Is Zach Eflin's Cutter Bad? Who is Cade Smith?

Zach Eflin, Ryne Nelson, Cade Smith

New video just dropped on the importance of pitch location. It includes thoughts from Cole Ragans himself! YouTube Link

• Rays Zach Eflin holds a 4.14 ERA with a 3.65 FIP this season.His 27% strikeout rate last year is down to 19% this year. He’s had reverse splits for each of the last two seasons (less effective versus right- than left-handed hitters). The problem is feels easy to identify: he needs his cutter, it grades out well (Driveline Stuff+ of 111), and it’s been pummeled. Cutters sometimes have inflated contact quality due to their behind-in-count usage (”I need to get back into this count, but I can’t throw a fastball”). Eflin increases his cutter usage when he’s behind, but even relative to other behind-in-count cutters, it doesn’t perform well. It only succeeds in a tight window, which you can see below. He had the same cutter issue last year, so he cut the usage in half this season (30% to 16%). It feels like he needs another non-sinker for behind-in-count situations that isn’t his cutter—easier said than done. ☀️

  • He’s started throwing more sinkers to righties inside rather than backdoor since June 1, which has helped but didn’t mitigate cutter damage. An odd side effect of the lack of cutter usage is that the swing-miss on his curveball and sweeper are down. Both of these breakers work the outer third of the plate for whiffs and now have nothing protecting them. He’s been better this season versus lefties. Righties remain his issue. I’m not sure there’s an obvious fix. Lean even heavier on the sinker? Refine his cutter location away, consciously giving up more walks? If he’s a trade candidate, I’ll be curious to see what another team does. I’m perplexed about how to right the ship apart from positive regression.

Zach Eflin’s average cutter location and expected damage. Notice how on the right plot, there’s only a small portion of blue that exists away from hitters (blue = good for pitchers). Notice the overlap of red in each heatmap (not good).

• Dbacks Ryne Nelson has a 2.22 ERA over his last 4 starts with a 22:4 K:BB compared to a 6.02 ERA in May/June. This is odd because it comes with a sharp increase in fastball usage. 49% in May/June up to 64% over his last 4. To righties, he’s gone from 50% to 72% in this stretch of success. He’s also completely backed off his curveball and sweeper to righties, using only his slider 20% and some peripheral cutter. There isn’t a shape or velocity change here on the four-seam. He’s locating the pitch more up in the zone to righties, which could be helping (see below). 🐍

  • To lefties, there’s essentially no location change. He’s just leaning on the four-seam and cutter more. Driveline Stuff+ has the four-seam as a 103, his best weapon. Strong usage here makes some sense, but if you told me 70%+ would work this well, I’d be skeptical. This is one of the more perplexing stretches of success I’ve found this season because of how it appears to be happening. This only makes me skeptical it will continue.

Ryne Nelson’s four-seam location to righties (May/June vs Last 4). Notice the more elevated location of the pitch.

• Guardians Cade Smith is one of the best relievers in baseball. He holds the 3rd highest FanGraphs WAR as a reliever and the lowest FIP (1.45) in MLB among qualified starters. His stats were gaudy last year (37% strikeout rate at Triple-A), but he gave up home runs and walked more. This year, he’s up 1 mph on his four-seam and sweeper. He’s also throttled his splitter usage from <10% to nearly 20% and it’s crushing hitters. The most impressive thing to me is that his fastball location to righties is pretty centralized and he’s been impossible to touch on that pitch despite throwing it 60%+. My best guess is that his 7.5’ extension is causing the pitch to play stronger than stuff models expect. Driveline Stuff+ of only 110 on the pitch—good, but not one of the best run-value pitches in baseball. The scary thing is that the Guardians have a similar pitcher to Cade Smith waiting at Triple-A in carry fastball king Andrew Walters. Their pitching development continues to dominate.