
In case you needed to affiliate a single present main leaguer with throwing sinkers, Framber Valdez can be towards the highest of the record. His standout profession is all about throwing sinkers and protecting the ball on the bottom. So think about my shock once I was perusing a leaderboard of starters who used their secondaries most steadily with two strikes in 2024. The highest of that record is dotted with pitchers who confounded my classification system: We’ve obtained Corbin Burnes, Graham Ashcraft, and Clarke Schmidt there representing the cutter brigade. A lot of the different pitchers within the high 10 combine in cutters liberally with two strikes. Then we’ve obtained Valdez, in tenth and looking out sorely misplaced.
Practice your eyes on Valdez, and also you’ll begin to ask your self: What’s occurring right here? In some methods, his statistics are constant to the purpose of monotony. Check out his strikeout and stroll charges over time, plus some league-adjusted run prevention numbers:
Regular as She Goes – Framber Valdez, Profession
12 months | Okay% | BB% | ERA- | FIP- |
---|---|---|---|---|
2018 | 22.1% | 15.6% | 53 | 112 |
2019 | 20.7% | 13.4% | 130 | 110 |
2020 | 26.4% | 5.6% | 81 | 64 |
2021 | 21.9% | 10.1% | 73 | 95 |
2022 | 23.5% | 8.1% | 73 | 78 |
2023 | 24.8% | 7.1% | 82 | 82 |
2024 | 24.0% | 7.8% | 73 | 80 |
After some early-career wildness, Valdez has produced a string of near-identical seasons. However whereas doing that, he’s reduce on utilizing his sinker to complete off hitters. I do know what you’re pondering: Certain, to throw his wipeout curveball. However nope! It’s a changeup story:
Two-Strike Pitch Utilization
12 months | Two-Strike SI% | Two-Strike CU% | Two-Strike SL% | Two-Strike CH% |
---|---|---|---|---|
2018 | 46.3% | 50.9% | 0.0% | 2.8% |
2019 | 35.3% | 64.7% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
2020 | 36.6% | 58.8% | 0.0% | 4.6% |
2021 | 35.3% | 56.5% | 0.0% | 8.2% |
2022 | 30.9% | 49.5% | 13.2% | 6.4% |
2023 | 22.1% | 41.7% | 17.2% | 13.9% |
2024 | 22.8% | 50.6% | 7.0% | 19.6% |
Early in his profession, Valdez didn’t throw many changeups. He used the pitch between 5% and 10% of the time, nearly completely to righties; it was an emergency possibility that he largely prevented. That was with good purpose: With a nasty sinker and wipeout curve, he merely didn’t wish to give hitters a break from his two high choices.
Valdez’s curveball looks as if the right two-strike pitch. It’s enormous and steadily misses the zone low; hitters defending the plate are liable to finish up fishing at one thing that bounces if he begins it on the identical airplane as his sinker. However the fish haven’t been biting lately. Putaway share is a straightforward statistic – strikeouts per two-strike pitches thrown. It exhibits a transparent pattern:
Curveball Putaway Price
12 months | Putaway% |
---|---|
2018 | 20.0% |
2019 | 36.7% |
2020 | 37.0% |
2021 | 32.1% |
2022 | 29.9% |
2023 | 26.6% |
2024 | 25.6% |
In case you ask our pitch-based fashions, his curveball is broadly unchanged. It’s one of many nastiest in baseball, and he locates it acceptably properly; it’s by no means going to be pinpoint given the large motion. Nothing a lot has modified on that entrance, although, which is what we care about. It’s nonetheless largely the identical pitch, however batters simply aren’t being fooled as steadily. That feels logical to me; when a man throws one signature pitch for seven years, well-compensated elite athletes who’re paid to beat that man will get higher at dealing with it.
Valdez hasn’t been taking this erosion in curveball effectiveness sitting down, although. First, he dabbled with incorporating a slider, as you possibly can see within the two-strike utilization chart. However in 2024, he hit on a brand new method, and the changeup is now ascendant. In case you take a fast have a look at one, it’s straightforward to see why Valdez would possibly lean on it. A lot has been fabricated from his more durable sinker and attendant decline in groundball charge. However that more durable sinker (94.1 mph in 2024, up from 92-93 earlier) has meant more durable changeups too, and the brand new Valdez changeup advantages tremendously. A 90-mph changeup is simply nasty:
That’s significantly powerful on righties, and Valdez largely throws the pitch when he has a platoon drawback. However in two-strike counts, he’s seen the advantages of diversification even to lefties. Try the distinction between all counts and two-strike counts:
Framber Valdez, Changeup Utilization
12 months | LHH, All Counts | LHH, Two Strikes | RHH, All Counts | RHH, Two Strikes |
---|---|---|---|---|
2018 | 3.6% | 0.0% | 3.5% | 3.5% |
2019 | 3.8% | 0.0% | 10.4% | 0.0% |
2020 | 1.9% | 0.0% | 11.0% | 7.2% |
2021 | 1.3% | 2.7% | 14.4% | 9.8% |
2022 | 0.3% | 0.5% | 11.3% | 8.0% |
2023 | 6.1% | 12.7% | 17.9% | 14.3% |
2024 | 9.3% | 18.2% | 19.0% | 19.8% |
How has that changeup carried out? By putaway share, it’s no higher than his curveball. It doesn’t induce extra whiffs or result in the next chase charge. However there’s one main distinction between the 2 pitches: The changeup will get an absolute ton of grounders.
I discussed Valdez’s more durable sinker and declining groundball charge up above. It will really feel disingenuous to jot down about him and never point out that main change. However what number of grounders you generate isn’t completely about what number of grounders your fastball generates. Imagine it or not, Valdez’s sinker was the least grounder-friendly of his three major pitches in 2024:
Framber Valdez, Grounder Price by Pitch Sort
12 months | SI GB% | CU GB% | CH GB% |
---|---|---|---|
2018 | 78.0% | 81.0% | 33.3% |
2019 | 64.2% | 63.9% | 71.4% |
2020 | 61.7% | 57.8% | 60.0% |
2021 | 74.9% | 60.3% | 67.9% |
2022 | 68.4% | 59.6% | 74.5% |
2023 | 53.5% | 59.8% | 58.1% |
2024 | 57.8% | 60.0% | 77.6% |
That may look bizarre, however his changeup is heavy. Measured when it comes to vertical motion relative to similar-velocity pitches of the identical kind, it has extra surprising drop than his sinker. Changeups are grounder-friendly pitches to start with, and he additionally locates it down, as proven by our new warmth maps:
Because you may not have seen a warmth map of this precise model earlier than, right here’s his sinker for comparability:
Now issues are beginning to make slightly extra sense. Valdez’s changeup has a number of similarities to his sinker, naturally sufficient. It’s heavy as a result of all the things he throws is heavy. But it surely’s slightly bit extra so, at the price of lacking the zone extra steadily. That seems like a two-strike pitch to me – and certainly, to Valdez.
In case you’re simply all for outcomes, you may not discover this variation. Valdez simply completed placing up a season price between 3.5 and 4.5 WAR for the third straight 12 months – or between 4.5 and 5.5 WAR should you imagine in his skill to constantly outperform his FIP. (I absolutely do, the grounders matter.) The 2 earlier years had been interrupted by damage, however combination them right into a single 32-start season, they usually match the sample as properly. The man delivers the identical season yearly.
Underneath the hood, although, we’re speaking a couple of new and completely different Valdez. It all the time felt stunning that he was capable of deal with main league hitters with solely two actual choices. Certainly they’d regulate sooner or later and pressure him to toss something else. Properly, they’ve – and he has too. Rating one for stars discovering a solution to succeed, even when it’s not the way in which they’ve carried out it prior to now.