Series Up!: Houston, we have a playoff vibe (complete with heartbreak)
On opportunity lost, brilliant Bassitt, Gausman's dud, belief in Berríos, Varsho, Espinal, rule changes, Chapman, Vlad, Romano, Pearson, Tiedemann, Joey Chestnut, Apple TV+, and more!
Welp. You win some, you lose some, you piss away a golden opportunity to make up for being completely stymied by Luis Garcia in some.
OK, maybe “piss away” is a bit harsh. George Springer scalded a .700 xBA ball at 102.4 mph toward third base with the bases loaded, nobody out, and his team down a run in the top of the eighth inning in Wednesday night’s rubber match between the Jays and Astros in Houston, only to watch it rocket straight into Alex Bregman's glove.
Springer and Vlad both battled valiantly against an incredibly tough reliever in Bryan Abreu, who came into the game with a 1.81 ERA since the start of 2022 and 103 strikeouts in 69 2/3 innings. Bo Bichette also had an at-bat.
The Jays' relievers came unglued after that and the Astros were able to run up the score a bit, but the game was lost in that top of the eighth.
There were positives, of course. As there were across the entirety of the series, despite the Jays' inability to win more than one of the three games of it. So let's talk about it!
Here's two up, on down...
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Down: Kevin Gausman
Somehow Kevin Gausman's outing on Monday in the series opener in Houston was not his worst start as a member of the Blue Jays, at least according to Game Score. His 4 2/3 innings of eight run (seven earned), seven hit, two walk ball produced a Game Score of 20 — one point higher than the 19 Game Score he was tagged with last June 16th against Baltimore, when he allowed seven runs (five earned) on seven hits and a walk over just 2 1/3 innings. He did manage to save the bullpen a bit by toughing it out until the fifth, but that's about as positive a thing as can be said about this one.
What does need to be discussed, however, is the how and the why — and I think the answer to both of those questions about this start is relatively simple. Here's how I see it:
Gausman can be a little bit predictable with his first pitch offerings, particularly to right-handed batters. For some reason he’ll barely use his nasty splitter on the first pitch against RHB. At 0-0 in 2022, right-handers saw fastballs 60% of the time from him, sliders 35% of the time, and the split just 5% of the time.
In this one, the first two Astros batters of the game were ready for the fastball — and that’s what they saw.
Mauricio Dubon smacked a 95.4 mph single on the first pitch he saw, and on Gausman's second pitch, Alex Bregman belted a ball 397 feet at 99.5 mph off the bat that Kevin Kiermaier caught on the warning track.
Thing is, predictability was only part of the issue here. Both of these two fastballs were clocked at less than 92 mph — 91.8 and 91.2 respectively — and it would take until his sixth fastball of the game before Gausman topped 92.3 mph. His average fastball velocity last season was 95.
His velo would increase from there — he ended the game at an average of 93.4 — but that mark is lower than all but one of his starts last season. (And, it's worth noting here, in his start in Kansas City on April 6th he produced an average fastball velocity of just 91.4, which is 1.6 mph lower than his worst reading from 2022.)
So, there's one pitch not working the way it should. And, despite the fastball being his primary 0-0 offering, particularly to right-handers, he wouldn't use it in that count again in the first inning.
That seems a sensible choice. Unfortunately, it quickly became apparent that his next most likely 0-0 offering to RHB, the slider, wasn't working either. He threw 10 of them on the night and was only able to get three across for strikes. Most missed badly enough that it was easy for Astros hitters to lay off — and this was particularly so of the ones he threw on those 0-0 counts in the first (as we can see below).
Overall, Gausman's splitter was his best pitch on the night, but it also took time before he was able to get it right. After Bregman he faced Yordan Alvarez and walked him on five pitches, only one of which was close to the zone.
After missing badly with one of those 0-0 sliders, Gausman threw José Abreu a fastball at just 91.5 mph at the top of the zone, which he smashed for a two-run, 109.3 mph double. Kyle Tucker then swung through a good splitter, watched a splitter and a fastball miss, fouled off another good splitter, then simply watched as the a pair of splits sailed way outside, handing him a walk.
Gausman's next batter, Jeremy Peña, went somewhat better at first. After missing badly with another 0-0 slider, Gausman put a splitter in the zone that was fouled off. He then found his fastball velocity, generating a foul tip at the top of the zone with a 95 mph heater. After missing with one split well low, he managed to get one inside that Peña had to check his swing on. Unfortunately, catcher Danny Jansen was reaching forward too much for the ball and made contact with Peña's bat. Instead of a full count, the batter was sent to first base on catcher's interference, loading the bases.
Next up was Corey Julks, and once again an 0-0 slider missed badly. Gausman's fastball velocity was back by this point, so he threw a bunch of those. Unfortunately, the first two just missed outside, forcing him into a 3-0 then a 3-1 count. On the 3-1 pitch, Julks smoked a two-run, 109.6 mph double on a 94.0 mph fastball that was much too close to being middle-middle.
The same “middle-middle” complaint could be made of the fourth pitch of the next at-bat, which was the one Jake Meyers crushed to right field for a three-run home run to make the score 7-0.
Against the next batter, Martin Maldonado, Gausman threw his best three pitches of the inning…
Foul tip on a fastball at 94.6, called strike on a 93.7 mph fastball right on the edge, then a swinging strike on a virtually unhittable splitter. But by then the damage was done.
He wasn’t perfect from there out, but he was more or less fine. The velo ticked up, the splitter worked, and the slider largely disappeared — after throwing four in the first inning he went to it just six more times over the next 3 2/3 frames.
In short, it appears to me that Gausman simply wasn’t ready to answer the bell in this one. And the thing is, that is not something we’ve experienced more than once or twice before, and we probably shouldn’t expect it to happen very much again going forward.
The velocity thing is interesting and worth monitoring, but even on that front it’s worth noting that his previous two months of April were also on the low side — 94.2 and 94.4 respectively. Currently he’s at 93.6, and if you throw out that weird one in Kansas City — which he bounced back from with a 95.0 average against the Tigers last week — it’s even more in line with April ‘21 and ‘22.
He’s fine. I mean, probably. He’s probably fine.
Up: Chris Bassitt
Take a bow, Chris Bassitt. After opening his Blue Jays career — and his three-year, $63 million contract — in the scariest way possible, allowing nine runs on 10 hits (four of which were home runs) over 3 1/3 innings in St. Louis earlier this month, Bassitt has really started to settle in, getting better with each start. On Tuesday in Houston he was vastly different pitcher than on opening weekend, pitching 6 1/3 innings of shutout ball on just three hits and one walk.
How did he get from there to here? It’s hard to say. With seven pitches — eight if you count the splitter that Statcast says he’s thrown twice this season — there’s a lot going on with Bassitt, both on a pitch-to-pitch, and start-to-start basis.
One thing that’s interesting is that at first it seemed as though left-handed batters were going to be the problem for him. All four of the home runs he allowed in St. Louis were to left-handed batters, and lefties hit their way on in seven of the 11 times they came to the plate against him. Curiously though, in his next start he didn't seem to do a whole lot different — his cutter usage dipped and his curve usage increased, but everything else was relatively the same — and yet he allowed just one hit to the six lefties he faced. Since then, he's done a very nice job of neutralizing left-handed batters (though his pitch mix against them has been a little more volatile, likely due to matchups and what's working best for him on a particular day). Over his last three starts lefties have slashed just .130/.231/.217 (.214 wOBA) against him.
Oddly, it's been right-handed hitters who have given him the most trouble. Heading into Tuesday's start right-handers had slashed .226/.359/.355 (.326 wOBA) against him, even though from 2020 through 2022 he’d held them to just a .270 wOBA. Then, on Tuesday, he found his way back. Eighteen right-handed batters came to the plate, and only three of them managed to get a hit.
The question is, what changed?
Well, his pitch mix, for one. After throwing his sinker just 39% of the time to RHB last season, Bassitt came into Tuesday's outing using it more than 45% of the time.
As you can see, in this one his sinker usage against the Astros was more in line with his 2022 rate.
Thing is, I suspect that his usage of the sinker is less a choice and more a response to the circumstances he’s in. Everything he threw in that first start against the Cardinals was getting hit, so let’s throw that one out. And if we do that, we see that against the Royals (60%) and the Tigers (38.5%) he was having trouble throwing the sinker to right-handers for strikes. Against the Astros on Tuesday he put the pitch in the zone 70% of the time.
Particularly of note, he was throwing his sinker at 0-0 in the zone more often to right-handers — 67% of the time, compared to 57% and 29% against the Royals and Tigers respectively. As such, he was able to stay ahead in counts. For the entire game he threw only 12 pitches to right-handed batters that was ahead of him in the count, compared to 21 and 31 against the Tigers and Royals respectively.
When Bassitt is behind to right-handers he will throw the sinker a lot — about 65% of the time. In each of the last two seasons his slider is the only other pitch to surpass 10% usage against RHB when behind. Not to get all Buck Martinez about it, but if Bassitt can’t throw the sinker for strikes to right-handers he’s going to find himself behind in counts more often, making him less likely to be able to make use of that deep arsenal of his, which is necessary for him to keep batters off balance.
Staying ahead is crucial for him, and he did that in this one. Step in the right direction!
Up: José Berríos
After José Berríos had a successful start against the Rays last week, Jays pitching coach Pete Walker seemed particularly encouraged by his changeup. It was understandable, as Berríos had it working well against Tampa, generating four whiffs on six swings and upping its usage to nearly 20% (it generally hovers a couple ticks below 15% for him) after adjusting the his grip on the pitch. It appeared to have been one of the key reasons that Berríos was able to break out against the Rays, and was a pitch close observers were looking forward to seeing him potentially deploy even more often in Houston.
Then the Astros went and only put two lefties in their lineup on Wednesday night.
And, frankly, that was probably for the best. Berríos did not have the same kind of command of the change on Wednesday (right) as he did last Friday (left). Uh, clearly…
And yet, Berríos was very effective once again in this one — likely even more effective than he’d been against the Rays. Aside from a slight blip in the second inning, when he hit a batter, walked a batter, then surrendered a two-run double, he was basically brilliant. Seven innings, three hits, just the one walk, and just the two runs against. Granted, his strikeout rate was low, as he only managed three, and only generated swing-and-miss eight times, but he also did a masterful job of limiting hard contact — a real rarity for him these days.
Berríos only allowed three hard-hit balls, with Astros batters generating an average exit velocity against him of just 80.7 mph. Prior to this, his lowest average exit velocity since the start of 2022 was 83.3. Only one other time over that span has he been below 85 mph. His 15% hard hit rate was his lowest since since 2020.
The changeup was, in fact, part of this, as the three put in play averaged just 76.2 mph off the bat, but there were two bigger stars of the show. One of these was the slurve. Berríos threw 38 slurves, meaning that he used it 49% of the time. Only one other time in his career, in a game back in early 2019, had he leaned on the pitch as much. But there was method to his madness here. Not only did he generate seven whiffs on 20 swings at the slurve, the nine balls put in play off of it averaged just 79 mph.
The other star was his sinker, which he threw 26% of the time, and which came off of the Astros' bats at 69.5 mph on average when put into play.
When they were able to make contact with either of these pitches they simply weren't able to square them up. You love to see it.
Unfortunately, this hasn't always been the case for Berríos and these offerings. For one thing, the Rays only took six swings at his 19 slurves (32%) last week, compared to 20 swings on 38 (53%) on Wednesday, so he's got to continue making them as enticing as they were in Houston. For another, the hard hit rate on both pitches in 2022 was 42%. Not great!
The difference in this one, it seems, is all to do with command. Which… we knew that already, didn’t we?
Still, it’s progress! He didn’t look lost out there. He didn’t get shelled. I’m not sure about some of the “confidence” and “attack” stuff that the pitcher and his manager were talking about after the game, but I’ll certainly take it.
Quickly…
• John Schneider used a pinch runner for Alejandro Kirk in a key spot during that eighth inning near-rally on Wednesday, and not only was it good to see it pay off — in the next at-bat Whit Merrifield doubled home the Jays' only run of the ballgame — it was even better to see that Schneider was willing to do it in the first place. One of the key things about having Daulton Varsho on the roster is his ability to catch, and even though the Jays clearly don't ever intend to use him behind the plate, the fact that his presence affords Schneider the ability to remove Kirk from the game in those situations without having to worry about not having anyone to catch should Danny Jansen get hurt once he comes in is just about as huge. I was afraid that their reluctance to have Varsho catch might have ruled out such moves!
• Not sure about using Santiago Espinal and his 51st percentile sprint speed as the pinch runner in that situation, though. However, a) it's not like they had many better options on the bench, b) it's not like that isn't still significantly faster than Alejandro, and c) it worked.
• Speaking of pinch running, according to Shi Davidi's latest notebook post at Sportsnet, when told about the "designated pinch runner" rule that MLB is experimenting with this year in the Atlantic League, Whit Merrifield — a part of, as Shi explains, "the 11-member Competition Committee that includes six ownership representatives, four players and one umpire" — said, "That's horrible."
“Maybe the Atlantic League will like it. Hopefully, not in my lifetime will that be up here,” he added.
I knew I liked that Merrifield guy.
• The rule, for those unfamiliar, would literally allow teams to designate a pinch runner, who at any time would be able to come in to run the bases in place of another player, who would then be allowed back into the game after the inning concludes.
They're also looking at limiting the number of times a pitcher can "disengage" per at-bat to one (it's currently two), as well as the "double hook" rule, which would force teams to give up the DH if a starting pitcher doesn't pitch five innings. (I hate that one less, FWIW).
• Another tidbit from Shi's piece is about the red hot Matt Chapman, who has been hitting to all fields more than usual this year — something he's deliberately worked on. I obviously can't complain about the results so far, but this does strike me as a little bit odd, seeing as Chapman had a terrible time at the plate when he wasn't pulling the ball last year (85 wRC+ in April and May, 38.5% pull rate), and was great (131 wRC+) after that, once he'd started pulling the ball (52.8%). Shows what I know.
• Some more pieces worth a read: Ben Clemens of FanGraphs looks at “Vlad the Omniscient” — a dig into the new gear Vlad seems to have found in terms of avoiding strikeouts. My friend and former colleague, Kaitlyn McGrath of the Athletic, takes a look at some early season trends among Jays players. Zack Crizer of Yahoo has one for those who like to keep up-to-date on the latest in pitching concepts, as he tells us all about Vertical Approach Angle. And sticking with Yahoo, my Blue Jays Happy Hour cohost, Nick Ashbourne, takes a look at an interesting quirk of Jordan Romano’s appearance against the Astros on Tuesday night: the fact that 14 of the 15 pitches he threw were sliders.
• LMAO, on the Sportsnet broadcast in the top of the seventh inning on Wednesday, Dan Shulman announced that competitive eater Joey Chestnut will be on hand at Rogers Centre on April 25th in order to kick off the "Loonie Dog" portion of the Jays schedule. Outstanding stunt casting.
• Nate Pearson managed another scoreless, hitless inning for Buffalo on Wednesday, adding in a strikeout for good measure. It took him 10 pitches. He did the same in his previous appearance, albeit with more pitches, picking up three strikeouts in the process. He now has 15 strikeouts in 7 1/3 innings, with just four hits, four walks, and a 2.45 ERA. Trevor Richards ought to start looking over his shoulder if he isn't already.
• Also on the prospect front, Ricky Tiedemann made his second start of the year for New Hampshire on Wednesday. He wasn't quite as dominant as in the first one, allowing a hit, a couple of walks, a hit batter, and surrendering a run in the first inning. But by the time all was said and done he'd gone 3 2/3 before reaching his pitch limit, striking out six and limiting the damage to that lone run. He might not quite be ready, but he's real good.
• Lastly, looking ahead the Jays have an off day on Thursday in New York before they open up a three-game set in the Bronx on Friday night. And if you want to watch the first game of the series on TV, you’d better be ready to give a bunch more of your information to Apple!
Friday’s contest will be the Jays’ first appearance of the season on “Friday Night Baseball,” MLB’s nifty little anti-fan cash grab that has given exclusivity for certain games to Apple TV+. And whereas last year all one needed was an Apple ID in order to watch games free of charge, this year you have to pay — or sign up for a two month free trial.
The fun thing about that is that the league and Apple have so far only announced the scheduled games up until the end of June. So, if you do take advantage of the two month trial — which you can here — for Friday’s game, there’s a chance the Jays will be on there again later on in the season, after your trial has expired, and you will have to pay. Woof.
Thanks, Manfred!
(Worth noting #1: If you’d like to learn more about this Apple TV+ nonsense, MLB.com has provided a handy FAQ.)
(Worth noting #2: At the time of this writing the Yankees have not officially announced their starters for the series, though with Gerrit Cole last having pitched on Sunday, you can be sure that he’ll get the ball on either Friday or Saturday. The Jays will roll with their number 1, 2, and 3 starters: Kikuchi, Manoah, and Gausman.)
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But if you subscribe to Apple TV you can watch precisely two (2) good shows! (Severance and For All Mankind)
the free trial code from MLB seems only to be valid in the US... damn!