The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of: Kyle Weiland

Many popular opinions of pitching prospects are formed from general scouting reports. While these reports are invaluable resources, they can’t always be trusted. Hundreds of minor league hurlers are credited with “mid-90′s velocity,” but very few MLB starters actually have that grade of heat, for example. It’s incredibly frustrating to hear about a pitcher with “a mid-90′s heater and plus curve,” only to have him come up to the big leagues and show a fastball that averages 90.5 mph and a slider.

When a pitcher come up to the majors, we can finally get a foolproof reading on what exactly his arsenal is comprised of, thanks to the great Pitch F/X system. In this series, I analyze just that–the “stuff” of recently-promoted MLB pitchers. Now that they’ve achieved their big league dreams and thus factor directly into the MLB picture, it’s high time that we know exactly what these guys are providing.

This time, I’m taking a look at Red Sox starter Kyle Weiland.

It’s been an inauspicious introduction to the major leagues for Kyle Weiland, as he’s been tagged for a 7.58 ERA and 6/10 K/BB in 19 innings. Obviously, he’s just adjusting to the big leagues, and he can easily be forgiven for failing to jump right into a pennant race and deliver stellar results–not to mention that 19 IP is a very small sample regardless of the time of year.

He recently turned 25, however, so Weiland is at the age where he can’t afford that many missteps in his bid to become an MLB rotation fixture. He was a fairly acclaimed prospect, but few ever called him a “top” guy, so he can’t simply coast on pedigree (like, say, fellow Sox starter Andrew Miller) either.

Weiland has a fairly standard four-pitch arsenal–fastball, slider, curveball, changeup. What stands out most to me about his pitches is that, on paper, they’re all quite impressive.

I’ll start with his fastball, since that’s Weiland’s go-to pitch. He’ll throw it anywhere from 90-95 mph, and it’s averaged 92.5 mph on the year–a very solid figure for a starting pitcher. Moreover, his funky delivery and three-quarters arm slot impart good run and sink to the pitch.

Weiland’s second pitch is his slider, a hard 85-87 mph power breaker. Again, the combination of velocity and movement are quite impressive, as the pitch breaks sharp and late. The same can be said for the righthander’s hard curveball, which he throws in the 77-80 mph range.

Add in the 83-86 mph changeup, which drops nearly five inches relative to his fastball, and we’re looking at a collection of four power pitches with above-average movement. That sure sounds like a recipe for success, doesn’t it?

As I said earlier, Weiland’s struggles thus far come in a very small sample and may not be indicative of any long-term problems, but the MLB results we do have certainly clash with what we’d expect a pitcher with this grade of stuff to be doing. With that in mind, let’s see what, if anything, beyond bad luck is leading to his poor ERA and low strikeout rate.

We can rule out the slider as an issue, as it seems to be playing just fine. Of the 50 he’s thrown, 34 have wound up as strikes, and he’s already induced seven whiffs. However, his curveball has been much more of a problem, as only 18 of 37 have gone for strikes, and he hasn’t induced a single swing and miss.

Given that we’re looking at such a tiny amount of data here, it looks like a platoon issue more than anything else. Twenty-0ne of those 37 curves have been thrown to lefties, and it doesn’t take a genius to realize most of them have been waste/chase pitches:

So that’s one issue: Weiland doesn’t seem to have any confidence in throwing his curve over the plate to lefties, which is problematic because it’s his most-used offspeed offering to them.

Strangely, though, it’s far from the core problem that’s dragging down Weiland’s MLB performance thus far–he’s retired 28 of the 39 lefty batters he’s faced, while only getting 27 of 53 righties out. That’s a .282 OBP for lefties and .490 OBP for righties, a rather severe reverse platoon split. That’s even odder than it sounds, because we’ve already established that Weiland’s breaking stuff has been fine against righties. His slider and curveball have comprised 32.3% of his pitches to righties, and he’s thrown all of nine changeups to them (and at that, seven have been strikes, including two whiffs).

So that would seem to pin the fastball to righties as the culprit behind Weiland’s early exits.

The Sox righthander has thrown 96 such fastballs this season, and indeed, the results haven’t been pretty. Just 50 have wound up as strikes, and he’s drawn all of three whiffs in 37 swings. That means that in the 96 pitches, just 16 have been either strikes called or strikes swinging–the other 80 have been called balls (46), fouled off (12), or put in play (22). Those are not good splits.

Here’s a look at where those 96 fastballs have gone:

That doesn’t paint the greatest picture of Weiland’s ability to locate the pitch. There are a fair number of stray pitches that hitters are almost certain to take, and then there are also a disturbingly high number of pitches clustered up in the zone and in the middle 75%. Heck, there’s some serious whitespace at the bottom of the zone, and even the other edges of the zone seem less dense than the areas that surround them.

Weiland’s only pumped in first-pitch strikes 51.1% of the time overall, and indeed, thirteen of the 59 righty batters he’s faced have watched a fastball sail off the plate for ball one. Note the further bimodal distribution of his first-pitch fastballs to righties–many seem to fall way off the plate, but the ones in the zone are classic “get me over” first pitches:

Beyond that, much of the problem is likely just greenness, small sample issues, and bad luck, but it’s worth noting that some of the bad luck comes from a place one might not expect:

These are those 96 fastballs to righties again, except only the ones that were called strikes or balls. Note that seven pitches that were bordering or in the strike zone were called balls, while none outside the zone were called strikes (one is right on the edge of the border, so I suppose you could say one was). Given that we’re talking about a sample of 96 pitches, getting squeezed on those seven is a pretty big deal that could easily alter the course of his starts. If all seven get called strikes, we’re talking about a 59.3% strike rate with 22.9% called strikes, numbers fairly close to average.

What seems to be happening is that umpires are getting fooled by the late run on Weiland’s heater, as fastballs that cross the inside corner will hit the catcher’s mitt a couple of inches inside. It’ll be interesting to see if Weiland continues to get squeezed, or if this is a mere blip in the radar. If it persists, it’s a rather important issue; he’s on the corners so rarely with the heater that it’s tough to succeed if his good pitches aren’t rewarded. In a way, that also helps explain his struggles thus far–when he misses his spot, he often finds a negative result, and when he hits his spot, he’s nearly as likely to be harmed.

In any case, the stuff is definitely there for Weiland to become a dependable MLB starting pitcher, but there are clearly some kinks to work out, and it’s an open question as to whether a pitcher like this (the sort that should really just be run out there for 25 starts regardless of poor results) is best suited for the constant craziness of the AL East. Weiland seems like the sort of pitcher who could struggle for a couple of years and leave everybody scratching their heads, and then emerge over in the NL Central as a dependable mid-rotation starter right as he nears his 30th birthday. Hopefully, that’s just a fear, and he (and anyone who calls his balls and strikes) adapts quickly. At 25, it’s time for him to prove his worth, but if it doesn’t work out in Boston, Weiland would make a ton of sense for a team to take a flyer on due to his abstractly impressive arsenal.

For more on the Red Sox, check out BoSox Injection!

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