Bastardo Debuts
With Jamie Moyer struggling and Chan Ho Park bombing out of the rotation early, Phillies GM Ruben Amaro made no secret of the fact that he was hunting for a pitcher on the trade market. When Brett Myers landed on the DL with what is likely to be season ending surgery on his hip, that need for help in the rotation only intensified. However, rising prospect Antonio Bastardo did his best to lay claim to one of the open spots last night, making his major league debut against San Diego.
The results were terrific – 6 innings, 4 hits, 1 run, 1 BB, 1 HBP, 5 strikeouts. The only run the Padres were able to muster was on an Adrian Gonzalez homer, and giving up a bomb to Gonzalez just puts Bastardo in the same company as everyone else in the National League this year.
However, if there’s one thing I’ve been advocating for years, it’s to judge by process, not results. How did Bastardo attack the Padres? Let’s take a look at the Pitch F/x data.
That’s the strike zone plot by pitch type, where the green squares are fastballs and the orange squares are sliders. I know, you have to look really hard to see the orange squares, because they’re covered by a sea of green. Of the 102 pitches Bastardo threw, 91 of them were fastballs – the other 11 were sliders. 41 of the 102 pitches were out of the strike zone, so even limiting his repertoire to two pitches, he still didn’t have great command.
Was he just overpowering hitters then? Here’s his velocity histogram.
The fastball was 89-95, but mostly clumped in the 91-93 range. That’s pretty decent velocity for a lefty, but those are four seam fastballs, and remember how many of them were up in the zone? Pounding the knees at 91-93 with a sinker is one thing, but Bastardo was going upstairs with a 91-93 MPH fastball, and that’s a recipe for a lot of fly balls. Not surprisingly, he gave up 10 fly balls to go along with three line drives and three ground balls. That’s what happens when you throw a lot of high strike zone four seamers.
The results? Terrific. The process? A little scary, honestly.
There are very few starting pitchers who can succeed consistently with just two pitches. The fastball-slider combination doesn’t give Bastardo an out pitch against right-handed batters, and not surprisingly, he’s posted significant splits in the minors. His 90% fastball philosophy won’t work, either – he’s either going to have to start mixing in some sliders or a change-up, or hitters are going to adjust very quickly. Toss in the fact that his approach last night would lead to an exceptional amount of fly balls, which is fine in Petco but less fine in Citizens Bank, and this is one of those classic starts where the results aren’t a great indicator of future events.
Despite a strong major league debut, Amaro should still be shopping for a starting pitcher if the Phillies want to try to repeat as champions.
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Is it just possible that Bastardo used this attack against the Padres because it was working? He had a big lead, and his mindset was likely to “let them try to hit me.”
If Bastardo and the Phils are in a close game, I doubt this is the mode of attack he takes (91 of 103 for FB).
Isn’t it a little early to judge a guy based on one game? Did Bastardo only throw fastballs in the minors too? Doubtful.
I cannot corroborate this, but on the Phillies broadcast before the game started they said that Bastardo’s best pitch is a changeup, which he didn’t even throw once last night, unless one or more of the pitches that Pitch F/x identified as a slider was actually a change. But if true, that should alleviate concerns that he’s a two-pitch pitcher. Perhaps Manual/Dubee thought that Bastardo could handle a relatively weak Padres lineup with just two pitches and wanted to hold back the changeup so that future opponents would have less scouting info.
Also, I don’t know if this is something you can do easily, but my impression from watching last night was that Bastardo’s velocity started off very high — his first inning he threw nothing but fastballs, and nothing under 93, but that he was having trouble throwing strikes. Later in the game he calmed down and his velocity dropped down to mostly 91-ish but his control improved, and I think that’s when he started mixing in the slider a little.
As to whether the Phillies should continue to shop for a starter, well, sure. But let’s not write off Bastardo yet. If the process was a little shaky for a pitcher making his MLB debut, that can surely be forgiven, especially when the results were so good. And don’t forget he has a very good minor league track record, with a 2.55 ERA and a 297:116 K:BB ratio over 264 2/3 innings.
He threw a couple change ups that were listed as fast balls. Only 3 or 4 though. He had tons of movement on the change up.
They were destroying the Padres, it was practically 6 Innings of mop up ball so there isn’t much to look into. Plus his debut, so I imagine they wanted to keep it simple for him.
He seemed to get a lot of movement on his fastball, and guys really struggled to square it up and get good wood on the ball.
Another interesting pitcher made his debut on the same day as Bastardo, and had very nice results as well, Vince Mazarro for OAK. Would love to see the same sort of analysis on him, I bet his shakes out far better than Antonio’s. Just some food for thought
a good term is ‘effectively’ wild. he was throwing inside very hard and making the hitters move around and think twice. i know he struck one guy out looking on a fastball on the outside corner than the hitter actually DOVE away from.
and i thought it was weird that he didn’t throw a change up at all. is the slider really a change up? the scouting report says he’s working on a slider but he has a +change-up.
and if anything, they had a great game plan goign in against the padres. pound them in with fastballs and try not to walk guys.
Wow, it’s only one start so not a ton can be read into it but I found this article fascinating. Nice work!
I second Big G’s request for a similar write up on Mazzaro
With respect to the strikezone plot — is there a way to orient the plot so that the pitches are shown in relation to “inside/outside” as opposed to “right/left?” (I am assuming the chart doesn’t chart the pitches in relation to the batter.)
The chart above is helpful, but if the high pitches are grouped on the inside half of the plate it might reveal a little more about Bastardo’s approach.
This guy’s got the best name in baseball
And he beat the Padres. I was hoping for a bad joke in the title.
I found it odd too that he threw so few changeups, given that from everything I’ve read, it is a plus pitch for him. Charlie Manuel’s presser after the game does agree with the pitch f/x data in that they were sliders, not changeups.
I’m in agreement, I’m not ready to make too many conclusions based upon just one start in which he had a 4-run lead before he even toed the rubber, but I’m also in agreement that this approach had better change.
He did throw at least 3 changeups last night. Mid 80’s pitches with pitchFx of over 10″
I would like the article a lot more if you had at least mentioned that he was staked to a 4-0 lead in the first which was extended to 8-0, and that catcher Carlos Ruiz was probably well aware of SD’s terrible struggles against LHP while he called the game
He does have a good slider from his minor league starts that I’ve seen. I don’t really know about his change and there have been mixed reports (from developing to plus)
I think the concerns are valid, pitching aggressively up with a straight fastball, but I think he has more in terms of secondary pitches than he showed
Interesting stuff. I agree that Bastardo was probably trying to keep it simple in his debut, which was exacerbated by the fact that he had a big lead early.
Also, Bastardo was tremendous in the minor leagues (career 1.17 WHIP, 6.7 H/9, 10.1 K/9). I’m sure Phillies fans are just as excited to see him as Mets fans like myself are worried.
Love the name. Amazin’ Avenue reader?
yeah, the grission thing always cracks me up. Bastardo looks good, but I want to see how he handles a right handed heavy lineup like the Mets who have been teeing off on LHP for a couple years now. Nice debut, and I hate to call it a low pressure situation, because honestly no situation is low pressure for a kid debuting in the majors, but facing SD in SD and getting spotted 4 runs before crossing the white lines is a pretty nice way to start your career.
His next start is scheduled to be against the Dodgers on Sunday. I believe that’s also an ESPN game so we will get to see some more of him.
watched the game live, and while your analysis is great, a couple things of note…
- They weren’t coming anywhere close on his fastball, and he had a big lead, so Ruiz kept putting one finger down.
- It was very clear in the first 3 innings that he was overly jazzed up for his first start (wild, overthrowing, hitting 95mph for some reason), but he calmed down in the 4,5,6 frames, showing much better location.
- Charlie Manuel said after the game that he was “gripping his off-speed pitches too tight” due to his adrenaline, so the ones he did throw weren’t all that great, and Ruiz didn’t have to call them, so he didn’t.
- His change-up is his best pitch, but he only threw like 3 all night, and none were very good. Hopefully he will be calmer his next start, and we can actually see it.
Promising start…. I’m not sure what to expect long term, but I know Phillies fans are pretty excited about him.
Excellent use of resources, but…… Wow. Before a post like this, some research is in order. Dave basically discredited an impressive debut without taking into account any outside factors or learning a little bit more about Bastardo’s repertoire before personally buying the kid a ticket back to Lehigh Valley.