Currently viewing the category: "Research"

Bradley’s Fastball-Reliant Approach Strangely Good, Not Good Enough

On May 28, 2015 By

Two-pitch pitchers are usually siphoned out of the starting pitcher pipeline and shunted to the bullpen. Archie Bradley has been a two-pitch pitcher this year, but is still a starter — in part because this whole two-pitch business is new. Bradley has had a changeup that graded well in the minors, and yet he’s thrown just 16 of them this …

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D-backs Aggressive With Stolen Bases, Situationally Smart as Well

On May 22, 2015 By

We’re 40 games into the D-backs season, roughly a quarter of the way. The team has 37 stolen bases, ranking fifth in the majors — and to get to the sixth-place Padres, you drop all the way to 31. Even better, the D-backs have only been caught stealing 11 times so far, a 77% success rate that on the surface …

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The Bat Is Back for Chris Owings

On May 20, 2015 By

Almost one quarter into the season, fourteen different D-backs position players have tallied at least ten different plate appearances. April offered some surprisingly excellent batting lines from not-(yet?)-superstars Jake Lamb and Ender Inciarte, but also some truly abysmal performances, especially from Tuffy Gosewisch and the D-backs middle infielders. The season stayed volatile when the calendar turned to May, nearly …

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Taking Inventory of Yasmany Tomas and His Adjustments

On May 19, 2015 By

At this point, there’s been a ton of talk about Yasmany Tomas, the deal he signed, and his quicker-than expected call-up to the majors. But there hasn’t been a ton of talk about his performance now that he’s arrived in Phoenix. Jake Lamb got off to a hell of a start before being injured, forcing Ryan to cry himself to …

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Does Shuffling the D-backs Lineup Matter?

On May 13, 2015 By

Messing with a major league lineup is one way to get everybody’s attention. It always seems to stoke the fire and raise a bunch of banter. Sometimes that discussion is positive, but usually it’s not since the original lineup is thought to be the one the team should be using. A departure from this seems like a step backwards, because …

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Diamondbacks Beginning to Show Their Draft Hand

On May 12, 2015 By

The MLB First Year Player Draft is less than a month away. A little while back, I provided an exceedingly early Diamondbacks draft preview. Even in the title, I called out the fact that the preview was too early to really get all that worked up about, and really, it was just meant to get some names out there …

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Is the Coors Field Carry-Over a Thing?

On May 7, 2015 By

The Diamondbacks just got done beating up on the Rockies. I can’t stand the Rockies mascot Dinger, mostly because he’s stupid. So taking two games in one day from an NL West team after having to be deprived of baseball unnecessarily for two days was extra special. Tyler Matzek really helped in game one with a game score of terrible …

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Diamondbacks Offense, Visualized

On May 5, 2015 By

Offense in baseball is a funny thing to measure. In a sense, it’s the heart of what most baseball fans watch the game for; the homers, the steals, the walk-off hits (too soon?). But the problem with offense is that it’s often inconsistent. Measuring something that comes in fits and starts can be problematic, especially when just over 20 games …

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The Effect of Josh Collmenter’s Lost Velocity

On May 1, 2015 By

Josh Collmenter has gone through some unusual role changes in his five years in the big leagues. He’s not your typical pitcher to have been pitched in a relief role and as a starter; it’s not a matter of wipeout stuff that can’t necessarily be maintained in longer bursts, or a question of bouncing back and forth because he was …

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Mark Trumbo is Giving Away Too Many Strikes

On April 30, 2015 By

The Diamondbacks have been playing Mark Trumbo pretty much every day. Scratch that, Mark Trumbo has played every day. He’s a perfect 18 for 18 in games started thus far, whether we like it or not. And why not like it? He’s hitting .324/.343/.559 through Tuesday. That’s good for a 144 wRC+, putting him among the league leaders. While that’s …

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Nick Ahmed, The Hit Tool and Expectations

On April 28, 2015 By

When Nick Ahmed was announced as the Diamondbacks’ starting shortstop, I was more than a little excited. Seeing him in person a handful of times backed up what I’d heard about his defense. It also backed up what I had heard about his (in)ability to handle the bat. But despite an okay start, the Diamondbacks have always been a sub-.500 …

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Bend it Like Bradley

On April 24, 2015 By

Coming into the season, one situation we were keeping a close eye on was Rubby De La Rosa‘s reliance on fastballs, which seemed to cause a problem for him in Boston, and seemed to make him something of a pre-breakout Dave Stewart. And yet, it’s Archie Bradley who has transformed before our eyes, throwing fastballs 75%, 71%, …

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Nick Ahmed the Key to a New Ground Ball Pitching Plan?

On April 23, 2015 By

With three full rotation turns and about a tenth of a season in the books, the D-backs pitching staff ranks 4th in ground ball percentage. It’s not a ton of time, but batted ball tendencies stabilize quickly — and the thing is, we were expecting the exact opposite. Josh Collmenter and Jeremy Hellickson have been fairly extreme as fly ball …

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Chris Owing’s Ineffective Swing is Fixable

On April 22, 2015 By

Baseball players go through slumps. You never know when they’ll arise, but they’re part of the game. And when this happens, the question you have to ask is whether it’s a case of bad luck, bad mechanics or a bad approach. Sometimes a player is just not getting the breaks while other times something is mechanically or strategically wrong. Chris …

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Why Pulling Bradley for Perez Was Just So Wrong

On April 21, 2015 By

When Archie Bradley was announced as part of the Opening Day rotation, everyone was elated. Here’s a kid who’s been the face of the player development system for the better part of four years in a time when the Diamondbacks’ prospect landscape was somewhat devoid of star power. After all, trading Trevor Bauer, Tyler Skaggs and Adam Eaton can …

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Daniel Hudson’s Devastating New Approach

On April 17, 2015 By

With a grand total of 7.1 innings pitched since June of 2012, Daniel Hudson does not have a large body of work in his current incarnation out of the bullpen. But even if there isn’t enough to do much with Hudson’s results — there is some clear evidence that he’s going about his business very differently. Whether it’s sustainable is …

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