One main culprit for David Bednar's poor season with Pittsburgh Pirates

Heading into this year, many Pittsburgh Pirates fans were confident the Bucs would win a lot of close games in the ninth inning. David Bednar was coming off his third straight strong season with the Pirates. From 2021 to 2023, Bednar established himself as one of the most effective late-inning arms in the game with a 2.25 ERA, 2.56 FIP, and 1.06 WHIP. Bednar struck out just over 30% of opponents with a 31.2% K% while only walking 7.7% of batters faced and posting a HR/9 rate of 0.60. 

Batters had an extremely hard time making contact off of Bednar in these three seasons. He induced a whiff rate of 32.6%. When they did make contact, it was rarely good contact. The Renegade held opponents to just an 88.5 MPH exit velocity and a miniscule barrel rate of 5.9%.

But this year, it’s been a whole mess of things gone wrong for the former two-time All-Star. Prior to his most recent meltdown against the Texas Rangers, Bednar had a 5.56 ERA, 4.62 FIP, and 1.31 WHIP. While he’s still limiting walks with an identical 7.7% BB%, his strikeout rate has dropped significantly to just 24.2%. Opponents are squaring Bednar’s stuff up regularly with an 89.9 MPH exit velocity and 10.9% barrel rate. Last year, Bednar was in the top 87th percentile of barrel rate. Now, he is below the bottom 10th percentile.

But Bednar hasn’t lost any nastiness on any of his pitches. He’s throwing harder than he ever has before with similar movement to previous seasons. Stuff+, a stat that measures the quality of a pitcher’s offerings based on velo, spin, movement, and release point, saw an uptick from 118 last year to 129 this year. Where it has all gone wrong is his ability to locate.

What's happened to Pirates' David Bednar during 2024 season?

Prior to his loss on Wednesday afternoon, Bednar had just a 100 Location+. Location+ is on a similar scale to stats like OPS+, wRC+, and ERA+, where 100 is always average. It factors in a pitcher’s ability to execute pitchers based on count and pitch type. That might not be a huge step down from 101 last year, but there have been some clear issues with some of his pitches.

His curveball, specifically, has been located horribly, and is the likely culprit of all of his issues. Location+ had his curveball at 99 last year, but just 93 this year. That is a significant step back. It’s not the only pitch that has seen a noticeable decrease in location. Bednar’s four-seamer has gone from 102 to just 99. In terms of Location+, this is a huge downward trend.

FanGraphs’ PitchingBot also shows a large discrepancy between his command in 2023 and 2024. In 2023, Bednar’s command was pinned at a 50 on the 20-80 scale. This year, he has seen that decrease to 48. Again, his curveball has given him the most trouble, going from a 50 to a 42. On the 20-80 scale, 50 is average, and 40 is below average. 

Although Bednar’s curveball has only induced a .101 batting average, .048 slugging percentage, and .101 wOBA, batters are clearly less fooled by the pitch. Last year, Bednar’s curveball induced a 40.5% whiff rate, the 13th best among pitchers who used their curve in 50+ plate appearances. 

But this year, batters are laying off the pitch. Bednar’s curveball whiff rate is down to just 26.3%. Opponents consistently swung at his curveball 33%-35% of the time, but now are only swinging at it 25% of the time. His chase rate on his curveball has gone from 28.9% to a meager 14.3%. Bednar hit the shadow/edge of the strike zone with his curveball 10% of the time last year, but has only done that 7.8% of the time this year. 

While batters aren’t hitting the pitch when they do swing at it, a drop in effectiveness in one pitch can lead to a cascade of issues with other pitches. Bednar only throws three pitches. If he can’t locate his curveball to an effective degree, then it’s much easier for opposing hitters to sit fastball or splitter and take advantage of that.

Bednar not being able to effectively locate and execute his curveball is likely the source of all his issues this year. The pitch is effective when he locates it, but that’s been the huge issue. A lack of locating one of his three pitches has led to his other offerings becoming less deceptive and easier to sit on. If Bednar wants to return back to form next year, this is where he needs to start.