What’s fallacious with Edwin Díaz? In a single GIF, that is what’s fallacious with Edwin Díaz:
I don’t need to inform him the best way to pitch, as a result of he’s Edwin Díaz and I’m an nameless individual on the web. However placing a slider proper in Josh Bell’s nitro zone just isn’t an effective way to method a high-leverage at-bat. Bell put a great swing on it, which was hardly a given, however Díaz put himself into that scenario and paid the worth for it.
On a superficial degree, there’s not numerous uncertainty over what’s fallacious. Through the 2023 World Baseball Basic, Díaz tore his patellar tendon, after which he missed the whole thing of the season recovering from surgical procedure that repaired that tendon. He’s again on the mound, however he’s clearly not the identical pitcher that he was in his dominant 2022 season.
First, there’s his fastball. It averaged 99 miles an hour in 2022. This season, it’s sitting within the 97-98 vary, and he nonetheless hasn’t surpassed 100 mph on a single pitch. He’d go weeks in 2022 averaging triple digits. It’s a noticeable change in profile:
Now, Díaz’s fastball remains to be wonderful regardless of the decrease velocity. He’s at all times had a devastating motion profile; his arm slot and lengthy stride produce a shallow method angle that mystifies hitters on the high of the zone. Hitters are doing extra harm than regular once they make contact, however they’re nonetheless swinging and lacking loads. Let’s put it this manner: For his profession, Díaz has allowed a 71% contact price in opposition to his fastball. This yr, it’s at 66.7%. From that perspective, issues aren’t so horrible.
The issue comes along with his slider. That cement mixer to Bell isn’t an remoted incident. Díaz’s transformation from wonderful nearer to otherworldly pressure wasn’t constructed on fastballs. It was constructed on his turning that slider right into a surgical software. Take a look at this attractive map of his 2022 slider areas:
That’s almost flawless. He wore out the decrease gloveside nook with 90 mph darts. This yr, to place it mildly, he hasn’t been doing that:
Commanding that slider low and away made Díaz utterly untouchable. He threw 539 sliders in 2022. Opponents hit precisely considered one of them for further bases. In 2021, one other strong yr, he threw 378 sliders and gave up solely three doubles with it. All of these hits had been on location errors in hitter’s counts. This yr, he’s already surrendered 5 further base hits, together with three homers, off his slider. Solely one of many 1,099 sliders he threw from 2020 by means of 2022 was hit for a house run.
The simplest strategy to describe what’s gone fallacious is these two heatmaps, however in the event you’re not a visible learner, we are able to do it in numbers too. In 2022, 23.6% of his sliders ended up over the center of the plate. That quantity is as much as 32.4% this yr. Alternatively, he’s nonetheless lacking the zone badly simply as ceaselessly. He’s primarily misplaced his fantastic management of the sides of the zone, the placement the place pitchers virtually at all times win. He hit the shadow zone — the sides of the plate and the realm simply off of it — 43.1% of the time in 2021 and 38.6% of the time in 2022 with sliders. This yr, that quantity is right down to 32.4%.
The information solely will get worse from there. Díaz’s slider, like his fastball, is down a number of ticks of velocity. Sadly, its motion profile didn’t survive the decline in velocity almost in addition to the heater’s did. His slider is now inducing roughly three inches of constructive vertical break, or carry. It’s gone from falling half an inch lower than similar-looking sliders to falling two inches lower than them. For a gyro slider like his, getting the ball to fall extra is vital. You need the trail to diverge as a lot as doable from regular fastball form. As an alternative, his slider is hanging up within the zone. I feel that that is each messing along with his command and making it simpler for hitters to get the pinnacle of the bat to the ball.
Don’t simply take that motion argument from me, although. PitchingBot thinks that the slider has gone from a 77 on the 20-80 scale to a 63. Stuff+ thinks it’s gone from 165 (normalized round 100) to 119. Each fashions agree that his command has gotten worse, besides. You’ll be able to take a tour of the web to take a look at different folks’s stuff fashions, they usually’ll all agree. Díaz simply isn’t shaping the pitch like he used to. The mixture of slower pace and extra induced vertical carry simply makes it much less devastating, no two methods about it.
Sadly, the easy nature of Díaz’s decline doesn’t make it any simpler to repair. His pitches simply aren’t working like he wants them to. To make issues worse, he appears much less sure of his command – fairly so, given the change in pitch form. Not solely is he strolling 9.1% of opposing batters, his highest mark (excluding a 25-inning 2020 season) since 2017, however he’s doing so regardless of a plan to keep away from walks at any value.
When Díaz will get behind within the depend, he simply throws the ball down the center and hopes for the very best. He’s throwing 37.8% of his pitches over the center of the plate in such conditions, the best mark of his profession and among the many 15% most aggressive of pitchers throughout the league. That’s the area of pitch-to-contact and sinker-dominant varieties, not swing-and-miss closers. He hangs his slider middle-middle a surprising 41.3% of the time when he’s down within the depend. He’s by no means even approached that mark earlier than.
The answer to this sudden malaise is straightforward and but tough: Díaz must get wholesome once more. Failing that, he wants to regulate to pitching with decrease velocity and refine his slider grip to eliminate that pesky further vertical carry he’s added this yr. With the pitch’s present form, velocity, and placement, he merely can’t get away with throwing it as a main possibility. Possibly which means creating a slower, sweepier model. Possibly it means going again to working off of his fastball, saving sliders for ambushes. It’s loads more durable to hit a median slider in the event you’re making an attempt to catch as much as 98 up within the zone.
No matter what his plan is, Díaz must do one thing, and he is aware of it. He’s instructed reporters that he lacks confidence in the intervening time, and I feel that’s an effective way of explaining what’s occurring. He simply isn’t commanding and ending the slider like he’s used to, and it’s getting in his head. That simply spirals, as a result of he wants the slider in larger spots, and so forth and so forth.
The historical past of patellar tendon accidents in baseball means that Díaz will likely be fantastic with time. Former Angels hurler Garrett Richards suffered a tear in his touchdown leg and was again in motion inside eight months. Zach Eflin tore his in July 2021 and contributed to the bullpen all through 2022. Matt Strahm has had surgical procedure on each patellar tendons and is pitching higher than ever. There’s no clear path again to feeling totally wholesome, however the long-term prognosis appears to be like good.
That’s nice information, but it surely doesn’t do loads to assist out within the current. The Mets are mired under .500 regardless of some strong particular person performances; their BaseRuns report is 23-23, they usually’re nonetheless very a lot within the playoff hunt. Their bullpen has been among the many greatest in baseball regardless of Díaz’s struggles; Reed Garrett has been chic and the center innings crew has additionally been wonderful. Carlos Mendoza indicated that Díaz will tackle some lower-leverage work whereas he rounds again into kind. That looks as if a great plan to me. This isn’t a case of a supervisor reacting to small-sample-size struggles. Díaz is simply worse proper now. The trumpets will certainly play in Citi Area once more, however their conductor must get proper first.