Atlanta Braves: Anibal Sanchez now a cut(ter) above

ATLANTA, GA - MAY 29: Anibal Sanchez #19 of the Atlanta Braves pitches in the first inning against the New York Mets at SunTrust Park on May 29, 2018 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)
ATLANTA, GA - MAY 29: Anibal Sanchez #19 of the Atlanta Braves pitches in the first inning against the New York Mets at SunTrust Park on May 29, 2018 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

Atlanta Braves pitcher Anibal Sanchez has seen a career renaissance due to a change in his pitch makeup. Can his success be sustainable?

This spring, the Atlanta Braves were looking for some veteran depth in their pitching and signed Anibal Sanchez. Sanchez began a remake on his pitching repertoire in late 2017 that has changed his success. Can this success last?

Sanchez was a very good pitcher with the Marlins early in his career based on a fastball/slider combination. The biggest issue for Sanchez at that point in his career was his health, as he struggled to stay healthy as much as had any other issues in making an impact.

Once he established himself as a starter in 2010, he pretty much had two seasons with the Marlins before being moved in his third year to the Tigers, where he was then re-signed that offseason to a significant contract.

After winning the ERA title in his first year with the Tigers, the injury bug struck again, and when Sanchez was on the field, his performance began to decline rapidly, from a 2.57 ERA and 202 strikeouts over 182 innings in 2013 to a 5.87 ERA over 153 1/3 innings in 2016.

In 2017, Sanchez was on his way to a similar struggle, with a 7.43 ERA and 1.68 WHIP over 82 1/3 innings through September 10 of 2017, but something changed after getting touched up for 7 runs in 4 2/3 innings against the Blue Jays on September 10th.

Over his final four starts of the season, Sanchez was a different pitcher, sporting a 2.74 ERA and 1.30 WHIP over 23 innings, striking out 31 hitters. Sanchez still was giving up some hits, but there was definitely something different in his pitch mix that was making him harder to square up the way he had been before, as he allowed just 1 home run in those 23 innings, while he had allowed 25 in 82 1/3 innings prior to this change.

After not making the Minnesota Twins rotation, the Atlanta Braves picked up Anibal Sanchez as depth for their rotation, and he has been a revelation, pitching to a 2.89 ERA over 10 games (9 starts) and 53 innings.

While the results have been great, many Atlanta Braves fans have been wary of the “other shoe dropping” due to the fact that Sanchez currently has a 4.15 FIP and 4.32 xFIP. So is his success sustainable?

The short answer is yes. The longer answer is that for the immediate term, he can certainly sustain this success. Much like has been seen from CC Sabathia in the last few seasons, Sanchez has changed his entire pitching approach.

In his ERA title season with the Tigers, Sanchez threw 47.3% fastballs and 21.4% sliders. He also threw his curveball and changeup. The last month of 2017, Sanchez began using a cutter more and more, and this allowed other pitches to play up more.

In 2018, he’s used his cutter 19.2%, his four-seam fastball 27.9% of the time, two-seam 10.3%, slider 10.4%, curveball 9.1%, and changeup 23.1%. The blend of six pitches all being used nearly 10% of the time has definitely allowed him to keep hitters off balance, but Brooks Baseball can help to add why the addition of the cutter has been so impactful:

"His fourseam fastball has much less armside movement than typical, results in more flyballs compared to other pitchers’ fourseamers and has slightly below average velo. His change has slightly below average velo. His cutter generates fewer whiffs/swing compared to other pitchers’ cutters, has good “rise” and has strong cutting action. His slider generates fewer whiffs/swing compared to other pitchers’ sliders, has less than expected depth and results in somewhat more flyballs compared to other pitchers’ sliders. His sinker has surprisingly little armside run, generates more whiffs/swing compared to other pitchers’ sinkers and has little sinking action compared to a true sinker. His curve generates a high number of swings & misses compared to other pitchers’ curves, has little depth, has primarily 12-6 movement and results in somewhat more flyballs compared to other pitchers’ curves."

To translate that a bit, of his six pitching options, only the cutter has above-average movement. However, that above-average movement allows the short, sharp movement of his curve and slider to play up and also allows the less depth of his sinker to work in creating poor swings and generating weak pop-ups and/or ground balls.

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The hit stats actually bear that out as well, as Sanchez in 2016 had 18.3% soft contact and 31.8% hard contact. In 2018, with the Atlanta Braves, Anibal Sanchez has posted a 25% soft contact rate and a 25.7% hard-hit rate.

The hit distribution also shows a change that gives an indication that this could be a long-term success. In 2016, Sanchez allowed 19.1% line drives, 39.6% ground balls, and 41.3% fly balls. This season, Sanchez has seen his line drive rate go down, with nearly all of it going into his ground ball rate, as he has allowed 16.4% line drives, 41.8% ground balls, and 41.8% fly balls.

In other words, Sanchez is giving the Atlanta Braves more balls that defenders have a chance to make a play on, as line drives have the highest chance of becoming hits by a significant margin. In this article by Fangraphs, 2014 data showed that line drives have a 446-point better batting average and 464-point better xOBA than ground balls and 478-point better batting average and 349-point better xOBA than fly balls, so being able to limit solid-hit line drives for Anibal Sanchez should allow him to continue his success, provided he has a solid defense behind him.

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The Atlanta Braves definitely have a host of young, talented pitchers on the way up in their system, but as long as a guy like Anibal Sanchez is giving them quality starts, why would they take away his rotation spot?