World Series Game 3 Preview: Brandon Pfaadt

Brandon Pfaadt

A couple of notes worth considering as you watch Brandon Pfaadt tonight…

• SINKER USAGE TO LEFTIES: The main difference between Pfaadt in August & September and his four postseason starts is his increase in sinker usage to left-handed hitters. He used the pitch just 8% in the final two months of the regular season. That usage has increased to 25% in the postseason. He’s primarily pounding this pitch middle-away from lefties when he’s even or behind in the count. The utility of this pitch to me appears to be establishing something hard, away from lefties. I generally do agree with the idea that opposite-handed sinkers probably aren’t the smartest pitch to throw, but if you control for location (which feels a bit like a cheat code to validate usage), down-away sinkers from right-handed pitchers to left-handed hitters yielded an xwOBA of only .327 in the regular season, almost identical to that of right-handed four-seamers to left-handed hitters at the middle top of the strike zone.

  • The Rangers were one of the 4 best teams in MLB against Pfaadt’s specific sinker shape by xwOBA (~7” vertical break, ~15” arm-side movement at 93 mph), roughly 80 points higher than the league average. 3 Rangers hitters are driving that success—Corey Seager, Leody Taveras and Nathaniel Lowe. It’s worth noting that the majority of that damage for all 3 hitters has come on pitches on the middle or inner third of the plate. In the postseason, Pfaadt has missed location gloveside on his sinker ~25% of the time (to my eye).

  • Pfaadt’s options are likely to a) back off usage of the pitch in place of more four-seamers or b) make sure you’re not pulling sinkers to your glove-side against guys like Seager and Lowe. The latter is a riskier proposition, giving the fickle nature of command.

• PITCHING INSIDE TO RIGHTIES: To right-handed hitters, Pfaadt’s approach has been roughly the same when comparing to August-September from a usage standpoint. The primarily difference that jumps out is a tendency to elevate his four-seam fastball more up and inside (heatmaps below).

Pfaadt’s 4S location to right-handed hitters

• This want to elevate jumps out even more when looking at two-strike counts, where more than half of his four-seamers to righties when he was ahead in the count came on the outer third of the plate in August and September compared to just one-third in the postseason.