Rates & Barrels - The Fast Adjustments of Jackson Merrill & Jackson Chourio

Episode Date: August 29, 2024

Eno, Trevor and DVR discuss Oneil Cruz's move to center field and the Pirates' needs in order to take a step forward in 2025, the fast adjustments being made by 'The Jacksons' -- Jackson Merrill, Jackson Chourio, and Jackson Holliday -- that have enabled them to make a significant impact in Year 1.Plus, they discuss swing adjustments being made deeper in counts, the erosion of Corbin Burnes' strikeout rate, and the long-term lack of whiffs from Logan Webb, who continues to generate great ratios despite limited swing-and-miss in his arsenal. Rundown 1:42 Oneil Cruz Moves to Center Field 11:32 Who’s Next at Shortstop for the Pirates? 15:52 Jackson Merrill & Jackson Chourio’s Fast Adjustments 28:57 Is It Good to Modulate Your Swing by Count? 44:11 Corbin Burnes’ Second-Half Struggles; Long-Term Decline in K% 53:08 A True Whiff Pitch for Logan Webb? 1:02:58 Name That Dude! Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper Follow Trevor on Twitter: @IAmTrevorMay e-mail: [e-mail] Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris With: Trevor May Producer: Brian Smith Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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So that's our tech tip of the day. But on this episode, we dig into O'Neill Cruz's move from shortstop to center field. We'll talk about the broader implications for the pirates as they try to take a bigger step forward in 2025. At least by wins 2024 looks a lot like 2023, but of course the arrival of Paul Skeens among other things making this team a bit more interesting. We're going to talk about the fast adjustments being made by the Jacksons, specifically Jackson Merrill and Jackson Churio. How have they found success so quickly against big league pitching when a lot of other rookies

have gone through prolonged stretches of struggles. We're gonna take a look at swinging differently in different counts as well and try to dig into that. Got some questions as well in our discord about Corbin Burns and why he struggled in the second half. And we were wondering where have the K's gone for Corbin Burns in recent years. So we'll try to unpack that.

Plus a question about Logan Webb and the possibility that he develops a pitch that can help him generate more whiffs. So as you can tell, a jam packed show lined up for us on this Thursday. We'll start at the top with the news. O'Neil Cruz making the move to center field, which will probably be more starts at DH down the stretch before playing center field in 2025. It takes time to learn a new position, especially center field. Not as easy as it would seem to just move from the dirt to the outfield.

There's a lot to unpack here. First, there's been some improvement with the bat this year. Overall, the quality of contact is as good as it's ever been. A 16.7% barrel rate, 54.7% hard hit rate. Cruz is striking out a bit less against lefty striking a little bit more against righty So we're still seeing a 30 percent k-rate from him. That's been a problem all along Defensively though a minus eight defensive run saved minus three outs above average a shortstop this year The concern all along with O'Neal Cruz has been he's 6-7 List the six seven short stops in baseball history.

Go, I'll give you as much time as you want, right? There just, there really aren't any. So you have this guy that is an incredible athlete, taller than usual for the position, great arm, 99 percentile in arm strength, 86 percentile in sprint speed. I think the possibility of this happening has existed for as long as O'Neill Cruz has been in professional baseball, right? This this is not a shocking development. It was more of a let's try him at short stop and see if it works and if it doesn't we know he'll be a very good if

not a great outfielder down the road. Is that a fair assessment, Eno? We had in our last episode this really interesting piece where I'm on the Monday episode, we were talking about Rob Arthur's investigation into racial bias in the minor leagues. And I know that this news came down like sort of right after that. And, you know, it's kind of hard to parse, you know, like, oh, is this another instance of racial bias? I just, you know, I think you want to be careful being very specific about that sort of stuff. And then also, you know, what we were talking about was the minor leagues and, you know, I think you want to be careful being very specific about that sort of stuff. And then also, you know, what we were talking about was the minor leagues and, you know,

black players being pushed to the outfield in the minor leagues. And I think the pirates gave him a lot of chances. You know, he played shortstop all the way through the minor leagues and he played into the major leagues and they gave him multiple tries in the major leagues. So it wasn't just like they looked at it and said, that was your one, you made an error, you're done. It was multiple errors. And I've been watching a fair amount of Pirates games and you know, some of them are just, I don't know, concentration or something, like, you know, they're, they're plays he should have made. I think sometimes you, you, Ellie De La Cruz, Ellie De La Cruz talks about this, where he can throw the ball so hard. And he's so athletically You know, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you it down, you know, and like, I think most athletes want to like do everything as hard as they can all the time because that's how you win.

Like you throw the ball the hardest, you know, so it's kind of weird to be like, I'm now going to place this ball to first base and now you're screwed up. So I think there was things that were started to steamroll and started getting his head and it didn't look that good, frankly. And the numbers don't back it up. And I think this is the right move. Yeah, I agree. I think it comes down to tools at the end of the day, like guys who have really good arms and who can run are, are, are going to be given a shot in center field.

Because tracking a ball in the outfield is something that it's kind of assumed is more natural, uh, for, for, or like a skill that can be learned, uh, easily. We were just talking on the radio right before this about show a autonomy, like what if he didn't have to pitch? What would it look like if he was just, uh, what position would he play? And we're like center field, like he's got a end of an arm and he runs like a deer. That guy's a center fielder.

Like, yeah, could he play short? Probably show a tonic, but he probably profiles as an outfielder because he could throw a hundred miles an hour and he could throw that from the, from the outfield similar body to he's a guy when you're that tall and you're going to be close to the ground all the time and you got to feel the ball and then you got to, he's got the arm and all that stuff. He had everything, but it's just comes down to range is going to be limited. There's just other, other kind of body types are a little bit better suited to play that position. It's just, it's just comes down to range is going to be limited. So it's just other, other kind of body types are, are a little bit better

suited to play that position. It's just, it's just that simple, I think. And it also comes down to like, he also profiles really well in that other position. So might as well give it a shot, especially if it's not when the numbers shake out. And, you know, like you mentioned, he's been at short for, it wasn't like a month. He's got a couple of years and now they feel like there feel like there's they have another option that they can play there. They can do a good job. And so now they have the luxury of giving them a shot out there.

Yeah. And as Matan in the live stream points out, it might be routine plays that are the problem, right? You can't make a lot of mistakes on routine plays. And that seems to be the bigger problem for Cruz because of his arm. He can do extraordinary things because of his agility. He can get to balls that a lot of short stops couldn't get to. But I think my point was the height was the concern when he was a prospect.

People just thought, ah, he might not, it might not work. He might just be too big. He might sort of never fit the position because of that. I don't know if that's a different type of bias entirely where you say, oh, well, we can't put this guy here because it's just not gonna work, it's gonna be too awkward. Maybe we'll see some great six, seven shortstop someday. I think a lot of six, seven players just end up in other sports.

Like that's it's part of why it's just small group of players to begin with. Couple things are interesting here. You know, Matan talking about the routine play, it's like, are we going to get more out of Cruz when he's not as engaged? Because he said her field sometimes is just hanging out. You know, like, may not get a ball for a while. Would shortstop have helped keep him more engaged? And would he have gotten better at routine plays over time?

Like, would Tatisse have gotten better at routine plays over time? Tatisse had the problem with the routine play and was pretty good at the exemplary play. So I think these are interesting questions. And the other thing that Trevor said that that stuck out for me was centerfield is actually a little bit easier than the corners in a certain regard. When you're behind the pitcher, you can see not only the movement of the pitch, sometimes Keir Meyer says you can see the catcher's sides, which I guess is out the window now. But you know, you can see the movement of pitch going in and then you can see the movement of the ball coming out. Like you can't actually

see slice as well from the corners. You know, like the way the ball, the way the ball is moving horizontally, you can't see that as well from the corners, but in center, you can see that ball moving. And so I know it's a more difficult position in terms of tools and what round you have to cover. But there are some things that make center field easier than the corners. I do remember when Aaron Judge moved out of the corner into center, I think people kind of laughed at that. They thought maybe it would make it more susceptible to injury or for one reason or another. Maybe it wouldn't be a smooth transition. I think he plays that position a lot better

than most of the skeptics expected at the time, right? He might actually stay there a little bit longer, just based on other personnel they have available. I think that's the other wild card here. I think as far as what Cruz has done as a hitter, you can look at what he's done this year. He's got up to a 117 WRC plus. You think about him being completely healthy

for a full season, which was not the case a year ago One more step next year is possible I think it comes down to slightly better swing decisions which come with experience a lot of times He can live with a high strikeout rate because he does so much damage So you could project another step forward I think from Cruz as a hitter I don't think that's an unreasonable expectation at all So what do you think the the ceiling looks like and how close do you think we are to that ceiling for O'Neil Cruz as a hitter, Trevor?

Yeah, I think there's definitely, just judging based on his improvement since he's come up, he has made incremental improvements over time the whole time. So that tells me that we haven't hit the limit yet. It's not like he's out of his mind with the season he's having a good season. It's the best one he's had,

but is there potential in there still? Yes, because he has that kind of power that if you just, he's the guy who can hit 15 home runs in a month if he gets super hot, that's possible. And he hasn't done that yet. So, you know, I would love to see him have two of those months where he goes off and he has a truly special season. I think that is entirely possible.

He's, he's a left-handed stick. He's got, when it comes down to like that kind of strength and that kind of power, and it's a strikeout rate situation, usually, you know, you're cutting that strikeout rate by 2%, 3% can make all the difference in the world. Like look at like Brent Rooker and how he's changed his, he still strikes out a lot, but he's dropped it by about two and a half percent. And we've seen his OPS consistently be a hundred points higher because he has that kind of power.

So like those, when it's that little adjustment, not, I don't want to say that's a little adjustment, but when it's one little thing, clicking, turning him from a good high quality hitter to a like a great hitter for a certain amount of time. I think he has that potential that maybe other guys don't have. Yeah, I think he could do like a 275 30 30 season or something. Yeah, still has that in there. Still a guy we're excited about from a fantasy perspective. Still a guy pirates fan should be really excited about even with the shift to center field Brock to a wing and in the live stream self Team directed at Bob Nutting,

who I don't think is a fan of rates and barrels, but hey, you never know. Bob, if you're out there listening, drop us a note, especially if you're in the live hive, we'd love to hear from you. What do the Pirates do at shortstop though? I think the interesting thing about the timing of announcing this decision is they're still

runway for this year, where they could have let Cruz have another month if they wanted to. They didn't go that route. Isaiah Kynar-Falefa, great defender, doesn't seem like a long-term solution. Maybe he's the stopgap until you find that franchise shortstop. Yeah, so you have your safety glove first option there. What's next for the Pirates, both at shortstop and for other parts of this roster? If they're going to really turn the corner next year and be a contender, at least for an NL wild card, if not for the NL Central, aside from shortstop, what has to change?

Figure out that infield. There's a story to be told where Cabrion Hayes is healthy next year, has back surgery or figures the back thing out. You know, between Henry Davis, Joey Bart and Andy Rodriguez, they have a good catching tandem. Nick Gonzalez plays short, Kynar Falefa backs up. This is, I'm telling the like, everything comes together story. Okay. Nick York is above average regular at second and they go out and if not rowdy to Les, then they go out and maybe they can you can actually afford to buy in free agency first baseman sometimes like an like an old first

baseman like what if they Paul Goldschmidt is in the free agent why don't don't shop in that bin like try to try to move up one bin but less slightly less. I don't know, Paul Goldner, like what if you had a resurgence season with the Pirates? Then you have this like, and then you add together the fact that their starting rotation is gonna be really good, their outfield is gonna be really good, I think. And you just need David Bednar to figure things out

and find a reliever or two. I mean, but I did tell the story of everything coming together. And what is the likelihood that each of those things I just said happened is one percent, especially the Paul Goldsmith part. I mean, that's that might be the most likely thing of all the things you've described. I think because it might be a year for six million, kind of like the old Carlos Santana deal or something along those lines.

And you know what Carlos Santana is? This is a little bit of trivia. You know what Carlos Santana is? This is a little bit of trivia. You know what he is? He's the only person in baseball over 35 that's gonna be an above average regular on the hitting side. Hey, he's the age of spondy. That's cool.

Yeah, he's got over a thousand of everything, over 300 home runs. We don't talk about that guy enough. Yeah, he's pretty amazing. But also it reminds me of what Joey Votto said in his retirement speech. Whereas in one of his retirement things, he said, it's a young man's game.

I am not a young man anymore. It changes quickly. The other thing that's interesting, just as kind of a flyaway idea, Tamar Johnson moved it to double A. He's been playing some shortstop this year, kind of splitting his time between second base and shortstop.

So I guess you can't really rule out the possibility that if there's some growth there over the course of the winter and into next season, then maybe Johnson's it being the next longer term option that gets a look at the position if they do go the stopgap route. His batting averages are not good, but by WRC Plus, he's been really, really solid.

He's gotta be getting closer, right? He's in double A now. I mean, that's what the thing is, I think that next year, they have to go between, they have to do this quickly too. Go from sorting between the options to these are the options. You know what I mean?

And so between Nick York, Nick Gonzalez, and Tamara Johnson, they need to find and like a good second basement and maybe even a shortstop. It might be a combo of veteran and free agency, you know, trade, big trade, where you trade some of your young pitching for a young infielder. They do have Bubba Chandler and Thomas Harrington. So they might have like a pitching prospect to trade.

Right. And then finding a third, like finding the third guy might be as much as you can put on the group of non-prospects that they're trying to shuffle through right now. But I think you could see it. You could at least tell yourself the story that 80 wins plus are a possibility in Pittsburgh with the right adjustments.

Still a nice long-term up arrow there, even though this year might be flat from a win total perspective. Let's move on to the Jacksons. We're gonna talk about some young hitters who've made some really quick adjustments over the course of this year. And Jackson Merrill and Jackson Churio have both done that.

I mean, if you look at what these guys are doing right now, go back to basically May 1st forward, throughout their first month. And in the case of Jackson Merrill, the first month wasn't bad. You're gonna see top 30, top 40 production from both of these players. They're doing it with very little experience at AAA.

Merrill's doing it while learning a new position, which I think makes it even more impressive. But let's start with Jackson Merrill, Eno. When you start to look at what he was in day one as a big leaguer and what he's starting to show us throughout the second half of this season, especially What's changed the most? Yeah, I have these heat maps here for for Jackson Merrill

Which kind of showed that you know on the left is his isolated slugging so slugging heat map for early in the season and This is when he was a contact guy that didn't have that much power Very oppo when I see that I see a guy who has kind of a scoopy swing. He can hit the low pitch and he can kind of inside out the pitch on the outer half. And that's what that matches up with my eye test. Now you look on the right and he's figured something out in terms of pulling the ball, hitting the ball,

middle, middle in. And I had a stat I I think, for you that was, for March, April, and May, he did not have a single double or homer that was middle or middle in. And since then he has 16. So he is a guy whose strength is oppo, who has added the ability to pull or go, pull or, or, or go center, but like, you know, do something on the inner half.

There's something there where I see that first heat map and I say, you know what, do I get, I really think this guy will never slug middle middle. You fill in middle middle and you get that second heat map. You know what I mean? It's like, you see that first one. It's actually kind of helpful to me. It's like, if you can do two things, why not add middle middle to that? And that's gonna be a theme for me with the two Jacksons that have really broken out. Yeah, what do you think about that, Trevor? If you see that when you're kind of looking at a young player or any player,

and you see that gap between two spaces where they handle pitches really well, do you start to assume that the space in between will become a dangerous spot to pitch them? Possibly, or it might be an example of being in between some pitches. So he's hitting a type of pitch one place and hitting a type of pitch in the other place. And also that's pretty indicative, like you mentioned the scoop swing, if you're looking at these, you can tell the angle, like look at the angle of the red, the angle of the red on the left is steeper than it is on the right. So it looks like he has maybe made a slight change or maybe it could be a mindset thing and that

has flattened his ability to flatten his swing out a little bit more and still get to that pitch down in a way has been the key. But I went and looked at his heat map and especially like his expected numbers in Woba and slugging and ISO and he handles like the middle pillar. I keep calling it the middle pillar of the zone. The stuff that's in the center and not on the edges. Those would be considered mistakes. But if you can hit them all the way down and all the way up, that's usually a pretty good example of your ability to take advantage of mistakes that most guys make. So they have to stay on the edges.

Once you know you have to stay on the edges, you become harder to pitch you. This is something like Jose Altuve has done so well in his career as he's hit really well, really high and really well, really low over the plate. Now, and not chasing off or in too much is when he's going the best right now. He's chasing off and in too much, but when he wasn't, that when he was the the best version of himself and Jackson Merrill seems to have made that adjustment. Like the east and west is not something he's having an issue. He's not chasing those those ways. He's just chasing within that pillar that he hits hard. So like when he's making a decision

to swing, he's making a decision to swing at something that he knows he can handle a little bit better. And that is something that's changed over time. And that's what that tells me. So if that's the case, then I'll be like, okay, now let's pick, let's, let's try to approach him in a way that, that where the pitches we're choosing are always moving away from the middle of the plate. Cause you know, if you're trying to backdoor something, guys who would try to backdoor, come off the plate on the plate and stuff are probably guys. He is abusing at this point.

Um, it's the guys that, that where you can get the edges that are moving from the middle of the plate into the edges that are probably having better success. Now I can't verify that, but that usually does happen that way. So that's what it tells me. And to be honest, the next guy we're talking about, Churio has also made a similar type of adjustment, not quite as well as Merrill has, but he is definitely starting to hit that middle pillar wells as well. Yeah.

And check out his heat maps. Like he has two spots. It's not quite the scoopy swing. It looks like, you know, he, he, he was able to hit high and middle in, and then he just sort of filled in the gaps a little bit and to some extent, I wonder how much anticipation has to do with this. To me, if I see two strengths, I see two swings, right? At least, or two approaches or two sort of tweaks he can make. So on the left,

he can block that high pitch and maybe that's like going oppo or sort of center oppo, you know, in the air. And then on the left, it's maybe sort of pulling that one for power. Like I see two areas of strength. I think maybe he has two swings. And when I look on the right, which is Churio since June 1st, or maybe it's May, I forget exactly. It says at the top.

That one's actually June. The Merrill one was May, but this Churio one's June. You look at the right, he kind of filled in the gaps. And so I wonder if it's more like, he already had the tools in order to like do what he did on the right, but he just needed to see how pitchers are going to pitch him. And now on the right, he's putting the right swing on each pitch each time. He's just sort of filling in. But again, what you see is not amazing middle, middle out before, and

now he's better middle middle. So like, I just don't think you become a hot prospect, a top prospect and you aren't good middle middle. You know, middle middle often is a place where you can, you can see someone's career is near an end. They start not being able to handle middle middle. But if a guy comes up and has two strengths and middle middle isn't filled in yet, I'm into it. Enjoy the biggest thrills and savings of the season has two strengths and middle middle isn't filled in yet, I'm into it.

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The collab that you always wanted is finally here. Tim's and Nutella. It's time to enjoy Nutella in a new way with your favorite Tim's baked goods and beverages. Try them all today at participating restaurants in Canada for a limited time. Just thinking about Churio, I knew more about Churio before he debuted than Merrill just because of being a Brewers fan, following more people on Brewers Twitter. I remember a lot of clips from last season from Kurt Hoag, the Brewers writer at the

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, of Churio home runs off fastballs that were high in the zone, either at the top of the zone or above. And I know we've talked about that one heat map spot up there. Yeah, the zone is different, but even some of them were like high 90s fastballs at AA, the occasions that he would get those, he was still driving those pitches out. And that to me gave me some confidence of like, okay, he's got plenty of bat speed. So unless there's a low problem where stuff down in the dirt, below the zone is-

And then he comes up and he has a low heat map too, like a strength low. You're like, okay, he's got two spots. I don't know. This is all in opposition to Jackson Holliday, which I was surprised, but Jackson Holliday only has one strength, middle in, and they've been filling up the outside part of the corner.

He has one hit, one hit on pitches outside, like low and outside, and it was a pulled change up. That's his only hit on the pitches on the outside part of the plate. So from a game planning perspective, right? That area is filled up. You're not afraid of that. Yeah, you're gonna get filled up there until you show you can do something planning perspective, right? That area is filled up. You're gonna get filled up there until you show you can do something with that, right?

Yeah, I mean, I'd be more afraid if he filleted that into the outfield. Right, if he slapped it down the left field line, you know, drove it. Now he's adding the Jackson Merrill, right? Like he started with the other part and now he's gonna add the Jackson Merrill. I'm gonna scoop this into left field, but I don't know if he has that ability. He might not yet, but he, he's a kid. Right. That's true.

That ball skills his so far in the minors has been very, very good. So it's like, doesn't strike out a ton. He walks as much as he strikes out. Those are good approach. Uh, he's got the, the head on his shoulders to have a good approach. So it's only a matter of time before I think he starts to figure that type of stuff out. But again, it comes down to like, what's he trying to do?

Still trying to juice things, still trying to be a powerbat, which he doesn't necessarily need to be yet. I think it comes down to maybe intent a little bit with him. And there's so much pressure and hype, and especially with the way their team is and stuff. There's just a lot of like noise that once it settles and we've seen it settle a little bit after the first stint and he's had some success.

Yeah, he's had lower, those same low peaks or the same valleys in the roller coaster but like he's coming back up a little bit more as opposed to just staying there. Him picking it up right away, I think maybe he had the highest expectation out of all of them and you know, who his dad is and there's just a lot going on there.

So when that stuff kind of settles down, I would be more, I think, willing to kind of put a stamp on, on the type of guy he is. But I think you're right though, showing the ability to kind of take that pitch away and just take your single away. It doesn't seem like he's, that's something that he's willing to do yet, but I'm still hopeful that he will. I'm assuming he can't. It's more maybe willing. It's a, I could see to do yet, but I'm still hopeful that he will. I'm assuming he can't. It's more maybe willing.

I could see the approach thing. But as a pitcher, if you're facing a guy that has sort of multiple bright red spots on the heat map, that's scarier, right? Because it also just means fewer places you can put the ball, right? Yeah. And he doesn't just have a swing type that is bad against a certain pitch. You can just keep going to the well if you need to because it doesn't matter if he knows it's coming.

He can't change the way he's swinging to do it. And those guys exist as well. And some of those guys have success because they only hit the pitch that's a mistake every time like Adam Duvall or Hunter Renfro are kind of like a couple of those guys. They're just waiting for the mistake, yeah. Throw that fastball down the way. I'll never hit it.

But if you throw a slider and it goes right down the middle, I'm going to crush it and I'm never going to get me in the big leagues. So, um, but I don't think he's not going to be one of those guys. I do think, you know what, to be honest, maybe intent or like willingness and ability are connected and he's like not willing to yet because he can't do it yet. So like trying to do it isn't going to make him better yet. But I think that just based on how he showed,

how he can handle the bat and has bat to ball skills, just kind of naturally up into this point that it's completely within the realm of possibility figures it out and figures out quickly. Yeah. And we've already seen since he's returned, it's been like 26 games since he had that first stint, five homers, K rates under 30%. You know, it it's it's trending in the right direction It just might not happen overnight because it usually doesn't and even the case of cheerio He looks so much different from June on than he did in those first two months

But that's to be expected for these guys Especially the guys that come through the minors as quickly as this entire trio has to this point And I think there are people that are getting frustrated even with Wyatt Langford. And Langford played college ball and was supposed to be a little bit more polished. But I think the injury that Langford had earlier this year also explains a lot about why he hasn't quite hit the ground running the way people were expecting

back in March. I think there's tons of reasons to still be excited about a lot of guys in this rookie class, even if they haven't clicked quite as quickly as Merrill and Churio have. Yeah. I think you're right also to point out the excellent swinging strike rates

that he had in the minor leagues. I just did a quick little thing where I look at, you know, double A players under the age of 21, since 2021 with excellent swinging strike rates and power in the minor leagues. And you've got a really short list. I mean, without power, you've got Bryce Turang, Xavier Edwards, Mason Nguyen, you know, with power, you got Roman Anthony, Anthony Volpe, you know, Tristan Casas. So there's a lot to say with just he's demonstrated the ability in the past and you know

Just needs to kind of figure it out the big league level and holiday will by far be the least Costly of the three Jacksons when you're looking at your 20 25 drafts no matter what happens in the final month There will be a gap between Maryland Churio and wherever holiday is going it might be a large gap to depending on how things play out the rest of the way We had one more talk that Eno saw at the Saber seminar last weekend that we wanted to dig into. And it's about if it's good to modulate your swing by count.

And this one had a fantastic visual too. So Eno, tell us a little bit more about this presentation and walk us through some of the different things that we see on this particular visual. This is from Scott Powers, who is a professor that used to work for the Dodgers, used to do their run their analytics department. And if you look at the x axis, it's how much the batter reduces their swing length by count. And then if you look at the y axis, it's how much they reduce their bat speed by count. And then if you look at the y-axis, it's how much they reduce

their bat speed by count. If you look at the shape of the graph, you notice most people in the major leagues do reduce their swing length and swing speed in two strike counts. I have another thing from Josh Rodriguez, who's at Coach Rodriguez 2. This shows how much people reduce their bat speed. Look at that. In 3-0 counts, the Major League average bat speed is 74 miles an hour. In 0-2 counts, it's 67 miles an hour. So that's a huge difference. And so back to the powers graph, what you see is in the red red those are players who are performing better in two strike counts and so you can kind of assume to some extent that the changes that they make are beneficial and so Julio Rodriguez is really one of the best case scenarios there he reduces his his

swing length a fair amount in two strike counts, or as the count gets deeper, he does not reduce his bat speed much. Then you have Adley Rutchman, who's in the blue, who has cost himself by reducing his bat speed a lot, but not reducing his swing length. And I guess that makes sense that you wouldn't want to have a long swing that's slower you know in two strike counts and part of my reasoning is and this is where I really wanted to get Trevor in on it is in two strike counts the league throws 43% fastballs in one strike counts it throws 45% fastballs in the modern-day baseball I don't think you're expecting that different of a pitch mix in two strike counts, largely because pitchers know you're reducing your

swing length, you're reducing your bat speed, I'm gonna throw you a fastball. So if you are Nico Horner or Anthony Rizzo, who reduced their swing length and bat speed a ton, I feel like I would just, I would, I would be likely to throw you a high forcing fastball and two strike counts. And I wonder how I know that Trevor watches a lot of Julio Rodriguez. And I just wonder what he would think as a pitcher if he saw, you know, an Adley Rutchman step to the plate or in two strikes or Julio Rodriguez in two strikes. Wouldn't that affect the way you pitch them as well? Yeah, actually, it's funny that I was,

I kind of just had a realization while you were, while we were starting that conversation and then you hit it. And so the interesting thing with like Adley Rushman, I would, if his swings gets, or is slower, but it's the same length fastball, like he's now gonna take more time for the barrel to get where it needs to get to hit the fastball hard.

Julio Rodriguez on the other hand, when he shortens his swing and then it's the same speed, his barrel is gonna get there faster. So breaking ball, which if you have, I've watched a lot of Julio, that works really well. The reason, and then also on top of that, the fastball is generally hit harder more often and can turn into higher Production slash homers and to get run value hitting a bunch of homers on a pitch

That's a great way to get that run value up on that pitch That's right He's hitting two straight two strike fastballs Julio is but like when he gets the breaking ball He also strike out striking out a lot on stuff That's not that pitch and so that And so that's the trade-off, but like you would still take that because every once in a while he's getting it as opposed to Adley who's not really putting himself in position to hit either pitch well. Maybe a change up, but even sliders, if your bat speed's long still and slow, you still

can't get your barrel to match the movement of the slider. So he's probably still not hitting the slider hard either. It's probably just change ups, which don't profile is a great pitch to him anyways. So less guys are throwing them and relievers don't even throw them at all basically. So it's like, you know, he's not putting himself in the position to hit a pitch. He's going to see a lot either. So that's probably the biggest difference, but that's how I would use it. The thing with like Nico Horner or Rizzo.

And I think honestly Rizzo's thing is just kind of coming with him aging a lot. That kind of keeps both of them open and you can basically just say either way, I can do this either way because it's just generally slower and that's how I would use that. Like I'm not worried about heavy damage to those two guys later in account because of the way they're going. Julio I'm still kind of weary of throwing that fastball but selling selling out like, Adley's kind of doing an old school way of approaching it, and I don't think he needs to. There is a good question from JumpShoot in the live hive,

does Adley being a switch hitter matter? I know we've seen with some of the early swing data, switch hitters do have pretty different swing speeds sometimes from the left and right side. His OPSs from the sides have completely flipped from his rookie year. Like crazy actually how much more damage he's doing from the right side this year as opposed to the left side and then vice versa when he first came up with much better OPS wise from, from the left.

I think it's really hard to have to be a switch hitter. Like you've got two swings. I mean, imagine being a switch pitcher. You have to maintain two whole deliveries, you know it's like just mechanically. I think that maybe and he's also one of the youngest names in terms of like small sample on this list. So it's like maybe this is just a part of him figuring it out. But I can see over his career the pitch that he hits the best with two strikes is the curve ball. And that actually sort of makes sense.

If you keep, if your swing is still long but slow, that's the one that you're gonna actually be able to hit the best. How many people are throwing two strike curve balls, sadly, Richmond though? I mean, like some people, that's their best pitch, but I'd be going fastball slider against them. So the give and take here, thinking about it,

just what a hitter's trying to do is avoiding the strikeout, right? But to the extent that you slow down and shorten up your swing, like you can over-correct and get to the point where you're not doing damage anymore, right? Then it's, I didn't strike out, but the best case scenario was a sack fly, a softly hit ball and play, maybe a productive out. Now we're getting to the meat of it. Because there's all the people that are yelling, there is no two strike approach

in the big leagues. And I just showed you that, you know, we they modulate their swing, there's, there's, there's swing speed. And in fact, I hate to be a hot taker and I hate to fight that battle because it's ongoing. You'll never win it. I would say that maybe the problem is the two strike approach. I would say you might get a fast, you're not gonna get a lot of fast balls, you might get a fast ball on any count.

Like you need to be able to modulate that and it needs to, you can't be swinging seven miles an hour slower in two strike counts. Like I'm sorry, I just don't think that's a good approach. Well, it's almost like the two strike approach is too vague. Like who's pitching? What do they do? What are their strengths? Like you would handle a two strike situation differently based on how you

expect to be pitched by whoever you're facing to. Right. And the team you're facing, I mean, scouting reports, were there teams that you were on that were a little bit more into two strike fastballs than other teams? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. The like that was a big thing with the twins when we first started to everyone throw the sliders We were like kind of going backwards and we're trying to get the fastballs We had we had the guys with the type of fastballs that could get the swing and miss late, too But you know the high fastball was it still is a very high width pitch. It's just higher

You know high risk higher reward so it really doesn't matter about this I think that a lot of the gripes about the no two strike, just to kind of go back to that, the no two strike approach comes down to like, you know, Chipper Jones, brother stuff that it's like the two strike approach in that, like you're okay. Grounding out to second in order to get the guy home from third. That has got like where that's the intent guys are like thinking. If I get out here, I would like actually to get out here because I don't have a chance like that's that might be gone. don't have a chance. Like that's.

That might be gone. Modern baseball does not wanna give up outs. Like we're just like out to your currency. Don't go up and out. I think that at all. That's not even going into their head that that's possible, which is good and you know, has its merit and doesn't. It just depends on your choosing your spots,

but you can't just go to, I'm gonna slow my swing down so I don't strike out with two strikes because like in Adley's case, for example, you know, Gunners on first or whatever. Now that's a double play and now a strikeout would have been a better option and either to run super well either. So like that's something you have to think about. And when you slow your swing down that much, the chances that you ground into a softly

in a double play are high. You're in so like it's, it's situational. I know it's baseball and we say that a lot. It's almost always situational, but overall maybe picking those spots more less, but having the ability to do them and just like flaying a ball if you need to flay it. Every once in a while is I think still valuable,

but a guy like Julio, like maybe it's just not in the cards for him because slowing down, like we talked about O'Neill Cruz, slowing down his bat makes him, it changes it some way that makes it like not a viable swing anymore. He might still miss just as much. Yeah, might be missing more, so much. You don't know how many guys are, that's the effect as well. But it's an interesting thing.

I just, you gotta have to take it case by case. I just love Yandy Diaz on here. He just, he doesn't shorten up. He doesn't slow down. He just rips it every single time, but he doesn't strike out that much. So it kind of works for him. I'd also say this question from Frederick Weaver

from the Live Hive, is the lower swing length on two strike counts evidence of a deeper contact point and opposite field approach being ideal. This is another reason why I don't love being a hot taker. I don't wanna say that people are doing the wrong thing because our information is still a little bit incomplete. And what we might find is as we study this better

and as we add contact point to our swing length and swing speed discussion, we discover that some people are modulating their contact point and are going to Oppo and covering more of the bag and doing what old schoolers want them to do. And some people are just slowing down. So there is a difference because, you know, contact point changes the measurement. And so if you don't have as much, if your bat doesn't get it out in front and you don't have as far to go, then you're not going to get the same bat speed measurement and you're not and you're going to have a shorter swing. But I think that you're seeing a little bit

of that on the graph where you're seeing that people who reduce their swing length but not their swing speed do the best. You know, that's, I think, one way to read this graph. And so if you reduce your swing length and not your swing speed, what you're doing is I'm swinging just as fast, but I'm letting the ball travel. I'm gonna wait on this one. I'm gonna watch it a little bit longer. And that might increase your contact rate,

which is what you kind of want in two-strike counts. In general, interesting thing about that question. Yeah, to answer, like to kind of touch on a point he made, generally, if you hit the ball deeper and like either some, if it's before you break your hands, because you gotta remember handbrake time also changes where the barrel is in, hand breaking is where, is for most guys where you turn your hands over,

that's where you're peaked in your bat speed. That's where it's going the fastest. That's what you want. So you wanna hit the ball when that happens, when it's at its fastest speed. If you're hitting it before you break your hands, you're not gonna have as much power because the bat's not up to speed yet.

So like in the case of Adley, he might be hitting the ball deeper into the zone as well, before the hands are broken to get the speed up as well. So like, and then once you hit it, like there's no reason to speed up anymore. So like, that's the problem too. So you wanna give yourself a chance of continuing, no matter where the pitch is and what it is,

by shortening the swing up and keeping the speed up, you're giving yourself the best chance to get the barrel out in front every time still. So you're still gonna hit the ball hard, and you're gonna be hitting it at the peak speed if it's a shorter swing. So that's why shorter swing as opposed to slower bat is the better option

because you're giving your chance to get the barrel to a place where it can still hit the ball hard. I think that's at the end of the day. So dragging the bat through is not a good intent anymore. It's more like you want to keep the barrel in. They call it like keeping the bat in the zone longer. It's not technically real in the way that's said. It's like pitching to context, not like real. No one's like hit this.

Like, but it is in reality, like it's in position longer. It's in the right position longer, not necessarily in the zone, but just in position longer if you do it the right position longer, not necessarily in the zone, but just in position longer if you do it the way Hulu does it versus Russia. Is the answer right in the middle of the graph with Juan Soto? I mean, like, if you're gonna mimic anyone as a hitter, Juan Soto seems like a pretty good choice

because there's a slight shortening up. There's a slight drop in speed, but kind of just happy medium. Does that actually kind of fit as what you think would be ideal, Trevor? That might just be something natural for him. And that's what tells me the way that it's so little and minute is rare and almost sounds like it's not conscious.

Like it's something he just is, he just does. And like with Julio, that's very clearly an intent thing. He's like, I do that. I shorten now. I think Juan may just kind of shorten it up a little bit naturally as the as the AB goes on, it gets longer because he knows he can still hit the ball hard and he keeps it within those ranges. And that's really hard to do. I think doing what Jose does is actually really hard to do with intent and with practice. and a lot of that is intuitive. There's a lot of guys there, but again, the same thing could be, guys are just going off intuition

and not really having the approach as well, and you would see the same thing, but he has the approach and that intuition, and that's what makes him the hitter he is. Unconscious feel for hitting, that seems to be, just a elite, historically great sort of level for Juan Soto. Well, let's move on. I'm not sure what happened to Eno, given the tech issues he was having before.

I'm not even certain he's coming back at this point. We had some great questions in our discord. One of them came from Stinky Stinky. Want to know if there's anything different about Corbin Burns since the All-Star break, we just saw a start from Burns against the Dodgers on Wednesday night, Shohei Otani took a deep like a pull the ball. It was outside that I don't it was kind of defied physics for me watching that home run. But have you seen anything, Trevor, with Corbin Burns in the second half of this season

that's notably different in terms of stuff, Velo movement, anything that would would lead you to be able to explain why Burns hasn't been his usual self in these last seven or eight starts. One thing that's interesting is there really isn't a ton, I think, in terms of movement. Everything's about the same. He's still throwing really hard. He's not lost any movement on any pitches. Maybe a slight changes at times because it's late in the year and there's

fatigue and he's thrown 164 innings. Like that's a lot of innings, but it is odd his decision making slightly different and he's throwing. It looks like he's going to pitches that are hit a little bit harder, not hit harder, hit more often, not swinging miss pitches as much.

He's thrown more changeups this year. He's got 11% change up rate. He is a sinker. Usage is, is, I don't want to say it's up, but if I feel like he's used it a little bit more, he's trying to use it into the righties and get the ground balls kind of maybe go for a double play a little bit more often and something we haven't seen him do in the past, he wanted to strike out double digits, right? And you know, it could be a function of the nature of how their starting rotation is put together right now. And he's being asked to do a lot, right?

He's like, we need you to go throw seven because our bullpen, we can't use everybody every single game. We need a guy that eats a bunch of innings. And he could be taking that to heart. I know he is a guy who cares about eating innings. That little adjustment could point to him not missing bats as much, making decisions where he's not worried about missing bats as much because he needs to go deeper into games, which is hurting him because when he tries to miss bats, he gets those things. But I just think it might be a little bit more bad timing and these things are just, he hasn't had a couple great outings in a row

and it just happens to be a time where they need him to and we're just noticing a lot. I tend to lean that way a little bit more because I haven't been able to find a ton, but we know we got Eno back and he usually has some great stuff. I'm glad because I want to hear what you have to say. You're right. There's nothing that I can't find a smoking gum when I look at the movement of the pitches or like it looks like it's all there. I did watch last night and you know my general theory and the question was, we have another question coming up later,

but with Corbin Byrnes, I think my general theory is like, just the league sort of knowing him better. So he goes up against Tosca Hernandez, and he throws curveball, curveball, sinker, which was a ball, and Tosker didn't even blink at it. Curveball, which now Teasker has fouled off. No way I would have gone back to a curveball. He does a slider, which Teasker fouls off, and then he puts a curveball back where the

last one was fouled off, exactly in the same spot, and Tiasca goes yakity yak. And I just feel like what is this approach in this moment here? Because in the next at bat, Corbin Burns goes up against Tiasca Hernandez. It's all cutters and sliders. And he strikes Tiasca out in like four pitches. Why didn't you take the cutter slider at bat and this 75% curveball at bat and put them together?

This feels like there was like a plan. This is what we're gonna do against Teosca the first time. This is what we're gonna do against Teosca the second time. This is what we're gonna do against Teosca the third time. To some extent, like if you're Teosca in this, you start sitting curve ball. You just told you, you just showed you three curve balls out of four pitches, like you're sitting curveball. He just told you, he just showed you three curveballs out of four pitches.

Like you're sitting curveball. He sat curveball and he hit it out. And I'm not here to say that like, you know, Orioles game planning is bad, but that one just struck me is like, what are you doing? And one thing that he did do when he got to the Orioles is throw the curveball more. And his curveball is good.

And it's led to a little early uptick in strikeouts. But I think he like one of my weirdest theories is that I think batters and pitchers should be random number generators and they should just like just be as weird as possible and just do the just like never get into any into any patterns. If you look, Gordon Burns, when he's behind, goes to the cutter 60% of the time. So he has some 60s on his chart that you're gonna circle. And once you, like I think Trevor's taught with this, once you get past 60, like, you know,

people are circling on that and thinking about it. I did find actually something interesting, I think, with the difference between his slider and his curveball. So he's throwing the slider more than he's ever thrown a slider. But I'm looking at where is the vast majority of them have been thrown? Not a lot in the strike zone. I think he's just more comfortable throwing curveball for strikes than he is throwing slider. He can't. That was my question is why does his slider goes well does well by stuff plus

that would lead to more strikeouts. He is down a little bit in strikeouts. Why doesn't he throw a slider more? Yeah, I thought maybe he was blending between the cutter and the slider Maybe that's they're too close or maybe just can't command it. Maybe he's just not he doesn't command a slider great I thought the blending might be possible just because he throws the cutter so much It's such an important pitch for him that maybe that's part of why I definitely protect that pitch You know the off season are different enough that it's hard to blend because this cutter is 96 and his slider is 88, right? So that difference in VLOs enough.

The interesting thing is here's the whiff rates. Curdball's whiff rate is 38%, but the slider's is 45.6. But he just doesn't get in the zone. So they didn't get swings. So I really think he's just, that's the difference at the end of the day. Like I bet you they're like, hey man, the slider's like, the slider's probably the way, even though the Curdball is bet you they're like, hey man, the sliders, like the sliders, probably the

way, even though the curve ball is really good, you still, we, but we wanted to throw them about the same amount of time and just kind of mess with them. But he's just like, my slider is a ball all the time. So he just heard the curve ball and which is hurting him a little more, which curve balls are hit harder than sliders now, especially if like, I think in the game of anticipation, if it like a curve ball, you know, if If I don't anticipate it a lot of times I just don't swing then you took you stole a strike for me But if I do anticipate a curveball, I can hit it Yeah, you got time to get the bear out there and if a slider, you know, I don't know what this is. It's 90

There's no like uh, and you just fell off. It's too hard. That's why this has become a slider league It's like he's just not leaning on the pitch that will get him the most, I think, effect because he's not, it's not throwing for strikes. And that's big for him. Like manning a pitch is huge. He's not going to throw it if he can't. And that is by far his worst command of pitch. Being a workhorse is great as far as getting paid in free agency, having the track record

that Burns has, he's going to get a massive deal this winter. But if you start yielding more contact, either because you're trying to pitch deeper into games or you become predictable, whatever the reason is, it seems like a very bad thing in a walk year. And when you look at a guy that's gone from 30.5% with the K-rate in 2022 down to 25.5% last year in his final year with the Brewers down to 22.3% and you look at the swinging strike rates the last two seasons being in that 12% range, I don't think we're going back to 30% strikeout rate Corbin Burns in the future.

I don't know if what's happening this year is necessarily the true talent new baseline, but if you want the elite strikeout rate, I think it's going to take a pretty big adjustment for that to come back and I wonder if that's gonna give any teams some hesitation in going out and giving him you know a six seven your massive deal that he's certainly gonna get this winter. If my team was about to sign him to a big deal like that I'd be like okay let's all talk about the slider now because I just feel like you know in this type of league I want the guy I'm giving millions and millions of dollars to to have a great slider.

And do you believe it's going to get better or that it can be used more effectively? I mean that was the one thing with Yamamoto, dude. He didn't have a great slider, but I think they must have seen enough in the cutter, the gyro, whatever they used throwing and said, we can work with this. They had a good question from Michael C. in the Discord wondering if there could be a true whiff pitch for Logan Webb, right? I mean Logan Webb, like Corbin Burns, has had a lot of success for several years,

but it seems like he's doing it with a lot of the same tools that he's always had. I think the only thing that's kinda caught my attention in the last year or so when we brought up Logan Webb is that, I think you said, you know, his release point's been changing, right? It's been dropping a little bit over time, but overall, it's a lot of the same approach and pitch mix that Logan Webb is using to get the results that he gets.

So are there similarities here, even though they're very different as pitchers in terms of the stuff that they're working with? The through line that I was going to try and draw, which is really, really hard to prove and has to do with sort of this idea of decay. The more you often you throw a pitch, the more people see it, the better, the worse it gets. Right. Is just that there's a certain amount of decay that happens for any pitcher that's been in the league for a while. I mean, they've just people now know what you throw. And that's why, you know, I think one of the reasons I admire Grenkie so much

was I felt like he was a real tinkerer that would be like, oh, you think you know me, this year I'm different, you know? And there was that kind of like every year, like he kind of, I felt like he wanted to come into spring training every year with something else. I'm not saying that these guys don't wanna do that. Corbin is throwing the curve more this year. He is trying to change a little bit.

Webb, I don't know if people know this. Webb throws a cutter. He has mostly thrown it to one player, Shohei Otani. I hadn't seen it everywhere, but like, yeah, I talked to Logan Webb about a lot about his cutter. He's it's not great. He's trying to figure it out. It could theoretically be good.

There are a lot of guys who are cutter, sinker, change-up guys. You know, the sweeper that that Webb throws, the baby sweeper that he throws right now is a decent pitch, but it's it's not, I don't know why. Maybe maybe people can see the release point so different from his other ones or it's he's he's tried a harder slider. He's tried a slower slider. It's there's something about his mechanics I think that will never make him have a really great breaking ball and I in in essence I guess the other through line between these two pitchers is neither one of them has a standout slider Do you want to have? Corbin burns if he develops that pitch or gets it, he hasn't already, but if it gets better,

how hard would you push that usage given that he's a workhorse starter? Is there any concern about going to that too much because of fear of injury? Uncle Ted in the live hive suggesting that's just asking for an elbow issue. I mean, we've seen some different research on this over time.

I think direct stress on the elbow is highest with the Thilo. I've seen there was some new research about spin being a problem, but there was actually research at the Sabre seminar that wasn't able to replicate that finding. I think it is a problem if you throw a 92 mile an hour slider, and Corbin Burns's is pretty hard, 88 is pretty hard. I wouldn't necessarily push it to 40%. You know, but right now he's throwing, what's he throwing? He's throwing 15% because he can't command it. I mean, he could throw more sliders. And Webb could, if I could bequeath Webb a standout,

amazing slider, they threw 25% of the time, he would be, he's already like a top 10 pitcher. I think he would be like one of the best, maybe best pitcher in the league. I mean, you're talking about like one of the best change up, one of the best thinkers, great command. I mean, if I gave him a plus slider, you'd be, that's like kind of the Pedro package. Pedro was like, oh, by the way, I have the best curve ball, the best change up and you know, one of the two best fastballs in the league. What do you think about the high VELO bullet slider that Frederick suggests

for Logan Whelm? He's been trying it. That's what he did one time. He talked to me for one year. It was all about how hard he could throw a slider, but he just couldn't get it high enough. He couldn't throw it hard enough. One thing that I think is being overlooked with him and pretty much nobody else, he throws a force seam sometimes. It's terrible and he knows that.

Logan's a guy who knows. He knows how well What his pitches are based on movement and which ones are the best the problem is the ones he throws all the time is You know what when hitters are hitting they're trying to shrink the strike zone He already shrinks the strike zone because he throws everything in the bottom half like the sinkers like mid thigh But it's not up like they don't have to look up ever with him. He is nothing. It's not about even like standing guys up or changing eyes, eye lines. No, he's just eliminated half the zone for them.

So like you don't have to worry. That's why he gives up so much content. That's why his kind of big slider doesn't get chased very much is because it's just moving exactly. It's moving in the general area eyesight wise for everybody and they're just like able to make a decision that that's gonna be way too far out it's too big in that case but if you think about it that way even if you add a smaller one in reality it's probably not gonna get like less swings on it they're probably just gonna hit it harder okay it's just because it's moving less that the reason it's changed up in a sinker both move down and away from a lefty a

lot I think the cutter could be a good idea, even if it's a 45 cutter, because he could throw it high in the zone, maybe. Yeah. He needs then I think that's what he wants. And that's why he throws it to Otani because Otani crushes everything at the bottom of the zone. Like he can't pitch this way to him, which that's a big issue. That's an issue.

Um, so he finding something that maybe stays higher or he can use high or maybe like a different version of a sinker that doesn't sink as much. That would be interesting to me. Like a Bassett sinker who he throws up all the time. Oh just like a the two this is the two seamer. This is not the sinker. This is the two seamer. Throw a four seam that's that's you know it's got 20 inches of drop still. His four seam seam does if you can't do that Then throw like something that goes a lot horizontally because you do that so naturally but like the non seam shifted sinker like the non seam Changes that and see what happens because he has already has such a good feel for that So like work within the things you have But you need to open up the top part of the zone a little bit somehow and figure out a way to do that man

Maybe that's just a different version of the pitches you already throw. Trevor, you might be interested in this. There was a little part of that question was, has there been research into pitch separation like different? And so one of the things that we saw was somebody looked at the value of, you know, when you see those pitch movement charts on Brooks or whatever, like, you know, those, uh, those spray charts that he just described the distance between the pitches like the the area of the blob or whatever and like the bigger being better

and it was bigger was better but what he found was if you take if you have like a tight blob if you're Graham Ashcraft and then you throw like a 75 mile an hour curve, right? Which is very different than your 98 mile an hour cutter and your 89, 90 mile an hour sweeper, right? Now you throw a 78 mile an hour curve. That pitch, that's the big thing that separates from all the rest, it has fewer swings. It can be good for you, but it has fewer swings. So that says to me, the batter sees it

because it's so different than everything else. But if you can command it. So that's what so it almost the question to well and web is not how good your cutter is is can you just put it there because it's going to look so different than everything else that most of the time people are going to see that cutter and be like what the hell was that? You know, and not swing. You just want them to have to think about it. Like, if anything,

if it just could becomes a pitch where they're like, I know that that's something that I might get, that could throw them off everything else, because everything else is in the same kind of bucket. Josh hater change his slider to be harder and move less. Because he's like, the other one, the 82 is just too different. Yeah. And he needs swings because he doesn't have good command. He needs swings. So you can't. I need swings and my fastballs, my bread and butter anyway.

So I need something where they're like, they're going to swing at this, meaning they're thinking about it, meaning that's going to make it my fastball better. And it has because he's like, but it's my slider is never going to be my outpitch. It never is. I can't throw a good one. I need one that that makes my fastball better. He made that choice, even though no one really noticed that he needed to do it by him because it wasn't really, it didn't seem like an issue because his fastball is still doing well. But that's, that's kind of the way that you would commit to a not as good

movement pitch in a vacuum in order to make other pitches better. That's a prime example. And that's what Logan needs. Well, just dabbling a little bit. He doesn't need a lot. I mean, he's still a really good pitcher. Oh, yeah. Well, if the swing and miss is something that he wants to be able to go to in certain situations and not just depend on

our defense all the time because he's given up a lot of hits this year, he'll tell you it's too many hits. What we're also saying is he may not get a true whiff pitch, but he may get a called strike pitch that makes his change up into more of a

whiff pitch. Exactly. Because now they're like, oh, wow, oh, crap, now it's oh, too. Now he throws the change of this further off the zone. Thanks a lot for those questions from Stinky and Michael C. In the discord, join the discord links in the show description, ask questions for future episodes. You guys ask during the show.

Sometimes we'll get those in as well. Do you guys want to play a name that dude before we go? I had one queued up for last week. It's just sitting here. I'm terrible at this. yes, let's go. All right, Trevor has the all time series lead, 1-0. Eno, see, here's the thing. Eno has to make sure that if he has an idea of the player,

he can't sound the player out out loud and then have Trevor steal because that's how Trevor got the win in game one, two weeks ago. I was like, hey, Mesa, Mesa. You were just giving more clues. You were on it. You had the edge and you gave it up.

Alright, so name that dude. I was a position player, born November 10th, 1986 in San Jose, California, and I made my major league debut on May 18th, 2011 after being drafted in the seventh round out of Pepperdine. Blank stares. Current No longer playing. I played my final MLB game in September of 2020 while appearing for my 4th major league team.

I'll continue. Still blank stares. I topped 25 homers in a season twice including a career high 31 homers in 2017. I wanna say Jason Kipnis. It's not Jason Kipnis. It's a little bit younger than that, I think. Some refer to me as Song Namja. Others call me Phone Home or Mr. T.

Tula Witsky? No. Damn it, he was Long Beach, wouldn't he? Frick! Still nothing there, you know, going to throw a guess out there. Mr. T. 38 year old.

Yeah, Mr. T. All right, what was the first one? Sang Namja. All right, you don't have a guess yet, so we'll keep going. I hit more home runs in the KBO than I did in the majors or across all of my minor league stops. That did not help me.

What? That should have given it away. Thames, Eric Thames? Yes, Eric Thames. That's it, Mr. T. Mr. T. God damn. Trevor takes a 2-0 season lead in Name That Dude. I'm terrible at this.

Not entirely surprised, but hey. Remember Sang Namja. Sang Namja. Mr. T should have done it. I don't remember Sang Namja either, but that was a fun little run for Eric Thames when he came back to the big leagues and was providing all that power

after just tearing up the KBO. All right, we are gonna go. On our way out the door, you can find us on Twitter, you can find Trevor at IamTrevorMay, find Eno at EnoSarris, find me at Derek the Riper, the pod is at Raids and Barrels. Join that Discord, link is in the show description. If you got a question for a future episode,

you can also email us, RaidsandBarrels, gmail.com is the other way to do that. Thanks to Brian Smith for producing this episode. We are back with you on Friday. Thanks for listening.