Raising Usage of Rising Pitches

Please note before reading: there are contradicting profiles of pitch classifications/usage in the case of Zack Wheeler. I have used Baseball Savant’s pitch classifications, but am aware that Brooks Baseball, for one, presents an alternative view of Wheeler’s pitch types.

Zack Wheeler and Noah Syndergaard together made just over three-eighths of the Mets’ starts in 2019. They played well. Cumulatively they worked nearly 400 innings and struck out a batter an inning on the way to more than 9 WAR combined. Neither pitcher, barring something truly unforeseen, will make a single start for the Mets in 2020. The former is out of the Mets picture after leaving via free agency, while the latter unfortunately required Tommy John surgery in March.

Trade rumors have surrounded both Syndergaard and Wheeler dating back a couple years now, or at least since Wheeler proved himself to be healthy in 2018 following his own TJ procedure. Talented starting pitching on a team like the Mets which seemingly can’t quite decide whether to buy or sell will do that. Talent begets interest. A notable point though is that those teams most interested appeared to maintain interest for two distinct reasons: first, for the realized value of these two quality pitchers and, second, for the unrealized potential that either of these pitchers represented.

In short, it seemed as though several teams figured they could get more out of either Wheeler or Syndergaard than the Mets were. While starting pitching always comes at a premium, the deal that Philadelphia handed Wheeler seems to indicate that they think he has more, yet untapped, potential. 

A ton goes into maximizing a pitcher’s talent, from mechanics, to pitch selection, to pitch optimization, and more; bucketing methods in this manner is a gross oversimplification in and of itself. What follows will only just graze the surface of possible considerations that relate to maximizing the talent of an individual. Specifically, it’s a discussion of fastball usage. 

Very simply, neither Noah Syndergaard nor Zack Wheeler threw a ton of four-seam fastballs with the Mets. Given their fastball characteristics (which will be addressed here soon), one could imagine that another organization might urge them to rely on those pitches more often. To start though, let’s take a look at four-seam fastball usage via Baseball Savant in 2019 in order to contextualize these two pitchers. Below is a histogram for four-seam usage for qualifying pitchers.

It doesn’t appear that four-seam usage adhered to a normal or uniform curve in 2019. The mean four-seam usage was 35% and the median was 35.4%. Baseball Savant has Noah Syndergaard down as throwing his four-seam 29.3% of the time; Wheeler threw his 30.0% of the time. One might wonder why this matters, as plenty (well, half) of pitchers, by definition, sit below the median in usage for any given pitch.

What makes the four-seam usage, or lack thereof, significant in the case of these two pitchers are the characteristics of their fastballs. Each pitcher generates strong vertical movement on his four-seam fastball. Of the 69 recorded pitchers via Baseball Savant, both Wheeler and Syndergaard make the Top 10.

Now is a good time to note that the title of this post is a misnomer, in that these pitches aren’t rising, but rather spinning so much, and with such efficiency, that they resist gravity moreso than one (i.e. a batter) might anticipate. Four-seams with high (or less negative) vertical break translate to what may be described as “ride” or “rise” and correspond to swings-and-misses. The Astros, pioneers of pitch design, undoubtedly had a hand in the vertical movement of both Gerrit Cole‘s and Justin Verlander‘s four-seam fastballs. Of note is the relative infrequency that Wheeler and Syndergaard defer to their four-seams as compared to the rest of this list.

The Top 10 above isn’t representative of typical four-seam vertical movement of course. To provide a more comprehensive picture, below is another histogram, this time featuring four-seam vertical movement of those same 69 pitchers.

The distribution of vertical movement in 2019 was fairly normal. Mean and median vertical movement among the listed pitchers was nearly identical here: -16.69 inches in the case of mean and -16.70 in the case of median.

So, the Mets had two pitchers who threw four-seams with highly efficient spin, (which generates strong vertical movement), but threw those pitches less than comparable players. Below is a scatterplot which visualizes the intersection of usage and movement; as you can see, Wheeler and Syndergaard appear to be slight outliers.

To supplement their four-seam fastballs, both Wheeler and Syndergaard relied on two-seam fastballs. It is incredibly hard to evaluate the relative value of throwing any given pitch marginally more or less. Sometimes pitches are effective largely because they are employed just a fraction of the time. Two-seam fastballs feature movement conducive to contact, often on the ground. That is an appealing prospect, but also goes against presently sought-after pitch qualities, which prioritize swings and misses.

As a bottom line, both Wheeler and Syndergaard did not reap as much value from their fastballs as one might have expected in 2019. Syndergaard and Wheeler threw the first- (97.7 mph) and fourth- (96.7 mph) hardest average fastballs in 2019, respectively (their rotation mate Jacob deGrom threw the second-hardest average fastball among starters at 96.9 mph), and generated the aforementioned elite movement, but didn’t seem to benefit in accordance with those characteristics. Per FanGraphs, Zack Wheeler and Noah Syndergaard ranked just 25th and 37th (out of 61 qualifiers) in wFB/c, a rate-based measure of pitch value, on their fastballs (all types) in 2019.

It’s unfair to have critical thoughts or educated recommendations from an evaluation like this alone. To start, it says nothing about pitch location or sequencing. What it does outline though is the disconnect between pitch characteristics and outcomes for these two individuals. If I had to guess, this particular disconnect is one which these pitchers’ future employers will be eager to assess and reconcile.