Talkin' Baseball (MLB Podcast) - Why Starting Pitching Will Never Be The Same

Episode Date: March 12, 2025

Go to http://shadyrays.com and use code TALKIN for 35% off polarized sunglasses. Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app and use promo code TALKIN Shop SKIMS Mens at https://www.skims.com/talkin #skimspartner Use code TALKIN2025 for 10% off your next SeatGeek order*: https://seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/TALK.... Sponsored by SeatGeek. *Restrictions apply. Max $20 discount Coach Trev and MLB Pitcher Kyle Gibson break down the state of pitching across baseball, if it’s inevitable for pitchers to get Tommy John surgery, how pitchers create new pitches and what happens to starting pitching in the future of baseball! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello and welcome. Talking Baseball, Jake is suffering in Texas. Don't worry. I got the starter, Kyle Gibson, with me. We're going to talk some pitching. I got a lot to ask you today, big guy. I can't wait.

I can't wait. Hello and welcome to Talkin Baseball. It's presented to you by Seekek. Use Code Talking 2025 for 10% off. Go see a comedy show. go see a big league ball game go see any sporting event see keeks got it all for you that's code talk in 2025 and as i mentioned uh jake is at south by southwest wasn't that where like all the tech guys used to go and either jake is is big time now or they've changed the format because

i don't think he's like a zuckerberg uh but he him and peter moylin are out there uh giving talks on a big stage. It's crazy. So in his stead, we have a talking baseball legend, one of our first ever guests on the show, my good buddy, Kyle Gibson. Gibby, how are you, man? Trev, I'm doing good, man, doing really well, sitting here in Missouri, enjoying some time with the kids. I got up to 75, almost 80 yesterday. I threw an outdoor bullpen on Monday. Just like got the spikes on and went to the high school here. That kind of is the feeder high school. And through a 70, pitch bullpen. Man, it was, it was beautiful. Seventy pitches is quite the bullpen. If any teams are out there they need pitching,

I know you're out there. Look at this. Stud. 13 years in the show. We're actually going to start with a few simple questions about yourself. I think what we're going to do with this episode, just so the listeners understand, because this is kind of is a different episode than we usually do. We're going to talk to State of the Union with pitching. You know, there's been some big injuries. You know, Garrett Cole is on the shelf. And, you know, we've seen just, massive uprising Tommy John surgery. So we'll kind of like get into that.

Some of your thoughts about pitch design metrics, all of that. But first, I got to get some true burning questions to my guy right here. First of all, I didn't know. I knew you've been in a league for a long time. And I know starting pitchers make money. But we're talking almost 70Ms in the bank account for my guy, Kyle Gibson. And one of our favorite things to talk about on this show is when a guy, guy makes good money, what you deserve.

Like, this is, we're applauding you for this. What's, like, in your basement? Like, what's the thing that you have because you got some extra dough? Like, what's your splurge? Do you have any? Like, you might be the one guy that doesn't have any. But I'm very curious with that. I mean, first off, the burning questions that are coming, this takes me right back

to Minnesota when we're sitting on the bench and you'd have a little rest day. You know, like, Gibby, you sit right here. We got to talk. Is this what this feels like? I love that. You know, I think you know me pretty well. I would say we're in the middle of a home build right now. So that's probably a better example because in our basement right now, we've kind of pushed things in.

When we bought this house, it only had three bedrooms and we have four kids. So you can imagine what's going on here. Right now we have a rogue rack kind of like a workout room set up. Pretty basic in this house. Next house we're going to have even like a concrete wall for weighted balls and med balls. and stuff like that to throw against. The goal is to maybe create like a little bit of some climbing holds and stuff like that for the kids to become, you know,

little climbers and kids that can control their own body weight and move around and be athletic. So that workout room will be probably one of the cooler things in our basement. This is why you're different because I'm going to tell you some other examples of what's in other guys. Oh, geez. Okay. Like Jake Arieta, for instance, got into,

spirits that were aged or found on the ocean floor because the rocking changed, you know, the viscosity of the beverage. I don't know. Like that's what I'm talking about. You're like, yeah, my kids are going to be, we're going to build something for my kids or maybe a workout room. That's why, hey, that's how you get 13 years in the show. I love that.

Everybody's path's a little different, you know, just a little different. I thought maybe there could be some like hunting stuff. You know what? I really haven't snagged like the big deer that I've been trying to follow the last few years. Took Hayden hunting for the first time, but we didn't get anything. So no big hunting thing. Okay. We're trying to set this house up to where the kids just want to have people over. So we got like a bunk room that's going to have room for 10 people to sleep when grandma and grandpa come over and stuff like that.

So we're kind of, we're sending this house up for some kids and letting them, you know, run around and play around. The outside is going to be probably a little bit better set up with pool, fire pit, you know, outdoor kids. kitchen down there. Now we're talking. Now we're talking there. Yeah. Inside, inside is not necessarily where we want them to be. You know, we're going to be over top of a pond and let's get them outside and playing. Okay. That's what I'm talking about right there. Yeah, you know, once you have kids, it's like you just realize you just, they need stuff to do. That's my biggest thing. I'm home a lot right now. And I work from home most of the time. I travel a little bit. But it's like, it's, I saw something on Instagram. It's like, when you have kids, they don't tell you.

you that you're responsible for feeding them three meals a day or the next 18 years. Like what are they going to eat? What are they going to do? And that's like your life. And then the time in between, you get to do some stuff on your own. But that's family life. Yep. I do want to talk about what's, yeah, again, call it the state of the union of pitching. The biggest news that's come out of baseball recently is Garrett Cole undergoing Tommy John surgery. He's been healthy. He's been a guy that's pitched a ton of innings, you know, not only in the regular season,

but also a bunch of innings in the postseason. So there has been a lot of miles put on the arm, but he seemed like a guy that was very durable. And then the news comes out that he's going to miss this year. I believe he went under the knife yesterday on March 11th. So we're looking at a mid-2020-six return for him. devastating blow to the Yankees. I believe they did have, for those who aren't really in

Yankees' lands, they did have insurance on the contract. I know it's crazy to break it down like this, but I think that does help their team out. You recoup, I believe it was $27 million of that. So they hopefully can go out and try that lands. Kyle Gibson. Well, I guess, because there's been some quotes out of the clubhouse. So Rodon basically said it's inevitable these days that a pitcher is going to get Tommy John,

whether you're 35 or 15, I believe was the quote. When it's your time, it's your time. You're a guy that went through in 2011. Do you think that statement is true? I mean, yeah, I don't know what percentage of pitchers have to get Tommy John overall in the game to reach that inevitable point. But, I mean, I think we're there. you know, if it's 80 to 85% of

overhand throwers in our game that are going to get Tommy John, I'd say that's pretty inevitable. I mean, that's a really high number. And maybe that number's off. But it does seem like there's a lot of guys every single year, especially the last few years that are getting it. I think there's a lot that goes into it.

I think, you know, we're all chasing, you know, that extra mile and hour in velocity. We're all chasing the extra RPMs and spin because now that we have the data and we can see what it does, there's an emphasis on it. You know, even back to my time in Minnesota 2019, you know,

it was, the talk was every mile and hour on your fastball is basically like 0.3 off of your ERA. Now, you ask anybody if they can take point three off of their ERA, they're going to say, yes. So, you know,

in talking to pitchers the last couple years, like some guy's goal is to throw every pitch as hard as they can. You know, because of the visual, you know, approach to home plate that it creates. So if you have two or three breaking balls, you can get your heater above 95 and make everyone come out of your hand as hot as possible looking like that 95. It's obviously a huge advantage for the Ghana.

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separates Shady Rays from everyone. Quality, good pricing, and then that protection, lost or broken replacement plan that they have. And exclusively for our listener, Shady Rays has given out their best deal of the season. Go to ShadyRase.com and use code talking t a l k i n for 35 percent off your next pair of polarized sunglasses that's a great discount that's code talking at shady raise dot com go get yours now people point three on your era every miles per hour that's actually a crazy way to put it and yeah if you're a pitcher what i mean that's you're like okay because guess what sure every point three off your er a is it's really it's millions of dollars we're talking about to go from a

a four, three to in, in the threes, I mean, you're talking big bucks. So here's the numbers. When you had TJ 2011, 111 major and minor league pitchers went underneath or had that surgery. And then in 2021, there were 314 of them. And we've shrunk the player pool as well. So the percentage is way up. it's it's very scary and look i don't people that listen to this show i love you and i love

having conversations with pitchers but i have no sympathy for pitchers because a lot of this is self-inflicted um and and i kind of use that as a joke i really i don't want anyone to get hurt my you know it's an ongoing thing i talk about pitchers always everything always goes your guys way all the unwritten rules are for you um you're supposed to win all these things things. But I think I'm going to be a little bit more serious and kind of dive into this because I think what you mentioned is very interesting to me. Once we started having Trackman and the slow-mo cameras pretty much track every single pitch off the mound that you make, it does, it creates an environment where you want to put these numbers up almost no matter what. And so, you know,

In the game, sure, I'd understand kind of going 100% because that's when it matters. But bullpens now chasing data, that's a real thing. Yeah, I mean, every time I touch the mound in Texas, we got a report from that day, just, you know, what you have. Now, you could customize that report and say, I don't really need to see this. I don't want to see that. So if you weren't necessarily working on a pitch design at the time, you know, you didn't have to sit there and look at all the vertical break and horizontal movement that you had. But I do think what that gave us was it gave us a barometer of kind of where you're at along the way. And maybe you could notice a mechanical flaw a week earlier, two weeks earlier, because you could see, hey, your sinker is not sinking.

Not only in the games, but in the bullpen, it's not sinking. We need to look at it. That's kind of how I used it. I didn't really, I've never lit up the radar gun with an average of 95, 96. Seeing that velocity doesn't make me feel good, I throw bullpins 82 to 85. That's just what I do. But I do think it can be a real weapon if you're in the middle of honing a pitch, in the middle of adjusting a pitch mid-season, which has to happen.

So it can be a real benefit. But you can get carried away with it. You can get to the point where you're ripping every pitch, and now you're essentially throwing a relief appearance of 30 pitches every time in between a start. And now you look at how many extra pitches that adds on. You know, it can be a big deal. So the pros of that would be, okay, in the game, hey, this pitch, your sinker is not, you know, getting the vertical break that you want.

And you, that's usually a mechanical issue. And so if you go in the bullpen and all of a sudden you're throwing. at, you know, 80% or 75%, it might not be the same mechanics and you might not get the same feedback. So that would be a reason why guys would go in and try to almost match what they're doing on the mound just because they want the data. They want to see exactly what, how to fix it, right? Yeah. So essentially, as you're, what I've been told, as your velocity slows, the pitches create bigger movement. So then as your fastball comes back to its normal velocity,

it's going to creep back to that zero-zero axis. So if it's at 18 horizontal, it's going to creep back to zero as you gain that mile an hour back. So, yeah, you can get a little sense of encouragement from a bullpen if you're flipping in sinkers at 84-86 and you're like, wow, that thing's going really down. You know, it's got a lot of horizontal acting like a change-up, right? So now when you bring it back to a heater, it's like, ooh, it's kind of flattened out.

It doesn't have that same movement that I had three days ago in the bullpen. Easy to do with breaking malls, especially. I mean, some of the sweepers I'm throwing right now in my bullpins, I'm asking myself, can I recreate this? I've got like a positive six negative 20 right now on a sweeper, but it's 77 miles an hour, right? So as soon as that comes back to, you know, my hopeful of 82, 83, that's going to come back to reality a little bit. How important is it for, because I'm actually so fascinated by this, I do love pitching. You just don't want pitchers. It's okay.

I don't love pitching. And you really love pitching. You hate pitchers because you decided not to pitch. And if anybody has listened to you very long, this is why it is. You love pitching. You hate that you decided not to pitch. So let's just go. Don't expose me, Kyle.

This is my show. Okay. I am fascinated by it, though, because I do think. it's such a double-edged sword all this information. It works the same way with hitters. I mean, there's so much data out there, but really, in the end, we're just reacting. Like, that's the bottom line.

There might be some outliers where you get the data and say, hey, this guy and this count throws this percentage of pitch, and you're going to go chase that or, hey, we picked up a tell. Like, other than that, you're freaking reacting. And anyone that tells you anything different is ridiculous. And that's why I have been, and this is great. You're actually going to love this, Kyle. So, you know, I'm doing the broadcast here now for the twins.

And the last year and the last couple of years, it's really in hitting almost the same as chasing Velo. You're chasing exit Velo. You're chasing, you're trying to put the ball in the air. You're trying to slug. That's what's going on. The problem is you can't always do that. And you can, and similar to a bullpen, you can do a lot in the cage. But when you get out on the field,

and you got to react like you have to well i'd always say is you have to have more than one club in the back you can't you can't just say here's my swing and that's it we you know those guys that have one swing and you're like where's the hole throw it to the hole that's it game over yeah so now in spring training new hitting coaches i like the hitting coaches that were there uh in the previous years popkins now is in in the blue jays um but they're focusing on situational hitting and hitting the ball the other way and line drives and and having more than one club in the bag. So I'm like, I think these things are very cyclical.

But for hitting, you really just have to rely on, like I said, reacting. With the data, has there been like a moment for you where someone has come to you and said, hey, man, like check this out. And it's really changed something for you? Yeah, so 2020 was, you know, obviously a hard season for a lot of people. But for me, my sinker just stopped going down. So all of a sudden, I was throwing a running two seam that really wasn't running elite. It wasn't sinking elite.

It was a standard two seam at 92 to 94, not what you want to throw. Trevor's like, get me in the box. So, yeah, that was the first time that I threw off-season bullpins on a rap soda. because I was really, and that was the year I was adding to cutter, but I was really working on adjusting my grip on my two seamer to create that sink that I used to have. So, yeah, that was pretty fun throwing some bullpins. You know, I got ramped up a little bit earlier that year.

And that was fun, you know, for the first time in a while, feeling like I'm tinkering with a little bit of a pitch. And, you know, taking my, you know, we have this baseball. Glad you told me to get a baseball. Took my fingers from the middle of the two seams right. and I'm sitting here like trying to play around and move all around. And then all I did was I just shifted my pointer finger onto the scene. All right.

And I remembered back to some video, some, some Edgetronic with West Johnson. And my middle finger, what I thought was the finger that controlled all of my pitches. But it's really only my change up that my middle finger controls. My sinker was coming off my pointer finger. My slider was kicking off my pointer finger last. So I had to make sure like, well, my mind, I've got my pointer finger now coming off of a leather part of the baseball. I need to get it on the seam. So I just put my pointer finger on a seam so I can rip it.

And all of a sudden the tilt came back and it became a sinker again. Was that, did you just kind of like end up in the middle and you used to be on a seam or is that just the way to fix what was going on? So back to time in Minnesota, my thumb was really what. determine my sinker, right? So if I was on the second seam, all right, around the baseball, I would get more down. If I wanted to throw that front hip two seam to the lefty, I would shift my thumb to the first seam. Oh, how do you do that? It would create more of a runner. So, I mean, that's, I always thought about my thumb because that's kind of just how I, how in my head, I'm like, okay, shift your thumb up. This is the sinker. Shift your thumb back. This is the

runner. But then I had to, the hardest part was figuring out where to hook my thumb on this new sinker, right? I had to hook it kind of underneath the Rawlings or in that horseshoe. But yeah, it was really just making sure that the most important finger is putting the direction of putting the spin on the ball last. And that was just you using? Do you have someone that you throw in front of? No, that was just the Rangers sending me a Rhapsodo for the offseason. I was in my shed that's 70 foot by 40 and threw up. a mound up and put a net at the end. And I didn't really care at the time. I didn't care where the ball went. I had that strike zone net up there. But I really just wanted to get the tilt right again.

You know, it had crept from 145 to 2 up to like 1 o'clock tilt. And that's why I just didn't have the same movement. So it's like, all right, I got to find a grip here that gets back that 145 tilt. And then I can move it back into the strike zone and back to where I'm trying to throw it. That's so interesting. And this episode is brought to you by skims. Let's talk about coming. where it matters most your underwear skims the official underwear partner of the NBA, the WMBA and USA basketball and the brand known for revolutionizing shapewear has now launched a line of men's underwear that's about to change your daily routine. I am wearing skims right now. I promise you I went and changed out all of my underwear two skims. It's that good. They offer three skims,

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so if you do go to skims and you want to see what i'm talking about um use our show and let them know that we sent you i really like these i don't always say that about everything go check out skims.com That's kind of like brings us maybe to where I want to, where we wanted to start with this episode. And again, I just want to talk some pitching with you. Usually our talks on the dugout bench for anything, politics, food. On everything you can't get into nowadays, right? You're not allowed to talk politics. We can do it.

We can do it. We can do it. We can do it. Thankfully, we weren't miced up nearly as much in 2017. You and I had some awesome discussions. Yeah, we did. Um, pitch design. I, again, I'm, like, I'm fascinated with this because I have thought for so long,

and I'm just a dumb hitter, but I, I was thinking once we got these adjutronic cameras and you had, you know, uh, biomechanic data, like you can really hone in on every single thing that you're doing on the hill, my thought process is always like, okay, well, Corey Klob is at the end of his career. Why don't we just sign him for a million dollars? and say, hey, just come to spring training. Then you can go home. But we want to get you in front of the cameras so we can teach people your cutter. You know, like, is that a thing?

Like, can you, let me ask you this. I guess there's always data, but could a pitcher who has a pitch say, I want to keep all my data to myself? Can you do that? Not unless you bring your own Rhapsodo and you bring your own trackman because you're using team stuff. you know like hawkye i believe is the league-wide yeah hawk i understand you can't really get around that right but yeah you want to throw a bullpen and and you say hey i've never seen anybody do it right so maybe you can't but i mean if you want to say hey this is my track man this is my data

i'm holding on to it this is you guys hold my iPad you guys tell me what the pitches are but you're not getting this report bear with me because my thought process here is you have an elite pitch. And that's it's very few and far between that we're, you know, what we're talking about. Like, again, Corey Klover and his cutter and, I mean, some, some sort of change. I guess the kick change is all the rage, but say Devin Williams, right? He's got the airbender. And he's like, I'm going to sell this catalog at one point. Like, right? Like, couldn't you do that? And that, to me, would be worth millions of dollars because that's information to a pitch that gets big league hitters out and what do you pay to get big league hitters out it's millions of dollars that seems a little

far off but i mean i'm just i'm curious about it but i think there was a time where you know starting pitchers and probably all pitchers just didn't talk to opposing players about how they throw a pitch didn't necessarily want to share how they throw a pitch because it was their pitch right now i think with all this data you know it was something we talked about on the cardinals last year is like hey i've just watch this video on this guy's pitch, I'm going to see if I can recreate it. I mean, like, you know, so it's possible. Yeah. The trouble is, is that everybody throws different.

Okay. Yes. I mean, that's the trouble. It's like, and I can create, I can create what on trackman says 10, negative, negative horizontal and negative 10 vertical. I can create that. But there's also a number on, I think baseball savon or one of those where it's like, Not induced, but basically like what the hitter sees.

Sure. Okay. So I can have this negative 10, negative 10, negative 10, but maybe to the perceived, perceive, perceive break, perceive tilde, whatever. You're right. Thank you. Whatever the hitter sees, the hitter might see that as a negative 5, negative 5 because of how I throw it.

So every time I look at a pitch design and I look at what I'm trying to do, I think back to old Mike Pelfrey, what Mike Pelfrey would say. Gibby, the hitter will let you know if that pitch is any good. That's so true. And it's so true, right? So I get, they'll let you know every time. You might have a pitch that nobody thinks is good. Mike Pelfrey's sinker, right?

Like, how is Mike Pelfrey getting guys out? Because the hitter let him know for however many years that they couldn't hit it, right? So I think back to that. And yes, I think it's good to get a shape and get a design to a pitch. But it has to work with the other pitches you throw. And then you have to be realistic with yourself as does my arm slot, does my velocity does my body type work when I'm actually facing a hitter I think that's such a good point because I've talked to like Joe Ryan of the twins and he talks about how his low arm slot is

different because he's not really like his hand placement or is release like with his hand is isn't low it's high so he's like a low arm slot but a high like hand so once he went to like a drive line and they saw that then they they were able to create not create pitches but like tell him what pitches will be effective with that the way he throws. So that's, I guess that's kind of the thing is you have to be, the perception is different. And for you, you'd have to have a guy with similar arm slots to really try to recreate the pitch. You can't just go in there and say, give me the number on Devin Williams airbender. Correct. And I'm going to throw it because it's, his body moves differently. And everything is different with every single pitcher almost.

Yeah, I mean, everything I do is helped by a higher release point, more extension, and I have more perceived movement on most of my pitches than maybe actual movement, right? My curveball is not this high spin rate, high break pitch. It just comes from higher than most players or most pitchers, so it ends up breaking more because it comes from a higher spot. So when I, I mean, I didn't throw my curveball for a long time in the big leagues for many percentage of pitches because I didn't. didn't necessarily believe it was a big league pitch. And then sometime at 2017, when I was going through some shoulder stuff, I adjusted my motion. And all of a sudden, I'm like, man, did I just make my curbelaw usable pitch?

And then I started looking at, okay, righties, it's slower than everything. Lefties, it has more depth. Well, does it really? Or do they just see like, man, that has more depth than everything else? I can't square that up. So, I mean, you got to look into what hitters see or else I think you're doing yourself a disservice. How much have you changed since you started in the babies? 2013 was your first year up until last year where you made 30 starts, bro.

2024. How much like has your repertoire changed a ton? I mean, I feel like I know what you throw, but I'm sure you've added some auxiliary pitches and change kind of some of the usage. And so has it changed? And then was there like a big reason why? you would have changed. Yeah, I mean, I think it's shifted a decent amount, you know, not only just percentage of usage and pitches to both handed hitters, but, you know, it was at the end of 2022 with the Phillies where, I mean, we had like a week and a half in the season maybe, and we're going into the playoffs and Caleb Coffin goes, hey, you want to try to make your slider go to the

left more? Like, sure, let's have some fun, right? And that's how I created a sweeper. I was in the middle of a bullpen. And I think this is what probably frustrates hitters most, is like a pitch. can tinker with something and take it to the mound. And then the hitters have no idea that they've done it, right? A hitter takes months to make a swing adjustment and then be able to take it to a game.

So it's a big advantage for a pitcher. But yeah, I mean, I honestly told our catcher stubby, I was like, Stubbs, I'm going to throw some warm it up today. I threw it in the bullpen two or three times in between starts. If my first couple before the first inning are good, we're going to use it to the first hitter. First hitter the game was Dansby Swanson. I threw a couple good ones and I got a strike out on my brand new pitch five

days later, you know? Like, it's just so, so that was a big shift to where I have not thrown a slider in game for two years. And that was my pitch going back to college, right? So that was a shift. Throwing a cutter in 2021 probably shifted the trajectory of where I was going in the game in the middle of my career. I needed something to throw against lefties that had a little bit more soft contact and swing and miss. So that was an offseason where I really tried to work on a cutter from talking to J-Code-Rizzy and Lance Lynn.

And that kind of gave me a viable pitch to play off my sinker inside the lefties. And then what I found is that that is a very useful pitch as well. The more I've used it to righties, really setting up that east-west movement because that's kind of my identity is east-west movement both sides of the plate.

And then now using it more in 2020, and 2024 to lefties backdoor has been something that I've played with a lot because I don't necessarily like to give a pits. I know Slug is the big thing, but I don't necessarily like to give a pits. And if I have a pitch that hitters are hitting 350, no matter if it's 79 exit Velo, there's something wrong to me. While I was starting to realize that the inside cutter to Lefties was giving them the right launch and the right exit Velo for a single to right.

It's like, okay, what am I doing? Let me give up a 95 monitor ground ball in a second. base by throwing it back door to a lefty and let's avoid these 75-mile or dink hits into lefties. I can't stand them. So, I mean, I still throw it inside obviously, but, you know, trying to look at things like that and figure out, okay, I think this is with some young guys, like, they lose with only looking at data. It's like, okay, where does my stuff play?

I have good stuff, but let's figure out where in the strike zone I use it to get outs. and then which two of my pitches play off each other really well. And then let's go after those combos and execute those pitches. Because I just thought because of throwing my cutter in 21 and 22, I should throw it inside the lefties and that's it. And in reality, I got more outs by throwing it away. So, you know, just figuring out, you know, how that helps other pitches like my changeup.

Does it help my sweeper? Does it help like eye movement, getting hitters eyes away and in? I've got to do that stuff because of, you know, not necessarily throwing as hard as other people as well. I can actually feel that pitch. That's a pitch. I'm just thinking if a lefty threw a cutter inside me, but it might jam me, but I know I'm going to get my barrel somewhat to it. And I'm going to get kind of inside it just enough where I can, you know, smoke it to left. It might not, like you said, I have crazy exit velo, but I know I can get my hands to it.

That's really funny. that does bring me to my next question you kind of stumbled into it there a little bit when you say you create or you start throwing that sweeper by the way your 2021 numbers with texas 19 starts to a 287 okay you're bad and this episode of talking baseball is brought to you by draft kings who's scoring big in the NBA this season you are with all the new ways to get in on the action with our partners at draft king's sports book right now All new customers who bet just $5 will get $150 in bonus bets instantly when you use code talking. For monster slams to dish in the rock to clean the glass. I used to just dunk all the time. Get behind your favorite players and the prop bets you can make on Draft Kings, the home of NBA player props. I just box out a little bit and then I slam it right on, guys.

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see dkng.com slash audio. When you start throwing that, how much does that affect different pitches? Like just the feel for them or the pitchability, does it change? Like, because now you're throwing, that and just in your hand does the ball change or feel different

with your other pitches? Pitchability for other pitches, I would say no. And even like percentage of usage didn't change everything as much because I just swapped out my old slider for a new one. No big deal. But I mean, it's easy to fall in love with a new pitch. It's easy to like all of a sudden now take it

and tick it up a little bit, right? That's kind of what I've been told my whole career is like, throw your slider more, throw your slider more. Well, every time I threw my slider, 40% of the time, I got whacked. So, like, you guys want me to just sit here and throw sliders. And that was one of my worst stretches of the year in 2018 when I actually had a decent year was Bobby Wilson and I just started throwing sliders. And now, five starts later, I've given a five runs a start. Like, no thanks.

But I do think, I do think it changes how hitters react to your pitches. You know, the sweeper has definitely added a different element of righties. needing to cover the outside part of the plate at a just a different way because it has so much plate coverage, which is something I think is kind of lost a little bit, is how much a pitch looks like a strike. You know, the hitters have to make a decision at some point. And if I can keep this sweeper on the plate for five foot longer toward home plate, man, that is a huge weapon for me. So I think it has definitely changed how I use, you know, my backdoor sinker to righties, how I've used this cutter to righties.

And it's, yeah, it's been, it's still something I'm learning about lefties because I don't think the sweeper is, for me, it has not been as effective to lefties as I thought it would be. So, you know, this year I've even thought about, you know, hopefully getting a job here soon, but thought about going back to my old slider and using old slider to lefties, sweeper to righties because of the different break and the tighter, you know, just the tighter movement, maybe a little bit later movement. But yeah, I mean, I think over the years it's, it's allowed me to have a little bit of fun and tinker with six pitches.

Yeah, just, you know, as a hitter, you go up there and you basically all we're trying to do is eliminate. If you throw four pitches, we're like, okay, number one, what's you throwing for a strike? Like, if you're not throwing a pitch for a strike, I'm just trying to eliminate the best I can. number two is it over 15% I don't know what the number is for everybody mine was probably right around there like if it's under 15% dude you if you get me on it you get me on it I'm not that good I got I got to hone in on the pitch as you throw most often because then I need to tunnel up I need to say okay I have to start here so it ends where I can get to it and you're right if you add that sweeper that just kind of stays on the plate a little bit longer and now all of a sudden that which is already minuscule that decision time that you have if it shrinks it anymore it almost becomes impossible to hit when you have especially you know that's all we see guys I think now you might start out as a two-pitch pitcher and that's all great and they might be excellent pitches but eventually like you said with

your slider you throw a big league hit or a nasty pitch enough times he's going to figure it out and so that's why I always talk about the show like when a pitcher is good with two pitches wait till he throws a third pitch. That just kind of opens everything up it. As long as you can throw it for a strike, that changes everything. And on any given day, if a guy has three pitches that he can throw for a strike, you're in trouble as a hitter. If you can go four pitches for a strike, like it's your, there's a possibility of like a no hitter.

Like that's kind of my thought process with it. It's just, I don't know, man. I do get fascinated with all the data. And we're seeing now, like you talked about being able to kind of just figure out a pitch quickly. We're seeing kind of a new pitch. I want to get your take on it. A lot of guys are starting to throw what people are calling a kick change, which is getting it off its axis, right? And I think it's a bunch of fancy words for a change up that has a lot of vertical break on it, right?

Is that, am I wrong on that? I haven't seen them. I haven't seen him. So my son's eight-year-old team. Well, Trev, I'm sitting at home. So my son's eight-year-old team, nobody threw any kick-changes working on pitching last night. So I didn't get a catch any last night. But I do know that the verbiage that you're using there, right, kick change.

And I'm getting to see it here a little bit real time. So I apologize if it's looking like I'm looking to the side here. But, you know, essentially if you can muddy up some spin and take the cleanliness, like the the exact, you know, you got your seam shift, right? If you can take this and muddy it up a little bit and make it wobble, then you might be able to create a different movement. So I think if I'm understanding what these guys are trying to do here, right, is kick the seam just a little bit at the end and kick it off of its axis.

And if you can kick it off its axis, then you can get it to wobble more and then probably not have as tight of spin. You know, I think if you can lower that spin rate, you can take vertical out and make it go down, right? Spend holds the line, excuse me. So, you know, if you can kick that off its axis a little bit, then yeah, you can, you can create a changeup that doesn't have the RPMs and doesn't have the carry to it. So that was Clay Holmes we just saw.

Typically, you know, last year, the percentages for him were 56% sinker, 24% slider and 20% sweeper. So basically you have the ball going like this and you have your fastball. you understand that one. The other two pitches are working away from you. So it's adding another pitch going on the fastball and something that, you know, as he wants to become a starter, he'll probably have to do. But we've seen a bunch of guys. So it's not just Clay Holmes. Andres Munoz, um, he's also throwing it. Last year, he was basically, um, slider and different variations of a fastball. So he threw it, a slider 47% of time. And then at four

team and a sinker, the other percentage. So he's adding this kick change up. Dylan Sees added it. Robbie Ray, Jack Lighter. All these guys have added it. And for a long time, hitters used to whisper, because we didn't want pitchers to hear.

Why don't, right-handers throw more right-on-right change-ups? It's such a good pitch. It was like faux-paw almost for right-handers to throw change-ups right-on-right. You'd use it against lefties, but why,

what was the thinking in that? I don't know, but when, let's see, I'm trying to think back to the year it was, the Ray started really doing it a lot. And it was probably sometime in 2016, Jeremy Helixen?

Helixen did it a lot. I'm trying to think if Archer did it. I can't remember it. He had to change up. But yeah, I mean, it was something that, that I started talking with guys about and it was something that I was like, you know what, okay,

I got to do this. I got to try to do it more. I like my change up, so I'm going to try it. And I think if anything, when you get to two strikes, everybody's chasing a strikeout, everybody's chasing the swing and miss. There's no doubt that off speed has that the most swing and miss for 90% of pitchers, right?

So you're going to an off speed pitch. If I can throw a change up that goes down and into a righty, looking like my sinker because I throw enough two seams into two strike counts, now the hitter cannot lean out and take the spin going away from them away. So used to, it was the up-end fastball kept hitters from leaning out, right? That hit by pitches and stuff, those unwritten rules that you don't like, you know, those kind of shifted, right?

You don't want to hit anybody in the head, obviously, but you're not throwing in for effect up and in to keep the power hitter from leaning away, right? So you're throwing inside. We're not doing that anymore. Well, I mean, hitters don't like, and pitchers, it's not. on a way because because very i'm sorry to cut you off but barry bonds went on and talked about show hey and said hey like if i hit two homers i'd get one up and in i still watch baseball i still see you guys going up and in i understand it's a little bit different mentality now number one because you'll realize if a guy gets on base it's not great but i i still feel like

that's part of the game but is it is it waning is it going away well i mean i think i think you can get yourself in a situation if you give up a couple of homers to a guy and you throw in and you hit them, you're now out of the game ejected because it's looked like you did it on purpose. So it's just you have to be, you have to be clear with your intent here, right? Like, you can move feet and move a guy's knees and hips and get, you know, similar, you know, similar reaction from them. So I guess I'm just saying like that was just a little different whereas like O2 up and in, stand them up actually had an effect. Whereas now like that just doesn't have the quite same effect.

So having that change up that goes down and in that is a swing and miss pitch and having that slider that goes down and away off of that same tunnel is a real weapon. And I'm sure there's some hitters that are not excited about Munoz doing that. That's for sure. I talk to guys, you know, when I go to the Twins games, I like to just go sit in the cage. Like they do like manager scrums and they go talk to Rocco. I'm like, dude, he's never going to say anything that's worthwhile. Like that's not Rocco's fault.

That's just the manager protecting his information. And so like I like I'd rather be in the cage and talking to guys because that's the info that I like to to present to the listeners. So I'll go in there and we talk hitting a ton. And it is it is one of the biggest things. Like they're trying to figure out ways to combat everything that we just talked about, to combat, you know, the adjutronic cameras to combat, to combat all the data to combat all these guys throwing no pitches.

Paul Skeens out of the cutter and a two seamer to R-A to a repertoire that added a four-seamer, a sinker, a curbel, and a sweeper that he throws more than 10% of the time. So he's just like adding pitches. And his quote, here, here's some of them. That's the sweeper. That's a cutter, excuse me. And thank you pitching ninja for all these beautiful clips. his quote was really I'm just trying to create more swing dishes the swing decisions that's what

it boils down to and that's exactly a hitter's nightmare it's like 100% you have this finite time to decide yes or no and then where do I have to my barrel and then when you just add more more of these things it's become so frustrating so you know they're doing things they're okay what's his best pitch let's get the the soft pitch like ball machine up there and let's crank the V-Lo up and get. I'm like, that, I guess it can help, but you still have to like get into account and you have to try to almost guess at sometimes what you're going to be thrown. I think sometimes that's the best course of action against, you know, a guy like Skeen's, hey, I got to guess. Well, I mean, one thing that, you know, sets him apart from

most guys is not only does he have the pitches that move different than a lot of people, but he has the ability to throw him both sides of the plate. This is, what I heard from hitters. He's throwing all of his pitches to both sides of the plate, setting hitters up at elite velocity. There's just not many guys that do that. Normally, the harder you throw, you're throwing your stuff towards the middle of the plate and you're going to miss over the middle of the plate because that's where you're throwing it, trying to keep it in the zone. He just has a feel ability to, and it can't be measured, right? He has an ability to feel both sides at the plate and to set hitters up and you can't look even a half, right? You can't even just look

in or look middle and try to hit the mistake. Like, you've got to be looking away for the cutter, in for the cutter, away for the splinker. Like, I mean, it's, yes, it's a big deal. You know, I think it's, it is important to have more offerings as a starting pitcher. And for me, especially because I'm, you know, 90 to 93. I need the extra offerings because I need hitters going up there thinking, okay, today, maybe he doesn't have all six pitches, but he has four of them, and he will throw four to both sides of the plate. What am I going to look for this time? And that's what has allowed me to make the starts and throw the innings and, you know,

stay in the game. That is, I mean, if you can locate to both sides of the plate, it basically doubles your pitch. If you're just throwing your two seamer inside, okay, that's great. but if you're also backdooring it, and same thing with, you know, your office speed pitches, it just creates, it's,

it stinks, Kyle. It's very hard. It's so much fun, Trevor. It's so much fun. So, okay, you've given us a lot of your time.

I got a couple more things, and then we'll get you out of here. One, I just thought of this. I want to get your reaction. What's your reaction to Josh Johnson saying? If hitting is the hardest thing to do in sports, what does that make pitching?

Yeah, that's a great question. I think we could probably look back at the beginning of this conversation when we talk about all the Tommy Johns and all the injuries. And I think that that goes into something. But do we have the advantage? For sure. But I also think there's the higher you get in a sport, the difference between being really good and not good is. so small, right? And like it's, I mean, if I could take two starts out of every season that I've had, man, would things look different, right? Like, it's just small little things. Just, um, but no,

I, I don't think it's the easiest thing to do in the game or Trevor Ploof would have chosen to be a so. Okay. Okay. But obviously, we have the advantage, right? Like, that was, that's kind of, but I think expectations, expectations for pitchers have shifted to where now being average is very different. You know, it's, it is a higher expectation because of where the game's going. All time quote by Josh, that's why I bring it up. But you're right. Okay. Speaking of expectations, I kind of want to end on this because we go over this,

quite a bit on the show. We talk about the future of starting pitching. And now in my mind, I got a big brain, Kyle. I didn't go to college like you did, all right? University of Missouri. Sorry, I dropped out. I dropped out of college. So we're about saying.

In my big brain, the way I think about pitching and the way I think, The way I think teams are starting to think about pitching is, the days of 200 innings is long gone. It just doesn't happen. I believe there was like, I think there was nine guys that did it in all of the big leagues last year, something like that. Somewhere right around there. So those guys are few and far between.

Do you think we're getting to a point? Well, a couple questions. Number one, what is the new 200 innings? Like, what is the goal now for the starting pitchers? And then number two, do you think teams are, viewing starting pitching now as let's have seven guys that can throw four innings. Do you think it'll ever get to that? Seven guys that can throw four innings will piggyback some of them. We don't need third time through the order sucks. Let's just get these guys and kind of piggyback day in and day

out. Do you think that's the future of starting pitching? Do you still think we'll have, try to have work courses? I don't think that's the future for a full staff. because I still think there is a real benefit. Even in the playoffs, there is a real benefit to your starting pitcher getting through six innings. And whether that's in that game or a week down the road where your bullpen's a little fresher, I think there's a benefit. So I use that to say, I feel like the new 200. And it's probably easy to go back 10 years and see how many guys were over 200.

And let's find that number right now, how many of these guys are above it. I feel like 30 starts 180 is about that number because that means you're averaging six innings. There was something in the playoffs last year where I see if your pitcher starter goes six innings, you're winning 85% of playoff games. I mean, the bullpen of the Kansas City Royals in 2015 or whatever it was that pitched six innings a game, five innings a game. That might have been the anomaly, right? Like that's not how teams have won.

But I also think the starting pitcher that going to, you know, going to. 220, 230 innings. Every team is paying their seventh, eighth, ninth inning guys to do their job, and they are all so nasty. The fifth inning guy right now is so nasty. The guy that's coming in and cleaning up the starter's mess, so nasty. So why put your starter into the more tired at-risk state of the game going through that third time when you have and you have brought in these four relievers, five relievers,

to close the game out. Shorten the game as much as you can, but at the same time, realize that, man, there's benefit when my starter can get through the sixth. Even into the six, right? You talk to guys in the bullpen. If your starter can get into the sixth, every out that that bullpen has to cover unfortunately costs you dividends in two or three games. So I do think that 200 numbers changing, but I probably think it's more around that quality start number of 30 starts, 180 innings. Let's see if we can this guy average at six. Because I think in the long haul, that sets up that bullpen. A lot of good teams have that three, four-headed monster.

Let's set that three-fourheaded monster up down there to close this game. I love it. I mean, I'm on the same page with you. I do realize that you can't do that every day. You can't have a guy go five innings and rely on your bullpen to cover six through nine and do it again the next day because that's what baseball is. It's a war of attrition. I mean, we're playing 162 and 180.

and I mean, relievers can't go every day. That's just the bottom of. They're not as effective. So that's the counter argument to what I'm thinking of. But I also think like piggybacking, you know, three times through a rotation and just really having, so that would make you'd have to have eight starters, two like two legit starters and then six guys to piggyback. And maybe you rotate through that throughout the season.

I don't know. I just think there is a change in starting pitching coming, not only because teams understand that tired. state third time through the order, but also it keeps the money down. But I mean, the relievers are going up, but. We're thinking about that from a conspiracy theory negative standpoint, right? Like there's a little bit of negativity in how we're saying that. But let's just think about the logic.

Two full starters, six piggyback starters. That's eight of your 13 pitchers. So now you have five guys because you can't just throw four innings and then two days later, go out there and throw four innings if you're needed. So that's really where I think you can maybe do it with one or two spots in your starting rotation. But if you start getting above two or three, I think you're really saying, okay, if we lose today's game, regardless of how this first guy goes, he is going four innings. Regardless of how the next guy throws, he is going four innings. So you've kind of said this game is going to go how it's going to go.

And I don't think, I don't think in a long season you can afford to do that. two or three times through a rotation. Maybe I'm wrong. I feel like there are some times where teams do say whatever. Like this guy, you got to wear it. You have to. You have to. We can't throw the bullpen.

And there are times where I say, hey, there needs to be like a white flag. We're done. And as a starting pitcher, honestly, like, I think this is one thing that I started to take a little bit more pride in, you know, in the middle of my time in Minnesota, realizing that I don't want to give away innings. So if I give up two or three runs in the first two innings, I have a choice of caching it in and seeing where this game takes me, or I have a choice of,

how am I going to put up a zero for the next three? The line's going to look nasty, five innings, five runs, but you got through five, right? Like, there's a lot of value in, and sometimes I can be lost because it's not seen necessarily from the outside world, but there's a lot of value in a starter saying, listen, Skip, I know we're going through a tough stretch here.

I just threw 50 pitches in the first two innings. See if you can let me get to 100. Let me see what I can get through here. Sometimes you can get through here. Sometimes you can get through six innings and you're giving up five runs. And at the end of the day, you lose the game maybe five to one. And your bullpen comes up and smacks you on the back every time they walk in the locker room. Yep, I understand.

It's not seen, but you've seen it. And you know what that feeling is from a bullpen when that starter just guts it out and gives up some runs. But, you know, cuts into some minutes. I love it, man. You're the best, Gibby. We appreciate you coming on and giving us the state of the union for pitchers. guys let's let's get this guy on a team let's go 30 starts last year Bobby hit the music baby

I'm talking ball with you this at the core of this show that's what it's all about talking baseball you know I love it what you guys do I appreciate you man that's fun thanks Gibby you're the guy man appreciate you dude hopefully we cross paths there soon and you see that family I'm sure everybody's growing so they're growing yeah they're growing yeah they're They're doing well, man.

I know we talked yesterday about it. Yeah, that's good. All right, give Olivia our best, dude. Tell me we say hello. All right. See you guys. We'll see you next time.