On Second Thought, David Price Should Probably Try and Take James Shields' Change

by R.J. Anderson on Mar 11, 2009 4:12 PM EDT

Thanks to Harry Pavlidis for providing me with the template for his flight path charts, we can now create these pretty things that will be thrown in ever so often with our PitchFx presentations:

Intuitively, you know Shields change-up goes slower than his fastball. With that knowledge, you can look at the above charts and get an idea of what facing Shields is like. Shields has the ability to use his change in any count because it looks so much like his fastball until it's too late for the hitter to adjust. The change breaks in and down more than the fastball, but doesn't give itself away easily, leaving hitters - at least those guessing fastball - off balance or potentially whiffing completely.

The flight chart data was drawn from Shields one-hit performance versus the Angels. Of the 24 change-ups he threw that night, seven resulted in swinging strikes. To combine our flight paths and that knowledge with some real world examples, I present this:

Kkk_medium

Shields owned that night. Hard.

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Per Josh Kalk's Pitch F/X

Shields threw 102 change-ups on two strike counts. 21% of them were swinging strikes.

by Tommy Rancel on Mar 11, 2009 4:41 PM EDT reply actions

I’m having trouble understanding the first flight path chart. The second one is pretty self explanatory, but I must be missing something obvious on the first one because I can’t figure out what it’s showing.

When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized God doesn’t work that way, so I stole one and prayed for forgiveness. - Emo Philips

Neglectful father of David Quinowski

by marcello on Mar 11, 2009 5:13 PM EDT reply actions

The first one is basically overhead.

Imagine you looking straight down on the path.

by R.J. Anderson on Mar 11, 2009 5:20 PM EDT up reply actions

Ok, thanks

So his release point on his change is a bit different horizontally from his fastball? Any idea if Shields’ difference is greater or less than other pitchers?

When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized God doesn’t work that way, so I stole one and prayed for forgiveness. - Emo Philips

Neglectful father of David Quinowski

by marcello on Mar 11, 2009 6:02 PM EDT up reply actions

the release point is pretty close to the same...

the part of the graph on the right is the release point… the numbers on the bottom represent distance from the plate

by nolesblogger on Mar 11, 2009 7:08 PM EDT up reply actions

Whoops

I was mixing it up again and thinking of it in terms of height. I get it now, thanks!

When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized God doesn’t work that way, so I stole one and prayed for forgiveness. - Emo Philips

Neglectful father of David Quinowski

by marcello on Mar 11, 2009 8:12 PM EDT up reply actions

Not quite.

His release point is a bit lower on his fastball — as you can see on the first base view — but basically identical to his body — as you can see on the overhead chart.

And no, unfortunately I don’t have any baselines established for different release points or anything really. I do hope to look at Shields during one of his worst starts tomorrow and see if I can’t compare the two and see what went wrong.

by R.J. Anderson on Mar 11, 2009 7:52 PM EDT up reply actions