Cam Schlittler's Electric Debut. A Theory on Andrew Abbott's Success
Cam Schlittler, Andrew Abbott, Slade Cecconi
Yankees Cam Schlittler looked great in his MLB debut (5.1 IP, 4 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 7 K). He’s 6’6” with a 6.4’ release height, higher than 93% of pitchers in MLB. His fastball sat 98 mph after holding 97 mph at Triple-A. He averaged 95 mph at Double-A this season, 93.6 mph last season, and 90 mph in 2023, with a wildly different shape. He might be one of the more dramatic two-year improvements I’ve ever seen—hat tip to the Yankees’ pitching development. Schlittler’s money pitch is his slider. It averaged 92 mph with 5” vertical break and 9” glove-side movement. It’s different than his sweeper, which he’s backed off considerably after throwing it ~18% earlier in the season. There’s only one other pitch this season that I can find sitting >91 mph with >2” vertical break and >5” glove-side movement — Ben Casparius’ cutter. Schlittler’s shape is coming from a release point that’s ~4” higher than the Dodgers’ righty, making it that much more unique. 🗽
Schlittler is one of the bigger “how did we miss him” pitching prospects this season. I wrote about the big righty a week ago in my minor league pitcher recap (link). I’m somewhat stunned that he wasn’t universally added to midseason top 100 updates across the industry (Baseball America was the highest ranker at 89). This is exactly what a top 10-15 pitching prospect in baseball looks like from a specs, trajectory, and performance standpoint. I’m curious to see how his four-seamer plays to left-handed hitters with his aggressive zone rate. That’s the central thing to monitor.
Reds Andrew Abbott has a 2.07 ERA in 16 starts with a 4.11 xFIP, continuing to outperform his peripherals. He’s the most mystifying pitcher in MLB. I pointed out in April that he has a new cutter, which he’s lightly using against righties. He moved over toward the first-base side of the rubber compared to last year. He’s throwing more changeups their year too, and his four-seamer’s performance at lower usage than 2024 has been exceptional from a run value standpoint. It also has a .285 xwOBAcon this season, the second lowest in MLB among lefty pitcher-righty hitter matchups to only Eric Lauer (min 300 4S thrown). 🤷♂️
Why Abbott is good? It’s a question I ask myself every time I see him dominate. I think it comes from his crossfire motion. He steps closed in his delivery (see below). While we have the degrees a batting stance is open/closed, I wonder if the degrees a pitcher strides open or closed would help stuff models better understand the “visual” created. On top of that, Abbott’s four-seam is vertical in its movement (95% spin efficiency). I feel like most cross-fire deliveries, to this degree, feature horizontal, sink/cut shapes (Ryan Walker, Jake Arrieta). I know it doesn’t make total sense, but that mix of vert with crossfire feels like it could be enough to limit damage.
Guardians Slade Cecconi is down to a 3.44 ERA in 10 starts after a great outing in Houston (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 2 BB, 9 K). There’s some regression coming against right-handed hitters, where he isn’t missing many bats, but he’s riding his new sinker and stellar command to a fresh start with the Guardians. While Location+ looks at Cecconi favorably (104), I would be curious to see his miss distances to righties. He’s thrown 61% of his pitches on the outer third to them this season, where the league average is just 44% (right on right). His shadow rate isn’t exceptional, he’s moreso just sitting away from righties but still in the zone to elicit swings. There’s also very little miss back over the heart of the plate with these away targets on his pretty two-plane four-seamer. This is likely how he can run a 9.5% swinging-strike rate with a <4% barrel rate since June. 🎯
Cecconi feels like a comfortable sub-4 ERA pitcher rest of the way. If there’s any easy edge left in pitching development, it’s taking mediocre major leaguers from teams that are more average to below average at development (the Diamondbacks) and finding a tweak. The Guardians did this exceptionally well with Cecconi. The DBacks retooled their pitching department at the major league level this most recent season. I think they’re aware of their past faults.