Thinking About Sinking | FanGraphs Baseball

Final week, Justin Choi wrote an interesting article about sinkers. You must learn it, as a result of Justin’s stuff is nice, however I’m going to summarize it right here as a result of I wish to riff on it slightly bit. In essence, Justin identified what all of us type of knew however didn’t speak about a lot: sinkers are a lot better in opposition to same-handed batters. Groups have caught on, and so they’re altering utilization accordingly.

Right here’s an ideal chart from that article: the share of all right-handed sinkers which can be thrown to right-handed batters:

That’s fairly easy: pitchers are more and more utilizing sinkers solely once they have the platoon benefit. Right here’s one other method of it: the share of sinkers amongst all pitches thrown by righties to lefties, league-wide:

In plain English, pitchers have stopped throwing sinkers once they’re confronted with opposite-handed batters. In the meantime, they’re throwing proper/proper sinkers as incessantly as ever:

These two charts hardly appear to be the identical pitch, and actually they aren’t actually. Righty pitchers are literally taking part in two barely completely different video games: they’re pitching to same-handed batters and individually pitching to opposite-handed hitters. The item of each video games is to get the batter out, so it’s not just like the video games are that completely different, nevertheless it’s inconceivable that the identical pitches could be finest in opposition to each side.

Let’s delve slightly deeper into why sinkers benefit this enormous break up utilization. At a primary stage, the argument is fairly easy. Check out groundball price, wOBA on contact, chase price, and whiff price for sinkers thrown by right-handed pitchers in 2023, break up by handedness of opposing batters:

Extra grounders and the ensuing decrease manufacturing on contact are the important thing variations right here. As a degree of comparability for a way platoon-sensitive a pitch is, right here’s the identical chart for four-seam fastballs:

4-seamers permit louder contact than sinkers and make up for it by lacking extra bats. However they permit comparable manufacturing on contact whatever the handedness of the batter.

To be honest, there are some choice results right here. A few of the sinkers thrown by righties in opposition to lefties are from pitchers who merely don’t have anything higher to throw, and people guys are typically dangerous. Each results shrink if we have a look at particular person pitchers and evaluate their outcomes in opposition to lefties and righties. However the general form of the impact is obvious. Until you’re throwing a selected subset of sinker, as Cam Levy wrote about earlier this 12 months, the platoon impact is vastly vital.

The overall thought right here is easy: throw your finest pitches typically. What’s modified is how groups and pitchers are deciding what’s finest. To get an instance of this, I made a decision to make use of two groups as a case examine. First, we’ve received the 2014 Pirates, the foremost instance of the mid-2010s sinker pattern. Their starters threw sinkers a whopping 43.4% of the time. We’ll additionally have a look at the 2022 Phillies, whose starters threw probably the most sinkers in baseball final 12 months (28.5%). The best way these two groups use their pitches is emblematic of the period every is from.

First, check out Pittsburgh’s starters from that 12 months:

This group is everywhere in terms of pitch utilization, however broadly talking, they have been equal alternative sinker throwers. Morton and Locke threw theirs far more incessantly with the platoon benefit, however the remainder of the crew didn’t actually. In mixture, Pirates hurlers decreased their sinker utilization by solely 5 share factors once they didn’t have the platoon benefit.

How’d that work for them? Not notably properly:

When thrown to same-handed batters, Pirates sinkers have been phenomenally efficient, permitting a wOBA round .330 when the opposition put the ball in play. When thrown to opposite-handed pitchers, these sinkers have been stinkers, permitting a wOBA of .379. Single-pitch platoon splits are tremendously noisy, so don’t learn an excessive amount of into any single pitcher’s line, however the broad level stays: these sinkers received creamed when hitters had the handedness edge. And this wasn’t a foul pitching employees; they have been second within the majors in WAR.

That was the sinker-iest crew of 2014, maybe the sinker-iest 12 months in baseball historical past. How does the 2022 model evaluate? Issues have modified, and but some practices stay the identical. Listed below are the Phillies starters who threw sinkers final 12 months (excluding opener Cristopher Sánchez):

Instantly, you may see that utilization patterns have modified. Did you see these graphs up on the prime of the article? The Phillies had loads to do with these. How’d they fare with their strategy? Pretty properly:

Bailey Falter is bizarre. Even accounting for that, although, the change in sample is obvious. Most Phillies starters threw way more sinkers when going through same-handed batters than they did when opposite-handed batters have been up. Like their time-shifted Pirates counterparts, they ran the next groundball price and allowed a decrease wOBA on contact in opposition to same-handed hitters. Weighted by variety of sinkers thrown, Phillies pitchers had a 9.5% groundball edge and 27-point wOBACON edge once they had the platoon benefit. They leaned into that hole by ditching sinkers once they weren’t set as much as succeed.

I’m undecided you’d consider the Phillies as a sinker-first pitching employees. I consider them extra as a top-heavy pitching employees than the rest; Nola, Wheeler, and Suárez are wonderful, and the remainder of the rotation is sketchy. However they threw extra sinkers than four-seamers, and received higher outcomes with them. In reality, they received the perfect manufacturing on their sinkers out of any crew in baseball. It won’t result in a bestselling e book anytime quickly, however simply because sinkers are out of trend doesn’t imply groups aren’t utilizing them properly.

As Justin talked about in his article, this type of handedness optimization is sweeping throughout baseball, and with good motive. You must fill that hole in utilization by some means — changeups, four-seamers, cutters, no matter your favourite impartial possibility is — nevertheless it’s a change value making. Sinkers are wonderful pitches, notably in the event you use them proper, and the league appears to be getting higher at simply that. It feels bizarre to deal with a fastball like a slider and put it in your again pocket in opposition to opposite-handed hitters, however you may’t combat the mathematics, so that you would possibly as properly be part of it.