Can we talk about Marcus Stroman?

[-MetA4-]

This new "pitch to contact approach" that he's refusing to deviate from is complete crap. He's averaging something like ~4.7 K/9 after tonight's game; an absurd stat for a guy with great natural stuff. He looks incredibly average this season, and nowhere near as dominant as he was in 2014 back when he was actually striking batters out. He came within a few feet of giving up 3 HR's tonight. His pitch-sequencing is incredibly predictable and the act of relying on BABIP to create outs is beyond stupid. Everything he is throwing is low, batters have and will continue to sit on this as he seemingly refuses to use his 4-seam fastball anymore. He should be elevating that 4-seamer to shift the batter's hitting plane; instead he's just dumping 2-seamers and changeups in the same spot over and over again. Several times tonight he had guys in 1-2 or 0-2 counts and failed to finish them off; the Wieters at bat being a prime example wherein he missed 2-3 opportunities before Wieters hit a seeing eye single which created a bases-loaded situation. He got Hardy to pop-up in the next at bat, but he's just walking into a situation wherein a ball is going to fall into play and really hurt him.

I don't know where this "pitch to contact" **** came from; but its really holding back what should be a great pitcher. He's going out there and throwing like a junkballer when he's got to stuff to miss bats and keep the ball out of play. Even a guy like Roy Halladay who was branded as a "pitch to contact" guy had his absolute best seasons when he was striking batters out on top of inducing groundouts. The notion that a pitcher should sell out to pitch to contact is complete stupidity. Strikeouts still are and always will be the most favourable pitching outcome.

[vaff87]

WTF? He's been fine with the exception of one start. Everything's a ground out.

Also, pitching to contact is fine under most circumstances. However, there are certain situations where you need to go for the strike out.

[Sifu]

I think part of this is the play calling of Martin. I rarely see a high strike or pitch thrown unless the pitcher missed his spot.

I think Navarro was better at calling games and called for a lot of high pitches.

[-MetA4-]

WTF? He's been fine with the exception of one start. Everything's a ground out.

Both his ERA and his xFIP are over 4 after tonight's start. He had 4 swinging strikes tonight. 4 out of ~100 pitches thrown. Thats a 2:1 whiff to HR allowed ratio.

He's going backwards. Has he been "fine"? Sure, but this is a pitcher with stuff that should be producing much better than "fine" results. He looks like he's trying to be Mark Buehrle on the mound when the only reason why Buehrle pitched the way he did was because he didn't have the arm to succeed otherwise.

[-MetA4-]

I think part of this is the play calling of Martin. I rarely see a high strike or pitch thrown unless the pitcher missed his spot.

I think Navarro was better at calling games and called for a lot of high pitches.

I'm not sure if Martin is simply executing Stroman's "gameplan". Stroman has indeed come out and openly paraded this shift to "pitch with more efficiency" and "rely on the sinker", so I can't help but think that the pitch-call is what he wants anyway. He pretty much never shakes Martin off, so its not like he's fighting him on the pitch calls or anything.

[c3luong]

WTF? He's been fine with the exception of one start. Everything's a ground out.

Both his ERA and his xFIP are over 4 after tonight's start. He had 4 swinging strikes tonight. 4 out of ~100 pitches thrown. Thats a 2:1 whiff to HR allowed ratio.

He's going backwards. Has he been "fine"? Sure, but this is a pitcher with stuff that should be producing much better than "fine" results. He looks like he's trying to be Mark Buehrle on the mound when the only reason why Buehrle pitched the way he did was because he didn't have the arm to succeed otherwise.

It's too early to be complaining about an ERA of ~4. Call me in July and we'll talk.

[vaff87]

I'm fine with it because it preserves his energy for when it's needed. There are times to pitch to contact, and times not to pitch to contact. That's what Halladay did as well as anyone, which helped him consistently go deep into games.

I'd rather see him pounding the zone early in games and with multi-run leads, than nippling and walking guys and elevating his pitch count.

[-MetA4-]

It's too early to be complaining about an ERA of ~4. Call me in July and we'll talk.

This is a shift in philosophy that stretches all the way back to last season. It is clear as day and it is really limited his upside as a pitcher. How many elite MLB pitchers do you know that strike out less than 5 batters per 9? He's pigeonholing himself into some "sinkerball pitcher" when there is absolutely no need for him to. Pitching to only one half of the plate just makes it that much easier for batters.

[Randle McMurphy]

Fire Walker?

[The_Hater]

The pitch to contact isn't exactly what it sounds. It's just a philosophy not to walk anyone because he has a strong defence behind him. So less nibbling the corners and more trying to get ahead early in pitch counts. Let's not are it sound like he's trying to specifically get hit.

And he should still have 2 fewer earned runs of that bobble by Goins wasn't inexplictedly called a hit. Overall, I think he's pitched well but still has room to improve and if had a weaker defense behind him and the philosophy changed to more K's, I think he could do that as well.

[Natural11]

I'm not worried about him. He's making an effort to mix speeds and throw off timing, but ended up with a few hanging off-speed pitches that got hit pretty hard. He doesn't have a big curveball, a sweeping slider, or a change-up that falls off the table. His success comes from changing speeds, messing up timing, and using the natural sinking movement of his pitches to induce ground balls. If not for the defensive miscue in Boston, he would be 4/4 in quality starts.

When he starts throwing junk for 2-3 consecutive starts we can panac.

[ldnk]

8.0, 5.1 (bad start), 8.0, 7.0 3-0 over 4 starts. Bullpen helped blow the loss against Boston. Yeah, I'm not worried. And honestly if Stroman is already trying to develop himself as a pitch to contact guy, great. It means he's learning to be a pitcher and not just a thrower. We know he can strike guys out. If he's not striking guys out in July we can talk. Right now the fact that he has given us 28.1 IP over 4 starts is what I care about. We are winning games with him on the mound despite spotty offense.

[Lateral Quicks]

I brought this up in the series thread, and think it's a valid concern. His K/9 this year is 4.8 this year, after 6 last year, and 7.6 in his first year. And as -MetA4- says, he's not missing bats. That's usually not a recipe for long-term success, nor do you see many front-line pitchers with those kind of statistics.

I'm not that concerned yet, though. I don't think his strikeout stuff has disappeared. If anything, his assortment of pitches is better than ever. It's just he's clearly trying to go as many innings as possible, and may be conserving himself a bit to make it happen. The pitch to contact stuff almost definitely comes from Papa Buerhle's mentorship.

[ldnk]

I brought this up in the series thread, and think it's a valid concern. His K/9 this year is 4.8 this year, after 6 last year, and 7.6 in his first year. And as -MetA4- says, he's not missing bats. That's usually not a recipe for long-term success, nor do you see many front-line pitchers with those kind of statistics.

I'm not that concerned yet, though. I don't think his strikeout stuff has disappeared. If anything, his assortment of pitches is better than ever. It's just he's clearly trying to go as many innings as possible, and may be conserving himself a bit to make it happen. The pitch to contact stuff almost definitely comes from Papa Buerhle's mentorship.

I think that's the thing, he's learned a lot from Buehrle. So much of his game is in the bottom 1/3 of the zone and he is consistently eating away at the lower edge of the zone. You aren't going to get a lot of strikeouts on those pitches because he's living down there...but as long as you don't hang pitches you aren't going to get burned by pitches down there either.

I think we have seen Stroman go into more typical "dominant" mode a few times late in games, particularly in the 6th-8th innings where he seems to find a way to shorten his pitch count despite facing guys for the 3rd time through the order.

[Skin Blues]

I noticed this trend too, and while I don't like it, it's not as extreme a change as I thought, at leasty by the results. The past two games have been extreme, yes, but his first two starts of the season his Zone %, SwStr % and Z-Con % (contact within the zone) were all practically identical to 2014. His previous two starts, though, were brutal. Everything in the zone is getting pounded. Maybe it's people adjusting, maybe it's random. And for 2015's 4 starts, his SIERA remained the same suggesting the increase in GB% offset the drop in K%, and migth also allow him to throw more innings. He's definitely using his 2 seamer more though, which isn't always a bad thing. Corey Kluber dropped the 4 seamer for a sinker in 2013 and broke out big time and then went back to the 4 seamer halfway through last year with no ill effects. (Note: Shapiro leaves Cleveland for Toronto and Kluber goes back to throwing 4 seamers, while Stroman does the opposite when Shapiro arrives; conspiracy theory??? DUN DUN DUN). The thing is, Stroman had a good 4 seamer and Kluber didn't. Maybe it's a team-wide strategy to try to pitch to contact, which I don't really like. Sure we have a great defense, but I'd rather focus on missing bats more often even if it means the bullpen pitches an extra inning every couple days to make up for the pitch inefficiency.

[Randle McMurphy]

Maybe he's more Tim Hudson than Pedro Martinez, I'd take that.

Either way, it's just 4 starts which is next to nothing to go on. Dickey, of all people, leads the starters in K9 right now.

[Boogie!]

maybe hes trying to save his arm and is going for longevity and efficiency... i was watching game in 30 last night, i remember buck repeating "another efficient inning, with 7 pitches." "another efficient inning only 9 pitches." etc... i think he wants to go as deep as possible into games and this is how hes going about it...

[LBJSeizedMyID]

I'm not a fan of it either, and sooner rather than later it will catch up - think he needs to mix it up a bit and once in awhile stray away from the contact and goto the swing and miss type approach.

[b0na f1de]

I seem to recall Brandon Morrow doing something similar after leading the league in k/9 from 2010 through 2011. As a baseball fan I felt kind of robbed. Then again...there was nothing to play for back then, and right now our bullpen is a bit scary in the wrong way.

[bluerap23]

This approach can work well and is actually more suited to his frame. There has always been a concern around how his body will hold up over a long season. He is not really a power pitcher. I've noticed his fastball this year is usually around 90 mph. That is not going to blow anyone away, but it should be good enough if he mixes his pitches and doesn't try to strike everyone out. This is why most project him to be a #2 or #3 starter, not an ace. Sanchez is the guy with true ace potential.

I am actually impressed that he has learned this at a young age and I'm thankful that Buerhle was around to mentor him.