Aaron Civale's New Slider. Albert Suarez's Righty Approach
Aaron Civale, Albert Suarez, Yoshinobu Yamamoto
Brewers Aaron Civale has a new slider. He started throwing the pitch on August 9th. It’s 83 mph with -2” vertical break and 7-8” sweep. FanGraphs Stuff+ should see this as a below-average to average pitch. It’s a shorter slider shape with more depth than his cutter but less horizontal than his sweeper. He’s using it ~10% to righties and barely to lefties. The pitch is a multi-situation weapon, holding usage above 8% in both two-strike and non-two-strike counts. The issue for Civale in June and July had been versus right-handed hitters (6.69 FIP allowed). His results since adding this pitch haven’t been better from a swing-miss standpoint, but he has seen a small improvement in contact quality. 🍻
The addition of this new slider has evened out his mix versus righties. He was throwing 4 pitches 10% or more in June/July. Since August 9, he’s throwing 6 pitches 10% or more to righties as he’s developed this new slider and jacked up his four-seam usage. Death via mix appears to be the approach. He’s also throwing more four-seamers to lefties, where his results have stayed solid. The Brewers have the playoffs in mind with this late-season addition. The underlying stuff and data don’t suggest it’s a game-changer, but I rarely doubt the Brewers with their adjustments.
Orioles Albert Suarez adjusted his righty approach and has seen great results. His fastball usage went down and his curveball usage went up when comparing July and July to August and beyond. Fastball dropped from 47% to 39%. Curveball usage climbed from 13% to 23%. His swinging strike rate against righties has risen from 10% to 16% and his expected SLG has fallen over 80 points. FanGraphs Stuff+ has his fastball at 90 and curveball at 95. The flip is somewhat supported by modeling. Very little has changed from a location standpoint against righties. His fastball has crept more middle-up than up-away and his curveball is in the zone more. 🤷♂️
Suarez is tracking for a pretty improbable sub-3.00 ERA in ~130 innings after last pitching in the KBO for the past 2 seasons with uninspiring results. He’s one of the more fascinating stories from this season. I like the idea of backing off fastball usage as the Orioles will likely need him to make playoff starts and his leash will be shorter than in the regular season. Thus, take a few weeks to figure out how to work with less of the pitch that allows damage.
Dodgers Yoshinobu Yamamoto returned to the mound for the first time since his rotator cuff strain (4 IP, H, 1 ER, 8 K, 59 pitches). He simplified his mix for the outing, throwing only his fastball, splitter, and curveball more than 5%. In the 2 months before his injury, he’d embraced a much more diversified mix, throwing sliders, cutters and sinkers all more than 5% on top of the three pitches mentioned above. His release height was down slightly (~1”), but not enough to convince me he’s working from a lower slot since the injury. It’s probably more important to note that his velocity sat above 96 mph. He was 95.6 mph in June/July before going down. Like the other 2 pitches on this edition of pitcher notes, he’s an integral part of his team’s playoff hopes. 🇯🇵