"sticky substances"

[Dominikk85]

1 hour ago, ptatc said:

Because it's not sticky enough to get a proper grip and they say there would be many hit batters and wild pitches if they do use "a little something else."

Interestingly hit batters are already at a high despite pitchers using substances. I think the safety argument is pretty bogus, it clearly doesn't seem to work right now. 

[Paulie4Pres]

12 minutes ago, Dominikk85 said:

Interestingly hit batters are already at a high despite pitchers using substances. I think the safety argument is pretty bogus, it clearly doesn't seem to work right now. 

I think this was always a bogus argument. More spin on the ball equals more movement and more velocity. Which equals less control. And that's what we are seeing.

[joejoesox]

As a side note, how many Sox pitchers you think are using shit?  If I had to guess, Rodon for sure, maybe Cease.  Maybe Crochet used something last year and stopped this year and that's actually what caused the decrease in velo?

[Squirmin' for Yermin]

2 minutes ago, joesaiditstrue said:

As a side note, how many Sox pitchers you think are using shit?  If I had to guess, Rodon for sure, maybe Cease.  Maybe Crochet used something last year and stopped this year and that's actually what caused the decrease in velo?

I would guess 80% of pitchers are using something.  Similar to steroids in he day, I bet most hitters used something.

[ptatc]

On 5/27/2021 at 5:14 PM, Dominikk85 said:

Interestingly hit batters are already at a high despite pitchers using substances. I think the safety argument is pretty bogus, it clearly doesn't seem to work right now. 

Part of this is that pitchers are trying to throw as hard as they can for as long as they can and this sacrifices control so they are going to hit more with this philosophy. 

[southsider2k5]

 

[reiks12]

why wouldnt they announce this during the offseason?

[Harold's Leg Lift]

7 minutes ago, reiks12 said:

why wouldnt they announce this during the offseason?

Because Manfred is a F'ing Idiot. He gave pitchers a free pass while they "collected the data" so they all went crazy doctoring the ball. Now that the problem is out of control they have to step in midseason to try to put a stop to it.  It's going to be real interesting to see how they suspend 90% of the pitchers.  Do they go alphabetical or by divisions?

[Dominikk85]

Manfred didn't want to catch guys, his goal was to do those investigations as a warning to give guys enough time to get off the juice and then enforce it next off season. Similar to what Selig did with the Mitchell report. 

 

However it seems to be so much out of control that they have to step in now as the hope that pitchers would stop in a advance didn't materialize. 

[southsider2k5]

 

[southsider2k5]

Worth noting from the previous article....

[ShoeLessRob]

30 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

 

This is wild. Explains all the no-hitters.

[Dick Allen]

The Cleveland pitcher clearly had some stuff in his glove, but the Sox aren't going to call it out because they have guys who do the same thing.

[Quin]

35 minutes ago, southsider2k5 said:

Worth noting from the previous article....

While our dudes are definitely using stuff, you an also account for:

- Adding Lynn

- Cease has a new pitching coach

- Rodon deciding to care about baseball and remember he had his stuff from college.

[South Side Hit Men]

2 hours ago, Quin said:

While our dudes are definitely using stuff, you an also account for:

- Adding Lynn

- Cease has a new pitching coach

- Rodon deciding to care about baseball and remember he had his stuff from college.

Reviewed year over year change in spin rate on baseball savant.

Rates for Keuchel and Lynn actually decreased.

Rodon’s rate is consistent with last year.

Giolito and Cease both show significant spin rate upticks across most of their pitches.

If a rate doesn’t change for a pitcher, it doesn’t necessarily mean they are not using, just that there is a possibility they have been using substances over multiple seasons.

Its a sticky situation baseball finds itself in. Can credit Joe West for leading this particular crackdown.

[Lillian]

Who else, besides Karinchak, on Cleveland's staff is likely using something?

[YoYoIsMyHero]

Just now, Lillian said:

Who else, besides Karinchak, on Cleveland's staff is likely using something?

Not sticky stuff, but Clase got popped for PEDs last year

[raBBit]

36 minutes ago, Lillian said:

Who else, besides Karinchak, on Cleveland's staff is likely using something?

People the more unknown/effective substances (i.e. not pine tar or sunscreen/rosin) are going to see the most significant change in their breaking pitches (as opposed to their fastball). The Indians have a bunch of guys that have taken big steps forward based on their breaking balls. None we're huge prospects or big velo guys. Just guys that threw strikes that all of a sudden started putting people away with the breaking stuff. Bieber is the big one. Plesac and Civale basically came out of nowhere. Bryan Shaw's slider is considered one of the most effective pitches in baseball. Karinchak has velo but he's obviously using something. 

Look at the Reds after they got Bauer. All slider spine rates 2018 vs. 2020/2021 (Bauer joined the team in 2019)

Lucas Sims - 2484 to 2733

Robert Stephenson - 2615 to 2809

Tyler Mahle - 2511 to 2625

Amir Garrett - 1748 to 1826

Luis Castillo - 2206 to 2447

Cody Reed - 2296 to 2565

Literally every player that was on the Reds in 2018 and either (or both of) 2020/2021 saw increases in the spin rate.  

[southsider2k5]

 

[raBBit]

4 hours ago, Quin said:

While our dudes are definitely using stuff, you an also account for:

- Adding Lynn

- Cease has a new pitching coach

- Rodon deciding to care about baseball and remember he had his stuff from college.

The lowest 5 spin rates on the Sox in 2020 (see below) have combined for 0 innings pitched in 2021. 5th and 6th lowest is Rodon (barely pitcher last year) and Keuchel (spin rate down year-over-year. After those two it's Fry (hasn't pitched) and Detwiler (gone)

-Alex Colome (FA)

-Jimmy Cordero (IL)

-Reynaldo Lopez (AAA)

-Dane Dunning (trade) 

-Gio Gonzalez (FA)

So if you look at the top 17 "used" (min. 100 pitches) pitchers from the prior year, 7 of the 9 lowest spin rates haven't pitched for the Sox this year for one reason or another. These pitchers have been replaced with: 1) More Rodon (similar spins y-o-y) 2) More Crochet 3) Lynn 4) Kopech 5) Hendriks

Past that there have been a few 2020-2021 increases (FB spin rate)

Cease - 2521-2612

Marshall - 2334-2456

Giolito - 2349-2425

Foster

[chitownsportsfan]

Making callouses on your fingertips in the offseason will be the new thing at this rate.

[Look at Ray Ray Run]

5 hours ago, ShoeLessRob said:

This is wild. Explains all the no-hitters.

This is SI desperately looking for hits. 

This is not the new steroids and comparing the two is laughable media overreaction. Should they shut it down? Sure. Does it gravely change the game like steroids? No. Is baseball using this as an excuse for them making the new baseball that further suppresses offense? 100%.

[caulfield12]

But this gets to something I’ve been stewing on for years, and wrote an article at BP about. Why is spin rate so important to pitchers? In Sawchick’s article, he says, “More spin means more Magnus effect, which is the invisible force governing most pitch movement.” But this isn’t quite right: active spin can lead to movement, but you can boost your spin rate by cutting the ball, which is how Garrett Richards can have one of the spinniest fastballs in the game, but well *below* average movement. If the idea is that spin is the raw material for Magnus-based movement, why not just measure – and stay with me here – Magnus-based movement? Given its correlation with velocity (more velo, more spin), it’s even harder to isolate the value that it can add absent a whole bunch of caveats. 

This is why Marcus Stroman can be effective despite a sinker with above-average spin but below-average spin efficiency, for example. I looked at Kendall Graveman’s spin rate, partially out of curiosity and partly to see if his turbo-sinker was as high-spin as it looks. The answer: no, it’s not. Graveman’s sinker gets only average spin, and thus below-average Bauer units given its high velocity. And what’s more, that spin rate has gone *down* – and markedly – in recent years. I went and looked at perhaps the most famous turbo-sinker in the game, Blake Treinen’s, and the same pattern held: he had pretty good spin rates in his 2018 Oakland peak, but it’s dropped off in each year since, and is now in a statistical dead heat with Marco Gonzales’ non-turbo-sinker. In spin efficiency and Bauer units, Gonzales “beats” both Treinen and Graveman’s pitches handily. But, and I know this is a stat-focused blog, just *watch the pitches.* 

Some of this has to do with the seam-shifted wake, the fact that another force can cause a pitch to move than just the Magnus effect. This seems particularly true for Stroman, for example, and may also be at play with Justus Sheffield, the M’s starter tonight. But whatever the reason, it’s not simply the case that spin leads directly to movement, and it’s not the case that spin (in and of itself) leads to effectiveness. Corbin Burnes and Brandon Woodruff, or Bauer himself and Yu Darvish, have been very successful and create tons of spin. But they all throw really, really hard. Bauer gets a ton of movement, while Woodruff doesn’t. And pitchers like Jack Flaherty, Shane Bieber, and Blake Treinen can be successful despite average fastball spin. 

Still, tell that to the pitchers. This season’s seen a ton of talk about cracking down on foreign substances. Mike Schildt’s press convo after his pitcher had his hat confiscated was the most famous example, but there’s constant chatter about the league taking balls to sample. Today’s word that they may begin, uh, doing something with all the evidence they presumably have plays into it. It seems that pitchers have seen what’s happened to Bauer and Cole’s spin rates over the years, and are trying new things to increase their grip on the ball. If a non-athlete reporter like Sawchick could add 400 rpms by using something, hey, what could they add? I’m sure a lot of pitchers are using stuff, but I keep thinking that if some of these new substances were that transformative, we’d see it in league-wide spin rates and movement patterns in a magnitude that would jump off the page. We DO see spin rate inching up, but then, so is velo. Movement’s up too, but as Rob Arthur mentioned, much of that could be due to the baseball being lighter.

 

Marc W.  http://www.ussmariner.com

[Balta1701]

So this is happening and it’s happening within days it seems.

 

[caulfield12]

23 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

So this is happening and it’s happening within days it seems.

 

That will definitely shorten games.  Not.