Rasputin said:Still, it's encouraging.
The five walks vs seven Ks part really isn't. Seeing his 4-seamer stay consistently around 92 was a nice sign, though. If he can keep that up, I think the big struggles will stay in the past.
Rasputin said:Still, it's encouraging.
"As far as stuff goes, I feel like I had the best stuff in this start, velocity-wise, that I had all year," the Boston Red Sox pitcher said Wednesday night. "There's absolutely nothing physically bothering me."
So, what is it, then? Manager John Farrell insisted "it looks mechanical in nature," ticking off all the things that Buchholz did wrong Wednesday night: rushing his body ahead of his arm, falling behind too often with pitches up in the zone, finding the middle of the plate with pitches when he did bring them down, lacking the late finish he typically has on his cutter.
And Buchholz again bemoaned the lack of feel for his changeup, a pitch that he has thrown with devastating effect in the past.
"My whole career, my changeup has been my main pitch," he said. "To not have the feel for it every time it's called, that's putting added stress there. I've got to figure out how to find the command and control of the changeup."
But Buchholz is too experienced a pitcher, Juan Nieves too accomplished a pitching coach, and Farrell too in tune with what makes a pitcher tick for them not to have made the necessary corrections by now.
While he was warming up in the outfield on Wednesday, Buchholz finally, found his changeup -- the knee-buckling, hitter-baffling changeup that made him one of the top prospects in the game and a Cy Young contender two years ago.
"It was right before the game when I started warming up, throwing it," he said. It was probably a mental thing going on with it, thinking about it too much. I just started throwing it and thinking of it as a fastball just with a different group. It came out well a couple of times."
absintheofmalaise said:We had a thread on CB back in 2012 that has some excellent data in it. Much of which, IMO, is relevant this season since one of the main issues seems to be his lack of an effective change up and he was having similar issues then. He eventually remembered how to throw it and it became a very effective pitch for him again. Here is a quote from an article by BMac from May 2012. Post 107.
If Buchholz is hiding an injury, then he really is an idiot after what happened to him in 2011.Anyone remember 2011? Specifically, the year John Lackey pitched like shit the entire season and nobody could figure out why until it was revealed he was injured?
Clay Buchholz, 2014.
judyb said:If Buchholz is hiding an injury, then he really is an idiot after what happened to him in 2011.
Snodgrass'Muff said:
I thought it was later revealed that he was asked to pitch through his injury because of the insane amount of pitching injuries they were already dealing with.
If he's hiding an injury I doubt he would be able to reach 93mph on his FB. Based on what he has said about not throwing it and the data at brooksbaseball.net not being able to throw an effective change makes the most sense to me. When he is on with that pitch it can be devastating to hitters.Adrian's Dome said:Anyone remember 2011? Specifically, the year John Lackey pitched like shit the entire season and nobody could figure out why until it was revealed he was injured?
Clay Buchholz, 2014.
Buchholz is not injured. Both the pitcher and the manager made that clear in the aftermath of the third straight battering Buchholz had endured, this time nine hits and another half-dozen rockets to the outfield that were caught in 4 2/3 innings pitched. His ERA stands at 6.32 — and his confidence, understandably, looks shaken. But he still is expected make his next start in Atlanta on Monday.
Compounding the problem for Buchholz is that he’s pitching with a depleted arsenal. He doesn’t have his changeup. He doesn’t have his curveball. He doesn’t really have his splitter, either. He might as well be pitching with one arm tied behind his back.
“I’ve got to figure out how to command and control the changeup,” he said after the game Wednesday night.
That leaves Buchholz with primarily a fastball-cutter repertoire — making him as easy to time up as a batting-practice pitcher. Any secondary pitches that ordinarily would disrupt hitters’ timing have been coming in nowhere near the strike zone.
nvalvo said:What is that pitch he keeps missing with high to the arm side?
absintheofmalaise said:
nvalvo said:
Nope. If it was easy, it would be fixed already and this thread would be back on the second page.soxhop411 said:
Ryan Hannable @RyanHannable 2h
John Farrell and pitching coach Juan Nieves stayed late at Fenway last night reviewing film on Buchholz. He's not repeating delivery.
Scott Lauber @ScottLauber 2h
Farrell/Nieves stayed up late last night analyzing video of Buchholz. Consensus remains that his mechanics are flawed. #RedSox
So this should be an easy fix.. Right?
I read his post as a criticism of Lackey, since he brought him up in responding to a post about Buccholz. If I was reading him incorrectly, mea culpa.Reverend said:
That was Lackey. Buchholz was shut down in August when they found out he had a stress fracture in his frickin' back.
In 2010 he enjoyed a year of singular dominance, going 17-7 with a 2.33 ERA. The next year he had a 5.33 ERA through the first month of the season before settling into familiar excellence for the next seven weeks (before non-displaced fractures in his lower back cost him the final 3 1/2 months of the year). And in 2012 he had a 9.09 ERA through six starts and a 7.84 mark through nine starts -- yes, a worse performance than he has endured to the same stage of the 2014 season -- before authoring a sub-3.00 ERA in his next 19 starts.
Bowden said today that he thinks Clay's up and down performances don't indicate a simple control issue. He thinks Clay's pitching through a shoulder issue and the only way to confirm is an MRI.absintheofmalaise said:Nope. If it was easy, it would be fixed already and this thread would be back on the second page.
soxhop411 said:
Ryan Hannable @RyanHannable 2h
John Farrell and pitching coach Juan Nieves stayed late at Fenway last night reviewing film on Buchholz. He's not repeating delivery.
Scott Lauber @ScottLauber 2h
Farrell/Nieves stayed up late last night analyzing video of Buchholz. Consensus remains that his mechanics are flawed. #RedSox
So this should be an easy fix.. Right?
This is the year where Clay's raw talent combined with his experience should have led to consistent success. He should be competing with Lester for staff ace. No more waiting. Check him out thoroughly. He won't be able to follow through properly if his shoulder is not at full strength. More throwing could mean more damage.Montana Fan said:Bowden said today that he thinks Clay's up and down performances don't indicate a simple control issue. He thinks Clay's pitching through a shoulder issue and the only way to confirm is an MRI.
wine111 said:This is the year where Clay's raw talent combined with his experience should have led to consistent success.
Problem is with the 32 start metric, he's never started more than 29 games in the majors. If you were to look at 2010 (first full year in the majors) - 2013, he's averaging 21.75 starts, which is not what you'd expect from a #3 starter.Savin Hillbilly said:All the ups and downs have added up to a solid though unspectacular pitcher. If you take his 7+ year career and condense it to four years, he has averaged 32 starts, 197 innings, a 15-9 record, 150/75 K/BB, and 3.1 fWAR per year along with his 3.76 ERA. That guy is a solid #3 starter, a rock-of-the-rotation type, a Derek Lowe or a Tim Hudson.
threecy said:Problem is with the 32 start metric, he's never started more than 29 games in the majors. If you were to look at 2010 (first full year in the majors) - 2013, he's averaging 21.75 starts, which is not what you'd expect from a #3 starter.
Is it the same training staff? The Clement injury happened in 2005. I am almost positive the Red Sox have changed their medical and training staff since 2005Plympton91 said:I know the Red Sox strength program is universally lauded, but if I remember right they kept saying Matt Clement was passing all the shoulder strength tests too until they did an arthogram and discovered it was spaghetti.
Hard to believe this all basically started with a baby sleeping on his shoulder. But, perhaps that fall he endured a couple starts after that story came out is the real cause of all the trouble. That fall could have screwed something up.
http://www.providencejournal.com/sports/red-sox/content/20140526-as-red-sox-ponder-clay-buchholzs-future-questions-about-health-persist.ece
ATLANTA — Following another hideous performance from Clay Buchholz on Monday, pitching coach Juan Nieves said what fans watching Buchholz all year have openly thought.
“I wonder how healthy he is.”
Nieves’ postgame statement runs counter to what Buchholz has insisted, to the media and to the front office, about how he feels physically. Before Monday’s start, general manager Ben Cherington said that Buchholz is “adamant that he feels good physically.”
“I’m healthy,” Buchholz said after Monday’s 8-6 win over the Braves. “I’m going to take the ball whenever they give it to me. I’m never beaten before I step on the field. It seems to snowball on me right now as far as getting out there and giving up a couple hits in a row.”
Buchholz has said repeatedly that the issues he’s currently enduring don’t stem from a current physical problem, but rather from mechanical ones brought on by compensating for his injury last season.
“Whenever you are hurt, you try to find a way to throw so it doesn’t hurt,” Buchholz said. “And that might not be the exact same way you pitched prior to that. There’s a little rust in-between last year’s and this year’s mechanics.”
“The movement is back; the controlling of the movement isn’t,” Nieves said. “It happens to guys that get injured. They forget. They’ve been nursing an injury, so they forget actually how they throw. They might have the same delivery, but the arm angle or the little things that have to be there don’t play.”
Buchholz’s spiral has been hard to break because the consistently poor results — even his best starts have looked shaky at times, and the contact against him has been hard throughout the season — have eroded his confidence. Buchholz’s start in last year’s World Series suggested to the pitcher that he could get by without his best stuff; this season has cross-examined that idea with impunity.
“When you’re out there thinking about getting big-league hitters out and thinking about three different types of mechanics you were doing in the bullpens, it makes it that much harder,” Buchholz said. “I felt really good in the bullpen, commanding everything. It’s tough to do in-game; it has to be second-nature at that point. I have to get to the point where I’m not thinking about anything — just throwing the baseball like I have been my whole life.”
“Of course there’s an issue of confidence,” said Nieves. “Sometimes you see [positive results] in the bullpen, and you’re hoping for it during the game. It was a challenge for him. Of course we saw it, almost to the point of evading contact.”
Indeed, Buchholz smashed his prior career-high for walks on Monday, issuing eight in three-plus innings. He’d never handed out more than five before. Those free passes almost seemed strategically delivered to the Braves hitters that could do the most damage, as he walked both Jason Heyward and Freddie Freeman three times apiece. Of course, it’s not really managing a lineup when you’re putting that many runners on in such a short span.
“Inside the game, the command was erratic,” manager John Farrell said. “We just tried to get him through as many outs as possible.”
Buchholz threw fewer than half of his 88 pitches for strikes, even against a team as free-swinging as Atlanta. After allowing six runs while recording only nine outs, his ERA is up to 7.02.
Two seasons ago, Buchholz carried a 7.19 ERA into June. That time, though, he had at least made some encouraging strides of late. This time, there were no positives.
“We won. That’s about it,” Buchholz said when asked what positives he could take away from Monday’s start. “Nothing for myself.”
Farrell said there had not been a determination about whether Buchholz would make his next start Saturday against the Rays. That’s in contrast to Buchholz’s last start, when Farrell declared afterward that Buchholz would make this start in Atlanta.
“We’ve got to look at this a little bit closer,” Farrell said. “We’ve got to continue to talk about what he’s currently going through and what’s best for him and what’s best for us.”
“If I wasn’t healthy, [skipping a start] might be an option in my mind,” Buchholz said. “I’m not really helping the team right now either; that comes from higher up. I’m sure I’ll hear from them shortly.”
With Boston running through all but one of its relievers Monday, the team could use another arm in the bullpen Tuesday. Placing Buchholz on the disabled list — with whatever — would be the simplest means of accomplishing that end.
Bard was an easy call, since he'd gone wild, literally, in his first full year in pro ball, and was reworked as a reliever in the instructional league. And when Buchholz started 2008 in a funk, you got an idea that he might be one of those up-and-down "aces." His whole career has been manic-depressive.HomeRunBaker said:At this point I'm willing to bet that Ranaudo gets Clay's start this weekend on his normal rest. What were the odds 3 years ago that two of our organizations best arms would both go Bard and Buchholz on us?
absintheofmalaise said:We had a thread on CB back in 2012 that has some excellent data in it. Much of which, IMO, is relevant this season since one of the main issues seems to be his lack of an effective change up and he was having similar issues then. He eventually remembered how to throw it and it became a very effective pitch for him again. Here is a quote from an article by BMac from May 2012. Post 107.