I do know this isn’t actually a blind merchandise, what with the title of the article and the image on the prime and all, however bear with me for a second. I’m going to provide you some particulars a few thriller participant. Right here’s a listing of all of the transactions they’ve been concerned in since their preliminary signing in 2016:
This appears like a reasonably boring participant, proper? Some type of alternative stage journeyman, most likely a reliever given how groups shuffle them on and off the tip of the roster. It’s true: He’s a reliever, and a alternative stage one at that, similar to you’d anticipate. This explicit participant pitched to a 5.80 ERA and 4.44 FIP (4.94 xFIP, 4.35 SIERA, and so on.) in 40 1/3 innings of labor. His WAR was precisely zero throughout components of three main league seasons.
Oh, right here’s one other knowledge level. Our thriller man began the 2024 season in Triple-A, and issues didn’t go so nicely. He struck out 29.7% of the opposing batters he confronted, however walked 10.1% of them and gave up a ghastly eight homers in 34 innings of labor. That’s, uh, not nice. That’s how you find yourself with a 5.77 ERA. It’s additionally apparently how you find yourself because the reliever with the second-best ERA and finest FIP in all of baseball, and earn a job because the nearer for the Tampa Bay Rays.
That’s proper – Edwin Uceta has been top-of-the-line pitchers within the sport this yr, albeit in a small pattern of 30 1/3 innings. He’s completely embarrassing individuals on the market, drawing unhealthy swings at a comically excessive price and placing out greater than a 3rd of the batters he faces. He’s not strolling anybody or giving up homers. He’s made 20 appearances and given up runs in precisely one among them – two runs in a two-inning stint on July 30. Apart from that, he’s been good.
I might hold this text brief and candy if I needed. “The Rays acquired a reliever after which talked to him, and now he is likely one of the finest pitchers on the planet.” We get it, that is what they do. However that feels slightly bit missing right here. There needs to be extra to it. There needs to be one thing we will level to.
A fast recap of Uceta’s prospect profile coming into the yr may assist. He got here up as a kitchen-sink starter, mixing sinkers, curveballs, and changeups. His changeup was most likely his finest pitch – PitchingBot actually thought so, and it additionally obtained one of the best outcomes out of the bunch. He kills the spin on it very successfully, so it begins on a airplane together with his sinker after which simply vanishes.
The issue with Uceta’s pitch combine was two-fold. First, his sinker wasn’t something particular. It was a show-me pitch greater than the rest, a fastball he threw as a result of it’s important to throw some minimal variety of fastballs. Second, his curveball was extra fairly than efficient. It’s a kind of beautiful low-80s rainbows that appears higher than it’s as a result of our eyes love the large arc however don’t understand the dearth of velocity. It didn’t pair significantly nicely with the remainder of his choices, both. Main league hitters are outrageously good today; you’ll be able to’t simply throw them so-so pitches and get away with it.
The Rays had a number of options. The primary one was easy: Ditch the curveball. He’s thrown solely three this yr, and as befits a Tampa Bay reliever, he’s as an alternative throwing a sweeper that has comparable depth however rather more glove-side motion. To be trustworthy with you, I’m not wild about that pitch both, however he’s utilizing it sparingly, as a shock to point out righties each infrequently.
The second answer is one I’m stunned nobody landed on earlier than: Add a cutter. After I prepare dinner, I’ve a secret: If one thing doesn’t style proper, I simply hit it with slightly acid. Since I’m a good prepare dinner and likewise actually annoyingly obsessive about baseball, I say I’m “sprinkling in a cutter” after I do it. Like acid in meals, cutters appear to be a magic ingredient. They bridge motion profiles and repair platoon deficiencies. In case you don’t know what a taco wants, it’s most likely lime. In case you don’t know what a pitcher wants, it’s most likely a cutter.
This 2-D illustration doesn’t fairly do justice to what’s modified, however right here’s a graph of his pitch motion from 2022:
And from 2024:
His curveball was simply too totally different from his different pitches, too simple to determine. It fell 30 inches greater than his sinker on its path residence, and he favored to find that sinker low within the zone. You are able to do the mathematics: A curveball on airplane with the sinker was usually a bouncer, and when he needed to throw it for a strike, it needed to pop excessive out of his hand on a relative foundation. It’s exhausting to mix two pitches after they’re so totally different.
The cutter lives in that center zone that drives hitters loopy. It’s not like you’ll be able to cowl the cutter and the changeup with a single swing, any extra so than you might the curve and alter. Positive, the cutter and changeup are a lot nearer in velocity, but when Uceta aimed the 2 on the similar spot, the cutter would find yourself one thing like 10 inches increased and a foot farther to his glove aspect. The identical is true of the sinker/cutter combo; we’re speaking eight vertical inches and an analogous quantity of horizontal hole.
Oh yeah, there’s one thing I ought to inform you about Uceta’s sinker. It’s not likely a sinker, though that’s the nomenclature we use to explain it. Right here’s a technique to consider it: He throws it about 94 mph on common. A pattern cohort of 94 mph sinkerballers: Bryan Hoeing, Reese Olson, Framber Valdez, and even Chris Sale. However Uceta’s sinker doesn’t appear like these 4. It falls six inches lower than any of theirs, and with far much less arm-side run. It’s nearer to being a four-seamer than a sinker by way of motion profile — extra induced vertical break than horizontal motion.
One other method of placing it: 339 pitchers have thrown 50 or extra sinkers this yr. Solely 13 induce extra upward vertical motion than Uceta. Two of these are Aroldis Chapman and Josh Hader, which ought to offer you an concept of what big-vertical sinkerballers appear like. There’s additionally Bailey Falter and Roansy Contreras, so it’s not like flamethrowers have a monopoly on this type of pitch, but it surely’s a bizarre one for certain. In case you examine his sinker to four-seamers with comparable velocity, it seems to be quite a bit like Joe Ryan’s or Jake Irvin’s.
That brings me to the subsequent change Uceta has made in Tampa Bay: He’s redesigned his supply considerably to make the most of how his fastball works. He’s at all times been a low arm-slot man. Right here he’s in 2023:
And right here’s a sinker from 2024:
The digital camera angles aren’t perfect, however he’s undoubtedly throwing from a decrease slot now. His common launch level has fallen from a median of 5’0” to 4’7.5”. That arm slot doesn’t jive with the pitch motion; guys who throw from that low usually throw pitches that transfer horizontally. It’s like a toned-down model of Hader’s weirdo fastball; righties see the arm movement and instinctively assume it’s tailing towards them, however as an alternative numerous the motion is preventing gravity.
By dropping his launch level, he’s additionally making a phenomenally flat strategy angle. He throws the ball low and exhausting, and it rides. The result’s a pitch that hits the strike zone at a really shallow vertical strategy angle, which is strictly what you need. Pitch fashions are drooling about this new pitch. PitchingBot offers his sinker a 59 on the 20-80 scale, up from 52 in his pre-2024 profession. Stuff+ thinks it went from 100 to 131. Yeah, that’ll do. Armed with this new, four-seamer-y fastball, he’s working increased within the zone, which suggests hitters have extra to cowl after they’re attempting to determine a pitch out of his hand.
The reality is, a few of these adjustments had been already within the hopper final yr. His launch level was dropping, his fastball was getting flatter upon strike zone entry, and he’d just about ditched the curveball. However the brand new cutter has been a revelation, and his fastball has been downright overpowering in its current configuration.
It was no provided that Uceta would abruptly flip into a fantastic pitcher when he went to Tampa Bay. It’s hardly written in stone even now; a few of his greatest previous struggles have been with command, and relievers lose their grasp of the strike zone on a regular basis. It’s not exhausting to think about a world the place Uceta struggles to copy his success over a much bigger pattern, or after a winter off.
That’s not likely the purpose of this text, although. The purpose is {that a} man whose earlier main league expertise was principally a montage of packed suitcases and new locker rooms is now top-of-the-line relievers in baseball. It’s not some mirage. It’s not some fluke of small samples and batted ball luck. He’s simply this good, at the least at this very second. What are you able to do aside from marvel?