fans because he's there and he's and he's looking a
25:01
Speaker 1: lot better. If you looked at any of Reid's charts,
25:03
Speaker 1: have you looked at any video you see anything that
25:06
Speaker 1: looks improved in your opinion.
25:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think we touched on a little bit. But this,
25:11
Speaker 2: I mean his slider I think has really taken a
25:15
Speaker 2: huge step forward for him. I don't know what they
25:18
Speaker 2: worked on, but it definitely seemed to improve the shape
25:23
Speaker 2: of his slider. It's got more depth and it's it's
25:28
Speaker 2: just a real weapon. He's using it a lot more
25:31
Speaker 2: than previous years. But all the others I looked at
25:33
Speaker 2: his stats and like his strike throwing his first pitch strikes.
25:37
Speaker 2: All that stuff is is kind of online with h
25:40
Speaker 2: and he's had flashes of success in his career. I
25:43
Speaker 2: mean he threw a no hitter, didn't he yes or something? Yeah,
25:46
Speaker 2: so you know it's in there, and it's just a
25:49
Speaker 2: matter of uh. I think too, success breeds confidence, right,
25:55
Speaker 2: and so maybe that little bullpen stint where he he
25:59
Speaker 2: he had success, you know, proved to himself that he
26:02
Speaker 2: could do it. I think there's there's you know, you
26:04
Speaker 2: can't put a number on that, and that's just the
26:05
Speaker 2: reality of it. For myself, I feel like I had
26:08
Speaker 2: to constantly prove that, yes, I have the capability of
26:11
Speaker 2: getting major league hitters out, and that was only through success.
26:15
Speaker 2: So you just can't fake it till you make it.
26:16
Speaker 1: On that one thing and that I wanted to ask
26:19
Speaker 1: you about, is he has He doesn't say a lot
26:23
Speaker 1: when he gives interviews in the media, a lot of
26:26
Speaker 1: cliches and whatnot. But one thing he did say in
26:28
Speaker 1: the past he felt like he'd fallen victim to as
26:31
Speaker 1: a starter, trying to be too command oriented, too perfect
26:35
Speaker 1: with his his locations, and I kind of think when
26:38
Speaker 1: he went to the bullpen it was more of a
26:39
Speaker 1: let it eat thing, and I think his command actually
26:42
Speaker 1: improved because of that mindset of attacking, which is kind
26:46
Speaker 1: of backwards, but a lot of things in sports are backwards.
26:49
Speaker 1: Do you think that there might be a point there
26:51
Speaker 1: that getting out of that mindset of trying to be
26:54
Speaker 1: the perfect picture, because I'm a starter, and really I
26:58
Speaker 1: think it's back to what we were saying, getting guys
27:00
Speaker 1: out in the strike zone, not afraid to make mistakes,
27:03
Speaker 1: trust in that the stuff, even if it is not
27:05
Speaker 1: in the greatest spot, is good enough to get the
27:07
Speaker 1: guys out.
27:09
Speaker 2: I think hitting is really hard, you know. I mean,
27:12
Speaker 2: I think you know it's it, And it's funny because
27:15
Speaker 2: for however many years to go, oh, just go watch
27:17
Speaker 2: them hit VP and watch how many balls they don't
27:20
Speaker 2: hit well in BP, and so you know, I don't
27:24
Speaker 2: know if that's you're not going to lob it up there.
27:26
Speaker 2: But yes, I think attacking the zone is extremely important.
27:29
Speaker 2: And I think that when you're the numbers do not lie.
27:32
Speaker 2: When you're when the pitcher is ahead in the count,
27:34
Speaker 2: the odds are substantially in your favor. And so Alan
27:37
Speaker 2: Mills bullplaying coach with the Orioles, used to say, if
27:41
Speaker 2: you start in the middle, you can work your way out.
27:43
Speaker 2: But if you start out of the zone, you have
27:45
Speaker 2: to work back to the middle. And you know that's
27:48
Speaker 2: implying that, you know, if you're too oh, eventually you
27:51
Speaker 2: have to come in and throw a strike, you know,
27:53
Speaker 2: and challenge a hitter too oh in a in a
27:55
Speaker 2: hitter's count when they're really ready to do damage, where
27:58
Speaker 2: maybe when you're a I didn't account, you're trying to
28:01
Speaker 2: protect a little bit more. And so I think that
28:04
Speaker 2: mentality for me worked really well. And I think with
28:07
Speaker 2: Reed it looks like he's just being a lot more
28:09
Speaker 2: aggressive attacking.
28:11
Speaker 1: I agree completely on all of that. We've talked about
28:14
Speaker 1: Soriano throughout the show. He has improved a lot. He
28:19
Speaker 1: started out the year absolutely on fire, and he's come
28:22
Speaker 1: back to earth to some degree, but he's still having
28:25
Speaker 1: an outstanding campaign, a guy that's going to be talked
28:29
Speaker 1: about in trades, but the Angels appear to not be
28:32
Speaker 1: moving him either. Urania is another the last one that
28:35
Speaker 1: I kind of wanted to get to. I do have
28:38
Speaker 1: his Baseball Savant chart here, and Richard, I was hoping
28:41
Speaker 1: you could take a look at this and is it unique,
28:44
Speaker 1: Is there anything that stands out with what Whalbert is
28:47
Speaker 1: doing as a twenty two year old rookie having a
28:51
Speaker 1: lot of success. When you look at this chart.
28:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean he's just got a huge fastball and
29:00
Speaker 2: uh and you know, and a really good change up.
29:04
Speaker 2: And I think that if you see here with the
29:08
Speaker 2: with the this charts specifically, he's got really good separation
29:12
Speaker 2: with his sweeper and his other pitches. So there's that
29:15
Speaker 2: they would they would say that that is good tunneling
29:18
Speaker 2: where there's you could see that the sweeper is very
29:22
Speaker 2: far away from his other pitches and the movement pot
29:25
Speaker 2: but the sinker, And it's funny, he actually uses his
29:28
Speaker 2: change up more than his sinker and he does a
29:30
Speaker 2: nice job of using his uh sinker and four seam
29:34
Speaker 2: combo well, and they have they have good separation on
29:36
Speaker 2: this chart. So a lot of times guys will throw
29:39
Speaker 2: a four seam sinker and they'll kind of blend together
29:42
Speaker 2: a little bit. But uh, I think that he, like
29:45
Speaker 2: I said, the guy's got really good stuff and he
29:48
Speaker 2: angles the ball downhill very well, creating creating that downward movement.
29:56
Speaker 1: I think that I whiffed on that part in particular,
29:59
Speaker 1: and probably because and ask you about it with Wahlbert,
30:02
Speaker 1: because I somehow didn't key into the fact that he
30:06
Speaker 1: is throwing from a higher arm slot and he does
30:09
Speaker 1: create a lot of downhill action. I mean, he's not
30:11
Speaker 1: I think he's probably six one six two height wise,
30:16
Speaker 1: but you know, I keep looking at it. It's like
30:19
Speaker 1: these opposing hitters just don't seem to know how to
30:21
Speaker 1: attack what he's doing. The changeup is miles per hour wise,
30:25
Speaker 1: it's it's around eighty nine ninety ninety one, so it's
30:28
Speaker 1: pretty hard change up. It's not one of these bugs
30:30
Speaker 1: bunny changeups. And I've thought maybe, in fact, it could
30:34
Speaker 1: be a little bit too hard, it could be too
30:37
Speaker 1: close to the fastball. But he is throwing ninety eight
30:40
Speaker 1: ninety nine one hundred and I've never faced him, so
30:43
Speaker 1: it'd be so much easier if I could get in
30:45
Speaker 1: there and give that opinion. That's what I've always They
30:49
Speaker 1: have a lot of training tools for hitters. Now you
30:52
Speaker 1: have these simulators, and a lot of guys are just
30:56
Speaker 1: doing stuff in the batting cage, not hitting on the field.
30:59
Speaker 1: We're not going to get into a rant, but there's
31:01
Speaker 1: nothing that gets you prepared to face a pitcher like
31:03
Speaker 1: actually getting in the box and you know pretty quickly,
31:06
Speaker 1: am I you know the guys. I think deception is
31:10
Speaker 1: the most underrated thing a pitcher can have by far.
31:14
Speaker 1: You hid the baseball as well as anybody. By the
31:17
Speaker 1: time you're actually getting a decent look at it, it's
31:20
Speaker 1: about halfway there. Deception is a hard thing to teach,
31:22
Speaker 1: but I think for young pitchers out there, for youth
31:26
Speaker 1: out there, for parents of pictures having a clean, polished delivery.
31:33
Speaker 1: You know, if your child or if you're a you know,
31:35
Speaker 1: a guy that's working your way through, if your mechanics
31:38
Speaker 1: don't look you know, perfect or something, there's no reason
31:41
Speaker 1: to change it if you're having success unless there's some
31:43
Speaker 1: injury thing. A lot of the best guys I faced,
31:47
Speaker 1: Kershaw Britain, Verlander had a cleaner delivery, sureser. All these
31:52
Speaker 1: guys are not giving you a good look at the baseball.
31:54
Speaker 2: Is yeah's got that. Verlander's got that. You know that
31:59
Speaker 2: those violent movements which I think you know it's not smooth,
32:02
Speaker 2: but anyway, sorry.
32:03
Speaker 1: No, you're it was just maybe you could expand it
32:06
Speaker 1: just briefly on is can you teach deception?
32:09
Speaker 2: I don't know if you can and I think that
32:12
Speaker 2: it's even hard to manipulate people's natural threat, people's natural
32:16
Speaker 2: throwing motion.
32:17
Speaker 1: Uh.
32:18
Speaker 2: You know, I think you can shorten the armstroke a
32:21
Speaker 2: little bit, and you see a lot of guys go
32:23
Speaker 2: that way, try to hide the baseball a little bit better,
32:26
Speaker 2: and I think that is deception. But you know, how
32:29
Speaker 2: do you even define deception as opposed to like like,
32:32
Speaker 2: I think you can just name examples of deceptive pitchers.
32:35
Speaker 3: But what.
32:37
Speaker 1: Now, you know you're doing fine? I think I think
32:39
Speaker 1: that it's a tough topic too. It's one of those
32:42
Speaker 1: things that there's not there's not a great answer, but
32:45
Speaker 1: it's just something that the best guys, in my opinion,
32:48
Speaker 1: they do it. They don't give you a good look.
32:50
Speaker 1: You can't be an iron mic out there, especially you know,
32:53
Speaker 1: for your fastball. So the last question that I wanted
32:57
Speaker 1: to get to, and we I think tried to tack
32:59
Speaker 1: a little bit of it. But the Angels bullpen inherited
33:03
Speaker 1: runners have been a big problem you pitched and relief.
33:06
Speaker 1: What is the mindset coming in with a lot of
33:09
Speaker 1: traffic out there on the basis I know, as a
33:12
Speaker 1: starter or whoever's coming out of the game, you don't
33:15
Speaker 1: want to leave guys with a mess to mop up.
33:18
Speaker 1: But what do you do as a reliever to try
33:19
Speaker 1: and limit the damage so it doesn't get out of hand?
33:23
Speaker 2: I mean, that's obviously really important part of being a
33:26
Speaker 2: reliever is being able to come in and leave inherited
33:30
Speaker 2: runner stranded. As far as how to approach that, I mean,
33:35
Speaker 2: it's just it's just it's making pitches. You have to
33:39
Speaker 2: just make pitches and execute your pitches. There's no real
33:43
Speaker 2: formula of you know, you're getting outs in general, right,
33:47
Speaker 2: And I think if you let the moment get to you,
33:49
Speaker 2: if you come in and try to do too much,
33:53
Speaker 2: then you might get yourself in situations where you're not
33:57
Speaker 2: going to be as successful. And I think I think
34:00
Speaker 2: that inherited runners the ninth inning, you know, a save situation.
34:05
Speaker 2: It's what you make of it. And so if you
34:08
Speaker 2: build this ninth inning, or if you build this situation
34:11
Speaker 2: up to be this huge moment, uh, it might affect
34:14
Speaker 2: you more so than just the ninth inning, is any
34:16
Speaker 2: other inning, or if you treat every inning like the
34:18
Speaker 2: ninth inning. Zach pop I don't know if you remember him,
34:21
Speaker 2: but he would go in the fourth inning and he said,
34:24
Speaker 2: like I just treat this like it's the ninth inning.
34:27
Speaker 2: Every inning is my ninth inning. And that was an
34:29
Speaker 2: interesting strategy, and it really it started to work for him,
34:32
Speaker 2: you know. And and uh, and why should any why
34:34
Speaker 2: should any enning be different than the most important one
34:38
Speaker 2: that you're throwing. With that being said, you if you
34:41
Speaker 2: go out there and try to be a hero and
34:43
Speaker 2: try to pitch around contact or whatever, it might end
34:48
Speaker 2: up working out worse for you. And you see that
34:51
Speaker 2: guys go in there, and they go in all amped
34:53
Speaker 2: up and crazy, uh, you know, thinking they're going to
34:55
Speaker 2: be the hero.
34:56
Speaker 1: And then and then and then you know, all behind
34:59
Speaker 1: in the count they going for you know, the only
35:03
Speaker 1: objective is to miss the bats and they fall behind
35:06
Speaker 1: two oh, and then they do have to make that pitch,
35:09
Speaker 1: that mistake that gets hammered. The best relievers, in my opinion,
35:14
Speaker 1: have a very good ability to get ahead down in
35:17
Speaker 1: the way, generally with the first pitch, or they can
35:21
Speaker 1: land one of their off speed pitches, not a hangar
35:25
Speaker 1: per se, but a nice strike breaking ball and the hitter,
35:30
Speaker 1: you know, especially because these guys are generally throwing very
35:33
Speaker 1: hard too. But you don't it's very hard to have
35:35
Speaker 1: success if you're relying on.
35:37
Speaker 2: A bunch of chase.
35:38
Speaker 1: In my opinion, starters can get away with it maybe
35:41
Speaker 1: a little bit more. But relievers, I think you've got
35:44
Speaker 1: to come in and try and get rid of the
35:45
Speaker 1: guy in three four pitches or less. But if you're
35:50
Speaker 1: you know, falling behind because you're trying to throw that
35:52
Speaker 1: wipe out two strike slider from the get go, I'm
35:56
Speaker 1: not sure that's always a great plan.
35:57
Speaker 2: Would you agree? Yeah, I agree, I think a great
36:00
Speaker 2: example of that none necessarily. Really where is Tyler Glass now?
36:05
Speaker 2: And when he was with the Pirates, he was not
36:09
Speaker 2: had the same stuff, wasn't good through hard, good breaking ball,
36:13
Speaker 2: and I think he was trying to just pitch like
36:15
Speaker 2: be like pitch like I pitch, you know, hit spots
36:20
Speaker 2: and stuff like that. Yeah, And so when he went
36:23
Speaker 2: over to the Rays, I actually talked to heinm Bloom
36:25
Speaker 2: about this. Who was there when he was there, And
36:28
Speaker 2: there wasn't any like magic formula. All they did. He
36:31
Speaker 2: told me. They did two things. They told him You're
36:33
Speaker 2: going to be in the big leagues the remainder of
36:34
Speaker 2: the year, no matter what you do. So they gave
36:36
Speaker 2: him the confidence to not be worried about being sent down,
36:39
Speaker 2: and they told him just throw every pitch like a strike, like,
36:42
Speaker 2: regardless of the count. We want everything. We just want
36:45
Speaker 2: you to throw everything in the zone. And I think
36:48
Speaker 2: those and then he took off with the Rays, and
36:51
Speaker 2: I think with like I said, like the Angels relievers,
36:54
Speaker 2: if you come in and and try to pick at
36:56
Speaker 2: the zone, you know, major league hitters don't chase that often.
37:00
Speaker 2: And then when you're you know, when you fall behind,
37:03
Speaker 2: you're you're in a lot of trouble because slugging is
37:06
Speaker 2: through the roof when when the pitchers are behind in
37:09
Speaker 2: the count rather than ahead in the count. So it's
37:12
Speaker 2: just it's been that way forever. You know. However many
37:16
Speaker 2: years the odds, like I said earlier, the odds are
37:20
Speaker 2: in the pictures favor when they're ahead in the count.
37:23
Speaker 2: So I think that's when you come into.
37:27
Speaker 1: The whole premise, Like what we're talking about is getting
37:29
Speaker 1: guys out. It starts, you know, preferably in the strike zone.
37:33
Speaker 1: It's throwing strikes, trusting your stuff there. If you're a
37:36
Speaker 1: guy that has crazy movement, you've got to find a
37:39
Speaker 1: way to make it appear at least attractive from the
37:42
Speaker 1: beginning and if you don't, it's a bad recipe. The
37:45
Speaker 1: Angels do lead the league in walks on the pitching side.
37:49
Speaker 1: That's an area to really improve. But they do have
37:52
Speaker 1: a lot of bright spots too. There's a couple of starters,
37:56
Speaker 1: especially in the games coming up against the Baltimore Orioles,
38:01
Speaker 1: are two spot starters. One's TVD. We'll see what happens there.
38:04
Speaker 1: But Richard, I want to thank you for coming on
38:06
Speaker 1: giving us some insights. I'll lean on you big time
38:09
Speaker 1: moving forward, but thank you for your time. Thank you
38:13
Speaker 1: to all the Halo Territory listeners, watchers, and everybody else.
38:18
Speaker 1: Please like and subscribe and we'll see you next time
38:20
Speaker 1: on Halo Territory.
38:22
Speaker 2: Thanks Mark.
38:23
Speaker 1: If you made it this far, you'll love this next video.
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Speaker 1: Check it out right here and make sure you subscribe
38:28
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