If you watched yesterday’s Home Opener, you noticed that Tim Lincecum really struggled to get through his three innings. By the end of the third inning, Lincecum had already thrown 78 pitches and he never made it back into the game. I do commend Bruce Bochy for pulling Lincecum when he did. It was pretty clear he didn’t have the command to pitch much further into the game. Lincecum’s final line was: 3 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 3 BB, 5 SO. By PITCHf/x, Lincecum’s average fastball velocity on the day was 92.5 mph, that’s a little down from his average fastball in 2008, but he did touch 93-94 mph a few times. The stuff was there — he struck out 5 in 3 innings — but the control was not. Despite “only” three walks, Lincecum’s fastball control was pretty poor. He constantly missed up in the zone with the heater. I’m not a mechanics expert, but on the Giants broadcast Krukow indicated that Tim’s shoulder might have been “flying open” and thus his fastball command suffered.
Here’s a PFX plot of Lincecum’s pitch-types by location. By watching with my eyes alone, it looked like Tim had better control of his changeup than the fastball. Let’s check out the plot.
I’ll note here that some of the PFX data from his start is absent, so this isn’t the full picture of what happened but I think it’s representative of his Opening Day start. There’s a pretty large grouping of fastballs that Lincecum threw that missed up in the zone. His control with the changeup was better, he put more of the pitches in and around the strike zone.
Here’s the movement plot for Lincecum’s pitches.
I split the fastball grouping into two groups. The blue dashed-line is Lincecum’s four-seamer. It’s got less horizontal movement because of the grip of the pitch. The red dashed-line indicates the two-seamer, which has more horizontal movement than the four-seamer. Lincecum mixed in some changeups, a single slider, and some curveballs.
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It was the first start since 2007 in which Lincecum didn’t throw at least 4 innings in a game started. Lincecum actually spoke some in Spring Training that he felt out of “rhythm” and was working on getting things together. Hopefully, Lincecum can find a groove in his next start. Who would have guessed that the Giants would win a game in which Lincecum only pitches three innings?
Other Game Thoughts:
- Pablo Sandoval looked OK defensively at third. Not great, but alright. It looked like he had trouble getting a grip on the ball (too wet?) to throw a few times and his range wasn’t spectacular.
- Watching Aaron Rowand go 2-3 with a 2-run HR and a double was nice to see. The Giants need Rowand to hang around average this year if they want to compete in the NL West.
- Ishikawa’s first inning bases clearing triple was crushed on a fat changeup by Jeff Suppan. That’s probably a HR in most any other park in the majors — welcome to AT&T, kid.
- Both teams looked pretty rusty at times.
It’s because Tim’s let all the adoration and media attention and video game cover get to his head! HE’S NOT A GAMER ANYMORE!!!!
The pitch FX velocity is interesting as the broadcast consistently had his fastball in the 94/94 mph range. Lincecum looked about as close to unhittable as pitcher can in a 3 inning, 3 run outing. I am reassured (not that you were suggesting otherwise) that even at his worst, Timmy was still pretty damn good.
As the pitchfx data confirms. Almost of of Timmy’s fastballs were high. Does he always throw up-in-the-zone fastballs or was that part of his command issue? I honestly can’t remember from last season.
kenshin,
I think he usually works up in the zone with his fastball. For example, check out Chris’ analysis of the 138 pitch game here:
http://www.baycityball.com/2008/09/16/pitchfx-tim-lincecums-138-pitch-complete-game/
Not a single fastball below the strikezone, but a bunch above it.
I’ll check out a season view of Lincecum’s fastball placement, but I’d say he’s more likely to miss up with the pitch. Even if you’re eyeballing the 138 pitch game, Lincecum got a bunch of fastballs in the zone. Yesterday, most were out of the zone.
Also, I noticed that it looks like MLBAM is providing spin data in their files now.
Cool stuff. Red = fastball orange = changeup blue = curveball
W/R/T the 138 game, he certainly does tend to miss up but he actually worked his fastball lower in the zone than I anticipated.
I think you may have curveball/changeup confused Chris. Shouldn’t the curveball have significantly more spin (and therefore be the orange circle?)
Nope, the changeup has similar action as the fastball in terms of spin. It’s just thrown slower. The curveball actually spins in a different manner than a fastball or changeup.
I should note, that I’m talking about spin direction and not spin rate. Spin direction is kinda self explanatory, it’s the direction in which the pitcher spun the ball.
I’ll post a plot on spin rate soon.
Ohh good. I felt like I was taking crazy pills after the prior graph showed what I thought was the spin rate.
Still, I didn’t realize quite how much rotation a fastball has on it.
Are those spin rates in RPMs?
A 90-mph fastball (average speed) takes less than 0.5 sec to reach the plate. That’s about 19 revolutions!
(60.5/5280/90)*3600 = 0.46 sec
(0.46/60)*2500 = 19.1 rev
I’m assuming the change is thrown with less spin by pushing it back further in the hand, or not snapping it off the fingertips, reducing the backspin. That and the slower speed would give it the familiar “drop.” (Any pitchers out there who could illuminate me?)