Or, rather, his slider isn’t, and Arrieta’s slider’s success is essentially a metonym for Arrieta’s success. farther from the third base side)–is an insidious combination that has sapped the righty’s ability to locate his pitches, and also, as we’ll see, to generate swings and misses.Ībout those whiffs: Arrieta isn’t getting them. The fusion of these two elements–higher release point, and closer to center (i.e. Arrieta’s hit the center quadrant just below the strike zone nearly ten percent of the time this year, by far the most of any identifiable quadrant via Brooks’ PITCHf/x, and 80 percent more often than in 2015. This is only with pitches down in the zone. Another result of Arrieta’s mechanical changes this season is poor location: compared to last season, the righty is missing more toward the center of the zone, failing at keeping the ball away to right-handed hitters. So, when we look at the past three months of Arrieta’s horizontal release point, it is troubling to see him inching back toward center. His “crossfire” action, wherein he angles his shoulders and lower half toward third base before snapping back toward center and firing the ball home, is what has generated velocity, spin, command, and general nastiness, particularly on his devastating slider. The second half of 2013 saw Arrieta move his release point toward third base (more negative on the chart), and in 20, Arrieta’s motion became fully realized. Arrieta’s horizontal release has crept toward center as he has thrown more over-the-top, further altering the angle at which Arrieta’s pitches attack the strike zone.Īgain, we see the evolution of Arrieta’s mechanics as he absconded from Baltimore and found a home in Chicago. Vertical release point is only a portion of the equation, however. While a two-inch difference might not seem like much, it is a consistent departure from the release point creating the necessary movement and plane on his pitches, and therefore a departure from the release point from which he has derived his Cy Young-worthy success. This season, however, Arrieta is throwing more upright than ever befor he’s left the “happy zone” in which he has lived the past two seasons (at about six feet, six inches of height) for the soaring reaches of six feet, eight inches. Arrieta bumped up his vertical release point, creating a different plane on which his pitches traveled, a key factor in how he turned his slurvy, cutter-ish slider into one of the most dominant pitches in MLB. Here we have a case of the predominant narrative - that Arrieta greatly altered his pitching mechanics upon joining the Cubs and pitching coach Chris Bosio - finding a cozy home in the graph. If there were a graphical equivalent to a scary story told around a campfire, it would be this: So, forgive me: Jake Arrieta’s finely tuned mechanics are shot, and he’s going to need to pick up a wrench and get to work.Īt the beginning of July, as his problems began to manifest in the box score, I speculated that it was a failure of mechanics producing Arrieta’s poor results. His devotion to his craft, his classically sculpted body, his majestically hirsute chin, his adorable kid, and his damn good numbers: all are qualities that inspire writers to snag the purplest of pens and analogize Arrieta to, say, an obscure poet or a 19th-century frontiersman.Īrrieta’s recent struggles - if you’ve missed hit, his recent starts feature more fives and sixes in the runs and hits columns than his starts from last season, which seemed to be input in binary - want for a new metaphor, and for an attendant explanation. It’s easy to get rosy-eyed when talking about Jake Arrieta.
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