[THIS ORIGINALLY APPEARED SEPTEMBER 23, 2010]
I love the Internet. I came across a website from a grad student who was doing neat things with heat charts and other stuff relating to baseball, tapping into my inner geek (and my outer geek). A few emails and a request later, and Brian Mills at Prince of Slides sent me what you will see below. One thing about me, I am always and will always be open to sharing this space with talented folks like this who bring a new slant to this old game.
With that, let’s leverage Brian’s charts and graphs and deep dive on AJ Burnett (you can click on each chart/graph to expand):
Where’d AJ’s fastball go? According to Brian, the dark line in the box represents the average speed per inning and Burnett’s average FB is down some 1+ MPH this year and down 2 MPH from 2007. Now, according to FanGraphs, AJ’s throwing that FB more often than last year (69.0% vs 65.9%) at the expense of his curve ball (27.4% vs 31.0%). Does this matter? Well, AJ’s FB “value” remains negative (as it was last year) but less so, so it’s less bad, as it were. The real problem seems to be that his CB value, once a major strength of AJ has turned negative: 16.0 last year vs -3.9 this year.
Much has been made about AJ’s declining (plummeting?) K rate, which currently stands at 7.0/9IP, down nearly 1.5 from last year and and down 2.5+ from his career high (9.56 per) in 2007 in Toronto. AJ’s swinging strike %, per FanGraphs, is at a career low 7.9%. Add a declining FB to a now-ineffective CB and you have AJ Burnett, circa 2010.
We’ve spoken about AJ plenty here this year, but this is a new look at the problem.
AJ’s ineffectiveness really manifests itself with 2-strike counts. With the charts below, you can see that Burnett is less in-the-zone this year versus last year. Could that be because of his decreased FB? No matter the reason, AJ’s staying away from the zone with two strikes, allowing batters to wait for something more to their liking.
Up, up and away! The heat charts below shows the swinging strike locations for AJ. This year, more strikes up in the zone. Up in the zone is bad news. Hits/9 are up this year (9.8 vs 8.4 last year), HR/9 slightly higher at 1.21, while K/9 are down (as mentioned earlier) at 7.0 vs 8.5 last year. Is this his ineffective curveball manifesting itself? If it’s not diving down, it’s getting hit.
Location, location, location. I’ll let Brian explain this one: “The chart below seems to show Burnett getting less called strikes up in the zone (more blue up top in the 2010 plot). This could be for one of two reasons: 1) he’s not throwing as many pitches up in the zone or 2) he’s not getting that call this season. But, since we see that he’s getting more swinging strikes up in the zone from the previous plot, maybe people are just swinging more at those pitches and therefore there are less strikes CALLED up in the zone.” Sounds good to me. The chart:
Ahead in the count, behind in the count. Here are the charts of AJ pitching both ahead and behind in the count, this year versus last:
Just for giggles. And lastly, a contrast of AJ and Mariano Rivera:
In AJ We (have to) Trust | It's About The Money…
I found your entry interesting do I’ve added a Trackback to it on my weblog
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OT, but watching Lee pitch Game 3, I couldn't help but recall the above chart of Mariano's pitches. Even on the 11 pitch ab that Swisher worked, virtually every pitch Lee threw (going by TNT's pitchtrak) was either outside the zone or clearing defining the outside edges of it. It was amazing.
Batter after batter – pitches consistently on the edges. Only difference between Lee and Mo was that Lee did it for 8 innings. The only pitch I recall that Lee put down the center was to Jeter – and that one, Derek took, allowing Gardner to steal second.
Should Mr. Mills ever chart Lee's work for last night's game, I imagine it would look like the corona surrounding a black hole.