The Stuff report is winding down! After this one, there will be one more official Stuff report. After that – who knows. The abyss??? One thing is for sure – I will miss screwing up Joshua Howsam’s entire schedule by telling him there’s a Stuff report coming (only to realize that I had already done one the week before). I’ll need to find new ways to screw with his schedule (Editor’s Note: Dr. Sonne should be careful how he messes with his editors. Who knows what we could do to his posts?!)
Starting Pitchers
The Jays starting staff hit some bumps along the way, but in the past week – they have been lights out again. Estrada has turned in some amazing performances recently, and J.A. Happ now has 20 wins on the season. I don’t think there are many Jays fans that could have predicted that one. Recently, Marcus Stroman has looked a lot like the ace we expected him to be as well – and Sanchez… not much more you can say about his dominance.
I have written before about drops in Stuff indicating that there may be a chance someone is injured. J.A. Happ has seen such a jump – but I will tell you why there is no cause for concern. A couple of weeks ago, Joshua Howsam wrote Happ, and the separation he gets between his four seam and two seam fastball. The gap between the two pitches is the biggest in the majors – and it’s leading to a lot of swings and misses. His fastball is without question the biggest weapon in the Happ arsenal. When you have such a weapon – why bother throwing anything else? That’s exactly what is happening with Happ’s stuff. To account for one-off pitches, or pitches that are not regularly thrown, I have declared that a pitch must be thrown 10% of the time to be included in the Stuff report. Happ does not have anything that he throws greater than 10% of the time – and as a result, that great separation is not seen. There are many ways to get hitters out in the big leagues – Stuff in this sense, is not what Happ uses to dominate.
Speaking of fastball dominant pitchers – I had written about calculating Stuff throughout the entirety of the MLB PITCHF/x era on my own site. I combed through the annals of history, to find out what other pitchers looked similar to Stroman, and one of the most similar looking pitchers was the 2007 incarnation of Roy Halladay. Stroman has a slightly better fastball, and a harder breaking ball – so his stuff looks a bit better than Roy’s. Remember, Roy had some bumps along the way before he became the dominant Cy Young winner we all know and love. The next few years of Stroman’s development are going to be very exciting.
Relief Pitchers
Joe Biagini continues to lead the way for the Jays bullpen with his stuff – and after a brief lull in the middle of August, his stuff has continued to ascend into the stratosphere. In fact, when you look at all pitchers who have thrown this season – and who have enough data to have their Stuff calculated (there are 614), Biagini sits at #35. This guy was a Rule 5 selection, and will likely go down as one of the best Rule 5 picks the Jays have ever had (note, one of. I have not forgotten George Bell). Without a doubt, he has seen some more difficult outings recently – and that might be due to the fact he’s putting in more work now than he ever has in his career.
The other arms in the back of the Jays bullpen continue to impress as well. Jason Grilli and Joaquin Benoit were picked up off the scrap pile from the Braves and Mariners, respectively. Their stuff on the season looks like it has in previous years – indicating that father time has decided to spare them both from his clutches in 2016! As long as that stuff remains, we’ll get to keep seeing Grilli celebrate his clutch punchouts.
I wonder what Christmas morning would be like at the Grilli house. pic.twitter.com/8HviQRlkpK
— Ian Hunter (@BlueJayHunter) September 25, 2016
That’s it for Volume 12 of the Stuff Report! Hit me up on Twitter if you have any Stuff or pizza related questions.