Sometimes a pitcher will make adjustments and one game will result in a large jump in one pitch or perhaps they can't control it so they just get rid of the pitch. That doesn't seem to be the case as John Lackey made a huge change to his pitch breakdown last night. Lackey has largely been a four seam fastball pitcher throwing more than 50% for three straight years. In 2008 and 2007 it was 59%.
Last night though he broke from the mold and became more unpredictable in his approach. He largely stuck to three pitches through the game using his four-seam fastball, curveball and cutter. When I say he stuck to those pitches he threw 100 pitches of which 30 were four-seamers, 29 were curveballs and 29 were cutters.
To put those 29 cutters in perspective we can see in 2009 he threw 81 cutters all year long for a 2.6% of total pitches. Before we go to far though we should see if there is any possibility that these are just misclassified fastballs. First we can see that from his 2009 chart his cutters(FC) are similar to the four seamer with less horizontal movement but similar vertical break.
April 8, 2010
Troy Patterson
