Point Blank – June 30
Will Matz be a Mess for the Mets (The Psychology of Pitching, Part 200-something)…It’s a New York, New York play day (here comes that Texas bullpen again)…The markets have misplaced Bumgarner/Overton into a bargain bin…
Most of the MLB days are spent poring through statistics to find edges from those taking the pitching mound, but for the shrewd baseball handicapper it should not be left there – the psychology of the guys on the mound is often every bit as important as what they can generate from their arm. These issues get written about here quite often, and it is time to go to Queens tonight, for a full Eye Test on Steven Matz. With a side project having me reading the lectures of William Blake on “Pragmatism” (extremely accessible, long before the post-Freud world created a jargon that can obfuscate as often as it clarifies), the mind is set for that direction, and this evening there will also be a financial interest as well.
Matz is a great young talent, opening at 11-3/2.96, with a 3.15 FIP, and his slider is not only one of the fastest in the sport (only Noah Syndergaard and Jake Arrieta throw that pitch at a higher velocity), but one of the best, certainly premier among left-handers. But Matz has a bone spur in his elbow, and will be pitching through it tonight, after this start was pushed back for a day.
This brings all sorts of issues into play, especially for someone that has just turned 25, and only has 19 MLB starts behind him (and only a half-season at AAA). That means time to get to work, because the markets are pricing him as being at full health, and not potentially damaged goods.
Let’s start with Mets GM Sandy Alderson, who brings what is anything but a glowing optimism - “We will continue to monitor his situation but at this point it’s a function of whether he can tolerate the discomfort while continuing to pitch. At the same time, what we will do is monitor that level of discomfort, monitor his mechanics to make sure whatever discomfort he has doesn’t cause him to do something that leads to something else, and we’ll monitor it on a start-by-start basis.”
Not exactly a ringing endorsement. How about Matz himself - “I’ve been doing it up to this point so it’s something that as long as they feel comfortable with me being out there with the way I’m pitching then I think I’m going to battle through. That’s the mindset, just get it all behind me and go out and pitch.”
When someone’s success level is based on cutting it loose on the mound, being willing to throw a slider at an average of 93.4 mph, you don’t want the GM talking about “level of discomfort”, and you sure as hell don’t want the pitcher himself believing that he is out there to “battle through”. Fortunately we have a contributor to these forums that knows much about this issue, Jake Dittler being I believe the only PB regular that has his own page at Baseball Reference (you will note there that he was once a Top 100 prospect when healthy), with the scars of Tommy John surgery the difference between AAA and his chance to pitch in The Show. This advice will be valuable to all of us, and will only cost me a couple of beers -
“The key from here is figuring out how he does pitching with the pain. If he starts to compensate due to the injury, it will lead to more serious injuries in the elbow or possibly the shoulder. Some other issues are different injuries affect different pitches. So while my ligament was torn (unbeknownst to me) the toughest pitch for me was in fact my fast-ball. I couldn't get any extension on my follow through that you need in order to complete a pitch to the opposite arm side. But my curve and slider were actually easier since the torque was lower. From what I know about bone spurs is that then can end up leading to an elbow that won't straighten - I've known plenty of pitchers walking around with their throwing arm cocked in a 35 degree angle.”
And that is just the physical issue…
“But the biggest question mark, is the mental aspect of it. That's one thing that unless you have been through it, you won't know how to deal with it. Even if you have, it never gets easy. After all, that arm and all of its pieces are your money maker.
The one thing I'll add on, and it might be almost the most important aspect on the physical side of an injury is when you are dealing with pain, it limits your ability to maintain your routine as you normally would. Maybe you don't get to throw as much on your side day. Even playing catch every day has its struggles. Maybe you take a day off every week to rest a little. They are even talking about a six-man rotation and we saw what that did to Harvey last year. Imagine a golfer that can't do very much work on the range, then trying to make shots in a tournament when it matters most. You will have a shade of doubt whether you are fully prepared.
Pitching requires "feel" probably more than any other sport. So if you are not able to continue to work on your craft in between starts, that will have a negative affect as well. I certainly remember throwing bullpens while my elbow was hurting and feeling like "what's the point?" I was in so much pain, it seemed like a waste. When you are throwing a side, there isn't the adrenaline of a hitter in the box or thousands of fans to help mask the pain. So that really hampers your work.”
Many thanks to Jake for that, and I bring this this front and center today because we saw how tentative Noah Syndergaard was at Washington on Monday, when he knew that he was pitching with a bone spur, though his injury is considered less serious than that of Matz. Now Matz not only knows that he has some damage to work with, but is coming off a terrible outing at Atlanta, the Braves getting to him for six runs on nine hits over 4.1 innings, without a single strikeout of the 21 batters faced. And that was against an offense that is #29 in AVG, #29 in OBP, #30 in SLG and #30 in OPS. Now he gets pushed back a day, his usual between-starts flow having been altered, and he goes from facing one of the worst offenses in the game to one of the best.
Item: Those Syndergaard and Matz elbows are magnified because the Mets lineup stinks
Originally they wanted to bill the first Chicago/New York series of the season as a prelude to October, but as it stands now the Mets won’t be there later. The offense has been dismal, rating #25 in OPS for the full season, but for the month of June it has been even worse –
Mets June production
AVG OBP SLG OPS
.236 (29) .303 (28) .374 (29) .676 (29)
And what was a quality defense in that 2015 run has also been a major letdown, falling from #3 last year to the current #13 in PADE (FanGraphs has them all the way down at #26 across their defensive measurements). They were thumped 20-6 in what was supposed to have been a showdown series in Washington, and that margin was despite the Nationals having nine fewer offensive outs to work with. The New York offense has scored more than four runs just one time in the last dozen games, vs. Aaron Blair, and in seven of those outings got held to two runs or less.
As such, I don’t think this price is in the right range, and in a moment I will show how I plan to work with it. But first there is some other business to attend to in New York.
Item: The Texas bullpen was a factor last night, and will be again today
Time here to follow up from yesterday because that key notion also comes front and center. The Ranger bullpen is not MLB’s worst because the Cincinnati Reds exist, but an ERA of 4.88 and an FIP of 4.87 would put you at the bottom of the list in just about any other season (the 2013 Houston Astros are the only team in the last five years to finish with worse ERA and FIP counts). And for as effective as closer Sam Dyson has been, this is his first season in the role, and he is subject to wearing down both physically and mentally, which means that last night’s ninth inning in the Bronx could become a difficult thing for him to work around.
So what does that leave Jeff Bannister with? A headache for this night-to-day setting, because he has to be cautious about bringing A. J. Griffin along. Griffin labored out to 91 pitches over 4.1 innings in his first start off of the DL, and in his first campaign back on MLB mounds since 2013 (he sat out 2014 completely, and only worked 14.1 IP in the Minors last year), they have to be thinking more long-term than short-term with him.
That leads to some value today because I continue to see much better things from Michael Pineda than a 3-7/5.51 indicate, and the advanced metrics agree, with FIP at 3.91, xFIP at 3.36 and SIERA at 3.37. Also note that those numbers don’t factor the quality of competition – of the 107 pitchers at 70 innings or more his DBF is #7. Pineda had a mechanical problem working from the stretch earlier that has now been corrected, and while he did not get credit for a win in either of his last three starts it was 25 strikeouts vs. only three walks allowed, the Yankees winning two of the games.
Behind Pineda all key arms of the Yankee Terrific Trio are rested and ready today, which means that New York may well have the better pitcher on the mound for all nine innings this afternoon, with a reduced chance of Texas needing a pitcher in the ninth. So let’s put the day together...
In the Sights…
Pit the Cubs lineup up against the Mets in a series of one-on-one position drafts, and how many Mets would be starting? While John Lackey’s outcomes have not been as good in his last two starts he still showed plenty of pop, with 11 K.s in 10.1 frames across that span. So Chicago fits in New York, as do the Yankees. But I believe there is a way to maximize the opportunities because of what the markets are doing with a West Coast game this morning, San Francisco having dropped from -175 to as low as -140 despite the presence of Madison Bumgarner on the mound against the not-ready Dillon Overton.
So here we go: #921 San Francisco/#910 NY Yankees Parlay (1:05 Eastern) and #921 San Francisco/#905 Chicago Cubs Parlay (7:10 Eastern).
This is not only a way to maximize the opportunities beforehand, but also to leave open the prospect for taking it a step further later on – with the Giants starting late the first two legs will have been determined, and should the Yankees and/or Cubs come in, there can be an opportunity to work the game a bit late-night, since I believe the markets will drift San Francisco back up, creating the opportunity to buy back a piece of Oakland +1.5 if the right price point shows. Get the Giants home 4-3 in that scenario, and you will be pleasantly surprised when you do the figures tomorrow morning.
Overton won his MLB debut against the Angels but it was pure sleight of hand – Mike Trout, Kole Callhoun and Albert Pujols all tagged him for home runs, and those three dingers happened to match his strikeout count of the 26 batters faced, which is never a good sign. But of the six Angels that reached base without hitting a HR, none came around to score. Baseball allows Overton a win for that uninspiring effort, and does not grade too harshly with ERA at 4.76; FIP looks at the same game and shouts a 10.04.
Meanwhile Bumgarner is exactly the kind of competitor you want to not just be The Stopper for a team losing streak, but also to end a two-game skid of his own, though he did not do all that much wrong in either (four runs over 14.1 IP, with more strikeouts than base-runners allowed).
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