Michael King's Cheat-Code Movement. Paul Skenes Curveball Party
Michael King, Paul Skenes, Jose Berrios
Padres Michael King has sustained some wild movement increases. I caught this in his first start of the season, but King’s four-seamer picked up 2” vertical break and his sinker added 2” arm-side movement, without a notable change in release. He’s slightly more efficient in the spin of his four-seam and sinker, which likely connects to the shape increases (~2-3% higher spin efficiency). His Stuff+ on each pitch has inflated 3-4 points. The story here is the four-seam fastball, which has pushed its whiff rate from 32% to 44% year over year (22% is average). Despite the improvement, he’s using the pitch less to right-handed hitters. Last night, he ran a 52% whiff rate on the pitch (9 whiffs on 17 swings). Righties are seeing more sweepers against him as well, with the usage of that pitch climbing from 16% in the second half last year to 27% this season. 👑
Lefties are seeing more four-seam fastballs, and the contact results in his small sample have been wonky. I’m confident the shape increase will net out positive results on the pitch come midseason (even if I have no idea how he’s catching extra vert). King is projected as a top-20 pitcher rest of season, but I think I’d take him over the likes of Corbin Burnes, Sonny Gray, Pablo Lopez, and George Kirby.
Pirates Paul Skenes leaned on his curveball last night in Los Angeles as he outdueled Yoshinobu Yamamoto. He threw the curve 10 times all season to lefties entering the outing and ripped it 11 times last night alone. His curveball isn’t so much a curveball as it is a third slider with a tighter shape than traditional curves. It’s 83-84 mph with -3” vertical break and 6-7” glove-side movement (the average curve has about -10” vertical break, way more drop that Skenes’ “curve”). Both of his other sliders have 6” more vertical break, meaning they don’t drop as much. The added drop of this curveball helps it perform versus lefties, like Shohei Ohtani. 🏴☠️
Numerous things make Skenes good, but the ability to ramp up the usage of a pitch into the ~20% window in a given start without throwing it much in prior outings feels impossible to plan for. He did this with his changeup at times last year, he does it with his four-seam at times as well. I think he’s a random pitcher at times from an approach standpoint. This is a compliment. It doesn’t happen in every outing, but when it does, it usually leads to lines like this—6.1 IP, 5 H, 9 K, 108 pitches, 64% strike rate.
Blue Jays Jose Berrios changed his cutter. The pitch was 91 mph last year with 11” vertical break and ~1.5” arm-side movement. This year, it’s more of a true cutter, sitting 90 mph with 9” vertical break and 1” glove-side movement. It’s a better cutter, but the pitch’s performance hasn’t ticked up because his location of it to lefties has mostly been middle of the plate compared to more inside in 2024. He’s also cut some slurve/sweeper usage to right-handed hitters and is throwing more right-right changeups. The latter are performing well. 🤷♂️
The main location change I notice is his sinker’s placement inside to lefties compared to down last year (see below). It seems like a logical approach to try and take back success on the outer third to righties. And that’s really what he’s lacked since 2022-2023. It’s ok command with below-average stuff that has now ticked back in velocity. He was never amazing versus lefties from a barrels standpoint, but he handled righties well. For the last two years, he’s lost the righty touch, constantly getting clipped in the zone. He can hang around a 4.30 ERA for a chunk of innings, but I struggle to see the unlock that vaults him back to the ~17% K-BB days of 2023.
