vNumbers don't lie easily, he bites now and I am seeing a last shot in Pawtucket... Hopefully he rights his thinking then physically he can go deeper and successfully. qui sait...
Rick Porcello: What's Wrong?
- Thread starter RedOctober3829
- Start date
This is not a Porcello-specific question, but when you look at location like this, how much of this represents the pitcher's ability to hit a target vs. the catcher setting the optimal target in the first place?
Great question. I have no idea. Pitch by pitch video analysis might be able to tell. Porcello actually seems to have great command of his pitches -- at least on average -- and I've wondered if the pitch calling is an issue but have no data to support it.AB in DC said:
As abs said, I spent a while looking at Porcello's pitches this year vs. last at Location is the Key for Rick Porcello to see if there was any smoking gun explaining why his results this year are so much worse than last. My eventual conclusion was that
That said I'm not 100% convinced of that. For the sake of discussion, I'm going to show some data that I didn't include in the post. These are just quick and dirty working copies I threw together for myself, so they're not particularly pretty. I looked at hits off Porcello's pitches (specifically, total bases per pitch) compared to height above the plate, comparing 2014 to 2015.
Note, because these show total bases per pitch, the number of pitches at a particular height matters -- if there was a single pitch 5 feet high, and it got hit, there will be a tall bar, but it's insignificant in terms of overall damage. Also notice that the scales are different - the slider and change get hit a lot more than the fastballs.
I mentioned that Porcello's curve is slower and has more break this year. Here's data on that:
That said I'm not 100% convinced of that. For the sake of discussion, I'm going to show some data that I didn't include in the post. These are just quick and dirty working copies I threw together for myself, so they're not particularly pretty. I looked at hits off Porcello's pitches (specifically, total bases per pitch) compared to height above the plate, comparing 2014 to 2015.
Note, because these show total bases per pitch, the number of pitches at a particular height matters -- if there was a single pitch 5 feet high, and it got hit, there will be a tall bar, but it's insignificant in terms of overall damage. Also notice that the scales are different - the slider and change get hit a lot more than the fastballs.
I mentioned that Porcello's curve is slower and has more break this year. Here's data on that:
Oh yeah, and one other thing about looking at Porcello's pitch mix -- there's no way of clearly defining what's a two-seam fastball (sinker) and what's a four-seam fastball. As the scatterplots I posted show, the two pitch types have about the same velocity and break angle, and though the outliers have different break lengths there's no clear discriminating line; a quarter or a third of the pitches overlap, and PITCHf/x arbitrarily slaps a label on the overlapping ones. Brooks is probably much more reliable than PITCHf/x, but no one is able to say for sure just how many 4-seam and how many 2-seams he throws.
During last night's on-field postgame interview Mookie was trying to give the cliche about the starting pitcher "keeping us in the game" and he stumbled trying to remember who that night's starting pitcher was and ended up having to ask the reporter. Extra innings makes the starter feel like a long time ago, I guess.
I missed that, thanks Andrew. Must have been embarrassing for Mookie. Porcello will have to get back at him, hopefully after 3 or 4 good outings for him and in the last, Mookie gets the game winning hit and Rick pays homage to "what's his name".Andrew said:
He seems to be the one starter who has been considerably worse since Willis arrived. Maybe coincidence, maybe not.
Looking like a lost season for Porcello. Rather just get the surgery/rehab done with if he's hurt. I'm honestly more worried that it's mental. There's absolutely no reason that a guy with the weapons he has should be sucking so hard.
The game logs are ugly: http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/gl.cgi?id=porceri01&t=p&year=2015
He's had quality starts on:
April 8 against PHI
April 13 against WSN
April 29 against TOR
May 5 against TBR
May 16 against SEA
June 3 against MIN (second game of a double header.)
The other 10, including today, pretty much suck. And for perspective, TBR, PHI, MIN and SEA have worse offenses (team OPS+, YTD) than the Sox.
It's a rough sketch, but against average or above offenses, he's produced 2 quality starts out of 7. Both were in April.
Against below average offenses, he's produced 4 quality starts out of 9.
He's had quality starts on:
April 8 against PHI
April 13 against WSN
April 29 against TOR
May 5 against TBR
May 16 against SEA
June 3 against MIN (second game of a double header.)
The other 10, including today, pretty much suck. And for perspective, TBR, PHI, MIN and SEA have worse offenses (team OPS+, YTD) than the Sox.
It's a rough sketch, but against average or above offenses, he's produced 2 quality starts out of 7. Both were in April.
Against below average offenses, he's produced 4 quality starts out of 9.
Porcello has always seemed like a head case to me, I was at the game in 2009 when he and Youk tangled and like Lackey before him was never a big fan but defer to those much better at stats than I to explain the logic in this signing. He just seems like one of those who has the talent, but constantly leaves one pitch out and it gets ripped and starts a cascade. Mental fortitude comes to mind but I don't know of a statistical analysis to find out when someone doesn't have the ability to pitch beyond talent. Something is wrong with him here, I don't know if it's a "yips" thing, injury or he has fallen off a cliff but until they figure out what's causing this I think we're full on into sit him down territory. Too much $ invested if this is an injury to push him through the motions, unless he has a new baby, is awaiting sleep apnea surgery and loves fried chicken.
threecy said:
To some extent, yes. He had a .667 BABIP against today. Some of that is allowing hard contact because his pitches weren't very good, of course, but he was actually more than a little unlucky today.
http://www.fangraphs.com/liveboxscore.aspx?date=2015-07-01&team=Blue%20Jays&dh=0&season=2015#home_standard
That's not to say he didn't look bad, but it's certainly worth noting that he could have pitched the same game again and allowed far less than 7 runs.
Eh, a month or two ago people were sneering at the idea that Buchholz was better than his ERA because his peripherals said so.threecy said:
I don't know what the hell is wrong with Porcello (or Kelly) but it's not like they are the first pitchers in history to suck. But if their true talent ERA was actually 2 runs worse than their xFIP that would seem fairly unprecedented.
This pitching staff has been very strange but I don't think that means we can dismiss generally helpful statistical tools based on 100 innings... that's an inversion of how statistical analysis should work.
Snodgrass'Muff said:
I appreciate that you're trying to be a little positive but when you give up three homers and a few other hard hit balls in two innings luck is pretty low on the list of factors. Maybe he could've given up fewer than 7 runs, but I think he also could've given up more.
I think you can make an argument that Porcello has been somewhat unlucky (or victimized by bad defense) to date -- that's kind of what the 4.62 FIP and 6.08 ERA tell us.
However, the difference between him and, say, Buchholz in April, is that Buchholz's peripherals were elite. Porcello's FIP is still 15th worst in baseball (qualified SP), so saying he's been "unlucky" is of little consolation. He's still sucked regardless of how you slice it. To date, he's still had the worst DIPS predictors since his rookie season.
Worth noting -- his linear weights on his FA/sinker combo aren't too far off where they were the last couple seasons. He is getting absolutely obliterated on his changeup and slider though (they are each worth between -2 and -3 runs per 100 pitches). Some of that appears to be a control thing, given that his velocity is actually up a touch this year but we obviously saw what happened when he hung offspeed stuff this afternoon.
However, the difference between him and, say, Buchholz in April, is that Buchholz's peripherals were elite. Porcello's FIP is still 15th worst in baseball (qualified SP), so saying he's been "unlucky" is of little consolation. He's still sucked regardless of how you slice it. To date, he's still had the worst DIPS predictors since his rookie season.
Worth noting -- his linear weights on his FA/sinker combo aren't too far off where they were the last couple seasons. He is getting absolutely obliterated on his changeup and slider though (they are each worth between -2 and -3 runs per 100 pitches). Some of that appears to be a control thing, given that his velocity is actually up a touch this year but we obviously saw what happened when he hung offspeed stuff this afternoon.
Rudy Pemberton said:
He's been unlucky as the hitters are hitting the ball in areas where our fielders are not shading them.... Those areas are in the stands and bullpen.
Pete Abraham @PeteAbe 46s47 seconds ago
#RedSox are off July 6 and 9. They could easily skip Porcello until after the break. All the way to July 21 if they wanted to.
Tim Britton @TimBritton 18m18 minutes ago
Sox can skip Porcello thru ASB, go: TOR: Miley HOU: Masterson, Buchholz, Rodriguez MIA: Miley, Masterson NYY: Buchholz, Rodriguez, Miley
#RedSox are off July 6 and 9. They could easily skip Porcello until after the break. All the way to July 21 if they wanted to.
Tim Britton @TimBritton 18m18 minutes ago
Sox can skip Porcello thru ASB, go: TOR: Miley HOU: Masterson, Buchholz, Rodriguez MIA: Miley, Masterson NYY: Buchholz, Rodriguez, Miley
I don't like the idea of skipping him -- at some point we have to be concerned about Rodriguez's innings. And how much do we want to push a guy like Buchholz? I would be OK, however, with moving Porcello to the bullpen or DL stint and giving his starts to Brian Johnson or Wright.
It was a .667 BABIP because they were hitting him hard. I'm not sure how much meaning there is to single game BABIP values.
HillysLastWalk said:
Yup.
Of the six balls in play, four were rocket line drives (one hit right at Mookie for an out), a ground ball and a bunt. For being touted as a groundball pitcher, a 2:7 groundball to flyball ratio sucks.
czar said:
Yeah, at least results wise, it seems like Porcello has some serious issues on his non-fastball stuff - if you believe pitch f/x's pitch classifications, his changeup is getting crushed to a .982 OPS, and his slider hammered to a .929 OPS. Having better secondary pitches could certainly help Porcello's fastballs be a little more effective. Of course, Porcello throws mostly fastballs, but he might not have to if he could rely a little more on his other pitches.
EDIT: Unless I'm totally reading this wrong, there's something weird happening with the classification of whatever slider-type pitch Porcello is throwing. Brooks has Porcello as throwing 8 sliders all year, and pitch f/x has 153. That kind of disparity seems....strange. Does that mean Porcello's stopped throwing his slider and pitch f/x is just classifying his slower moving fastballs as sliders, or is his slider's movement so 'non-movementy' that it's now classified as just a slow moving fastball by the Brooks' system? Whatever it is, it seems like whatever slider-like pitch he's throwing probably isn't very sharp.
The idea of skipping him though is that he gets more time to work on adjustments. Difficult to do while in the rotation because you have to worry about the proper amount of rest after each start.FanSinceBoggs said:
I have to Imagine Wright would be the one to take his place and at this point I would rather see Wright get more starts. He is more likely to keep the sox in the game.
alwyn96 said:
Brooks counts the pitch as a cutter. When you have a pitch that breaks away from armside, classifications have trouble with the pitch if it's only a few mph off the FB with in between spin axis.
Whatever you want to call it, the pitch he throws sub-90mph that runs away from righties has sucked this year.
A cutter. Of course. That makes perfect sense, since every last place Sox team of the last decade has featured at least one starter's continued reliance on a damn shitty cutter.czar said:
Looking forward to more discussion about what's wrong with Porcello because something's wrong with Porcello and it may or may not be fixable. Along the lines of SM's piece on Napoli (which was great to watch along with his ab's today) - where there's some evidence that Napoli is just slowing down and can no longer survive with the plate approach that got him here - maybe Porcello's got a similar identifiable problem. Change or Die.
All I can say about Porcello today was that he threw some great low pitches in the first and the ump burned him. Did that impact anything? Who knows. What's obvious is that throwing a homerun to Encanarcion on a 3-1 count with first base open is just, well...unacceptable, and the Sox pitchers keep making those types of mistakes.
Without knowing what's wrong, a smart decision can't be made about waivers...because a team that believes he's fixable could put in a valid claim, a team like Detroit? It's still a good contract for a Porcello who lives up to his potential. Maybe he just hates clam chowder. Maybe he just wants to be a Yankee.
I can't decipher his normal stats. By some measurements, 2012, 2013 and 2014 were decent years: FIP's of 3.91, 3.53 and 3.67 - all below his lifetime average. He threw 204 innings last year (and has averaged 180 innings/year lifetime) and 200 more pitches than he's ever thrown. Is he burned?
All I can say about Porcello today was that he threw some great low pitches in the first and the ump burned him. Did that impact anything? Who knows. What's obvious is that throwing a homerun to Encanarcion on a 3-1 count with first base open is just, well...unacceptable, and the Sox pitchers keep making those types of mistakes.
Without knowing what's wrong, a smart decision can't be made about waivers...because a team that believes he's fixable could put in a valid claim, a team like Detroit? It's still a good contract for a Porcello who lives up to his potential. Maybe he just hates clam chowder. Maybe he just wants to be a Yankee.
I can't decipher his normal stats. By some measurements, 2012, 2013 and 2014 were decent years: FIP's of 3.91, 3.53 and 3.67 - all below his lifetime average. He threw 204 innings last year (and has averaged 180 innings/year lifetime) and 200 more pitches than he's ever thrown. Is he burned?
Sampo Gida said:
I think that's pretty much the story.
He has had a worse outcome in the 1st half than you'd expect and I wouldn't be surprised if he could pull himself together and get his ERA back into the upper 4's.
Maybe it all started last Sept. and there really is an answer. But - I think the most likely answer is that he's just a very mediocre/borderline shitty pitcher.
Looking back, more of us should have been up in arms over his deal.... I just think we wanted to BELIEVE.
HriniakPosterChild said:
Baloney, I usually preach patience. It was a good trade to get him, but it's not working out. Move now when there are still some clubs who believe they can turn him around.
Harry Hooper said:
Yeah, right. Let's move Porcello when his trade value is at an all-time low. Do you want the Sox to package him with Mookie and get a mid-level prospect in return? That might get it done. Or they can just toss 2015 off as an adjustment year for Porcello, and hope he returns to form as a solid #2-#3 in a good rotation.
This. It's pretty funny that Ben played Lester (who will be attached to Porcello for at least a few years in these parts) and Porcello the complete opposite ways in terms of contract negotiations..and ended up playing them both the completely wrong way.Soxfan in Fla said:
Someone earlier in the thread mentioned that Porcello is changing the way he pitches and the type of pitcher he is in some misguided attempt to justify his contract and I think that's exactly right.
A Boston beat writer wrote something yesterday (Lauber I believe) with some quotes throughout the year from Porcello and it really does seem like the vast majority of his problems are mental.
He is quoted as saying he is putting too much pressure on himself because of the contract (understandable) but the quotes that really caught my eye and made me wince were him talking about how the AL Central and AL East are completely different because the East had much better fastball hitters (in reference to why he threw his terrible change up so much yesterday) and how in Comerica if you hit a 410 foot fly ball to center it's an out and in AL East parks it's a home run.
It seems like he is so in his own head about the contract, the change in stadiums and hitters, that he is not going out there and trusting his stuff and throwing with conviction
Post-Crawford deal, you would think and hope that this would be a a bigger focus for the FO (is the player ready to play to his new deal...and do so in Boston?)tbb345 said:
With a guy like Porcello (far from an established stud), I think it's pretty clear that they should have let him "earn" the big contract. Do we really think his price would have run far away from $20MM per? Even if it did, it would have been worth it.
It's all the more befuddling when they lowballed a guy in Lester who DID have a track record of success in Boston.