The best pitches of the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Shark Tank

In recent years, the Pittsburgh Pirates’s bullpen, “The Shark Tank” has risen to prominence, ranking in the top ten in almost all relevant statistical categories.  This offseason, Neal Huntington and staff put additional emphasis on beefing up the bullpen even further, adding Antonio Bastardo and Arquimedes Caminero, among others.

To refresh your memory, in 2013, the Bucs bullpen ranked third in ERA in 2013 at 2.46, and ninth for 2014 at 3.28.  The reasons for the the jump-up in ERA of almost a full run are plentiful, but to me chief among them was the horrible start in April by the bullpen.  Jason Grilli and Mark Melancon spearheaded a crew that blew five saves in that month alone.  Contributing his own special brand of bad baseball to those year-end numbers was Ernesto Frieri, who posted at 10.13 ERA as a Pirate.

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Looking at those factors, it was hard to fault Huntington for pouring more resources to bring the bullpen back to 2013-level dominance, from good back to great.

Today I’d like to prime us for another season of Shark Tank dominance by highlighting the very best pitches from the mainstays in the Pirates’ bullpen.  Just as I did with the starting rotation, I’ll be highlighting the pitches that each of these hurlers hang their hat on.

For the purposes of this column, I am going to place considerable weight into a few factors, which I think are highly important to a pitcher’s performance.  First, I will only choose pitches that were thrown 10% of the time or more.  I had considered holding this to a higher percentage, but being that relievers throw less varied pitches than starters, 10% seemed appropriate.  Second, only data from 2014 was used, to give us a better snapshot of where these pitchers are right now.  Here they are, with a brief explanation:

O-Swing% –  Simply put, this is the percentage of pitches that a pitcher throws outside of the strike zone that batters swing at.  League average – 30%

O-Contact % – This is the percentage of times that a batter made contact on those same pitches that he chased out of the strike zone.  League average – 66%

SwStr% – Swings and misses / total pitches.  Basically said, the time that a batter swung and missed against a particular pitch.  League average – 9.5%

Ground ball rate % & fly ball rate % – The percentage of times that a batted ball against a certain pitch resulted in either a ground ball, or a fly ball, respectively.  League averages – 55.3%/10.5

(All data is pulled from pitchf/x information available at FanGraphs.com)

These are the factors that I believe truly show the best pitch of any given pitcher.  Getting batters to chase at pitches is critical for any hurler, and when these pitches are hit, keeping them on the ground is crucial.

Our first bullpen arm is the one who actually christened The Shark Tank

Next: Mark the Shark

Sep 22, 2014; Atlanta, GA, USA; Pittsburgh Pirates relief pitcher

(35) pitches in the ninth inning against the Atlanta Braves at Turner Field. Mandatory Credit: Daniel Shirey-USA TODAY Sports

Mark Melancon came over to the Pirates in the Brock Hold/Joel Hanrahan trade prior to the 2013 season and has been a rock for the Pirates almost form Day one.  A lot of that reliability has to do with his knuckle-curve.  Let’s take a look at how this pitch rates by our criteria:

Melancon makes his money with his cut-fastball, but also knows that if he wants to get batters to chase, the curveball is his best friend.  Getting batters to chase and swing at above-average rates will do that.  When batters do chase, they often leave it on the carpet, and rarely get it in the air.  Not pictured is a line drive rate of 34%, which you live with if you get people to chase it half of the time.

Our next shark tied for the most appearances by a reliever in 2014, and rightfully so.

Next: Watson's best pitch is elementary

Tony Watson had a remarkable 2014 that resulted in his first all-star nomination.  At one point leading the Pittsburgh Pirates in wins, he posted a 1.63 ERA and a microscopic 1.02 WHIP on the year.  And he did it on the back of his changeup.

Before going any further, I’d like to point out that Fangraphs’ pitchf/x data had Tony Watson throwing the sinker 67.3% of the time, leaving a smaller sample size for all other pitches.  His change was thrown 10.7% of the time, and resulted in some very good chasing and swinging strike numbers.  Elementary took a big step up in strikeouts from 2013 to 2014, increasing his total to 81 from 54 despite only pitching 5.1 innings more.  The changeup was a huge part of that.  Hitters also hit .226 against this pitch, so even though the contact percentage outside of the zone is higher than some, it resulted in outs just the same.  Watson has a great arsenal of pitches, and for 2015 I would love to see him throw the changeup a bit more to keep hitters off-balance.

Our next bullpen pitcher is adept at standing runners, but which pitch does he rely on to do so?

Next: Runners on base? We've got the perfect pitcher for that

Perhaps no other pitcher has benefited from the Pirates’ reliance on shifts more than Jared Hughes.  Hughes has developed quite a niche in Pittsburgh, quickly becoming the go-to guy to come in with runners on base.  In 2014, Hughes enjoyed a robust strand rate of 78.1%, which is listed as “Great” over at Fangraphs.  A lot of that might have to do with his highly-effective slider.

Batters offer at Hughes’ slider about 40.8% of the time, but only make contact at a staggeringly-low 16.1%, while swinging and missing at 29.4%.  As we all know with Hughes, he loves to keep it on the ground, with a 41.2% GB rate.  His career overall ground ball rate comes in at 61%.  Jared Hughes is the Charlie Morton of the Pirates’ bullpen, but a tad more reliable.  Hughes uses his slider very effectively, leading to ineffectual balls put in play by opposing batters, playing to his strengths and a shifting Pirates defense.  The harmony of Hughes’ skill-set and the Pirates’ defensive approach is perfect.

Next, we’ll look at the marquee bullpen addition for 2015.

Next: Welcome to the tank, Bastardo

Sep 20, 2014; Oakland, CA, USA; Philadelphia Phillies relief pitcher

(59) pitches the ball against the Oakland Athletics during the eighth inning at O.co Coliseum. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

Antonio Bastardo was Neal Huntington’s big acquisition from the 2014 winter meetings.  He carries a career 3.72 ERA and a 1.20 WHIP.  These numbers do not impress, but to gauge the true value of Bastardo, one needs to look no further than his strikeout prowess.  He owns a sparkling 11.4 Ks per nine innings, and a good 2.38 strikeout-walk-ratio.  This has come chiefly from his slider.

By far his best strikeout pitch, Bastardo doesn’t get folks to chase the slider all that much, but does get them to swing and miss a very good 18% of the time.  These numbers tell me that the slider is a miss-or-contact scenario, and not many are taken for strikes.  This is evidenced by his O-contact rate of 39.5%.  One wonders how he could have done with Russell Martin framing his pitches.  By all accounts, Francisco Cervelli is equally adept at pitch-framing, so I believe we will see the O-contact number for Bastardo decrease substantially, adding another element to this already effective pitch.

Now, of course, these are but four of the vast number of arms at Clint Hurdle‘s disposal.  Perhaps in the future we will have the same spotlight shown on Radhames Liz, Caminero, and John Holdzkom, but for now, these four are the Mount Rushmore of the 2015 version of the Pittsburgh Pirates’ shark tank.  Each have unique skills,  and are equally dependable.  For Hurdle to have two righties and two left-handers available in the sixth through ninth innings allows Hurdle the freedom to matchup at will and provides great versatility.

If they use their best pitches effectively, and play to their strengths, I see The Shark Tank easily returning to the level of mastery achieved in 2013.