Explain Reyes' New Problem

[Fat Strat]

Reyes turned around one recurring question when he roared through the first inning with three strikeouts. But the big inning bit him again; it just came later.

The right-hander permitted two doubles and two two-run home runs in a four-run fourth inning. In his other five innings, he didn't surrender so much as a base hit. He struck out five Cubs against two walks, but lost for the fourth time in as many starts and his ERA crept upward to 5.73.

Reyes has allowed either three or four runs and pitched either five or six innings in each of his four starts this year. He has yet to endure a disastrous start; he just hasn't had a good one, either.

Out of Reyes' 22 innings in 2007, 16 have passed without a run scoring for the opposition. Yet three times in four starts, Reyes has sustained damage of at least three runs in a single inning.

Minimizing the damage was a problem again Friday. The first hit against Reyes came when Derrek Lee doubled to lead off the fourth. Duncan got a glove on Lee's liner and nearly made a spectacular catch, but the ball squirted out as he hit the ground, yielding another what-if.

Four pitches later, Aramis Ramirez homered to turn a 1-0 Cards lead into a 2-1 deficit.

A deep fly to center provided the first out, and Reyes got a grounder to make it two down. Mark DeRosa doubled down the right-field line to keep the inning alive, and Felix Pie hit his first Major League home run to stretch the Chicago lead to 4-1. Reyes set down the next seven batters before he was removed.

"I threw two pitches that got over the middle of the plate, and you can't do that up here," Reyes said. "Unfortunately they scored some runs on it. I felt a lot better. I felt like I'm getting better. I've just got to bear down on the one inning where I struggle. I've just got to do a better job."

It seems to me that Reyes' development has moved into a new area. He's solved the problem of disastrous starts, where he allows 5-6 runs in 2-3 innings. In my opinion, that represents a signficant hurdle crossed. He's learning what is required to get major league hitters out consistently, which is always one of the first steps for a rookie to overcome.

My question, though, is what is causing this new problem of one awful inning, surrounded by elite performance? Whether it's the first inning or the 4th, he's consistently had one breakdown at some point in the game that ruins his era and sets him up for a short outing (5-6 innings).

How do you explain a 5.73 era and a #1/#2 caliber 1.27 whip?

Mental breakdowns at some point in the game?

Gets off gameplan?

Poor execution caused by an unexplanable and temporary lack of control?

Bad luck? (i.e. a HR to Felix Pie).

Overall his control has been pristine. A 1.27 whip translates into significant success. His GB/FB ratio has improved to 1.04 this season. His HR/FB% has improved to 10.7%. His BABIP is a reasonable .288, in line with his career. His K/BB ratio is up to an acceptable 2.5.

I'm having trouble coming up with a statistical explanation for what he's experienced, except bad luck on some ill-timed hr's.

Regardless, if he keeps pitching the way he's pitching, he's probably going to become a very reliable and high-quality pitcher for this team as soon as this season.

Anyone have any explanations for his one-inning implosions?

[Jmodene]

The P-D seems to think it's a case of pitching up in the zone, which makes sense, because he's always pitched up in the zone - you can get away with that in the minors, but not the majors, not for long.

He may also have just temporarily hit a wall in that fourth inning after having thrown so many pitches in the first three innings - he clearly got a second wind in the fifth and sixth, though.

He really needs to get with the game plan, though, and start keeping the ball down.

As I mentioned on another thread, he's starting to remind me less of Tomko and Stephenson and more of Jose DeLeon, a similarly-talented pitcher who also struck out a lot of guys (he's the last Cardinal to lead the NL in K's) but who was also susceptible to the big inning (he had terrific WHIP's but kept losing games).

[haltz]

Part of the problem is that each two-run jack is worth about a run of ERA at this point. Sample-size, et cetera.

Jose DeLeon walked about four batters per nine, far more than Reyes will hopefully, and ended up throwing almost 2,000 102 ERA+ innings. It looks like he was just a little unlucky in the Wins department. I'm not sure that comparison is particularly apt.

He's not getting hurt by pitching up in the zone, pitching up in the zone can be very effective if everything is mixed properly. What he's doing is hanging that damn secondary fastball and some Cubs hitters have punished him for it. I also thought the changeup down the middle to Ramirez, who seemed to be sitting on it and hits off-speed stuff really well (seems to me from watching him now and again anyway) was a really terrible pitch. I think Jim disagrees, so I may be wrong about that one.

He is throwing a ton of pitches this year, but I don't really see how that can mean anything. It *seems* like hitters are fouling off an inordinate amount of pitches, and I'd have to think that there's really nothing to that except for some bad luck. If there's a good theory then, sincerely, I'd like to hear it. He threw a good amount last year, something like 3.9 P/PA, but that just puts him with Schilling, Arroyo, Glavine and Schmidt near the top of the list going by guys that were actually qualified. Forty pitchers were above 3.7, and even then, the difference between #10 and #40 is two pitches per 10 batters faced.

I'd like to hear a fresh take from Longhorn though.

[Maclowery]

That inning was hellish to watch. Every single Cub that came to bat hit the ball hard. Even Marquis. Whatever Reyes was trying was failing miserably.

[jim]

His first two starts, he didn't have a good inning period. He may have gotten outs, and put up zeros, but he wasn't there. The last half of his last start, and most of yesterday ranged from acceptable to good.

Ramirez' homer looked like a good pitch. The pitch to Pie wasn't the worst he's thrown all year by a long shot. He either just didn't have anything left in the tank, or he was throwing more 2 seamers that weren't doing anything.

[ghostrunner]

Is it a simple windup/stretch thing? I'm reluctant to say simple, because I've never completely understood what's physically different, but every color commentator makes that point in big inning situations.

[GatewaySnayke]

It's an odd, odd thing to watch someone be so good for 4-5 innings, but crap the bed in one inning.

[Richie Allen]

If you typically pitch down and away and float one over the middle of the plate you may see a line drive. If you pitch up in the zone, that area under the chin that is difficult to hit but miss and find the middle of the plate...a lot of hitters can't help but take you deep.

As far as why they seem to come in the same inning, I couldn't possibly say. Unless those are the innings that he loses his control a bit.

He's definitely an interesting player to watch at this point. I still have no idea how successful he's going to be in the majors. I could envisage anything from almost Ace-like success to a number 5 guy that does very little to help you win.

[TheoSqua]

I still feel that Reyes needs an out pitch, or maybe a better secondary pitch.

It seems to me all he does is Fastball, Change-up. He's got a few other pitches, but he rarely throws them and when he does I don't see them for strikes too often.


So say Reyes hits the corner with his fastball and goes 0-1, then he throws another one down and away for 1-1. Now what? He doesn't have the count for an "out" pitch, so he throws a secondary pitch. Either a 2-seemer or a curve (i think he has a curve, brain blank). He doesn't have good command of either so one of three things happen at about the same frequence. He either misses, hangs it, or gets the strike. so i'd say about 60% of the time he throws a secondary pitch the count either goes to 2-1 or the batter puts the ball in play.

So lets say he missed with that secondary pitch. Now the counts 2-1. Do you go fastball, which you've already done 66% of the time, or do you go to your "out" pitch, the changeup?

The days that he's really effective is when he's able to get by most hitters with just his fastball and changeup and rarely gets into counts where he has to mix up his pitches. If his curve is going in for strikes then he does even better, but his bread and butter is Fastball - Changeup.

This wouldn't be a problem if he had Santana control of these pitches, but he doesn't. The changeup has really good movement, and the fastball has decent action, but he hangs them too often for him to rely just on those two pitches.

So I think he either needs to a.) Get better command of a slider/curveball/cutter/2-seamer that allows him to have a third pitch to go to in the middle of counts, or he needs a better out-pitch such as a good curve or a splitter that will allow him to interchange his changeup and his second out pitch during the middle of the count.

[jim]

This wouldn't be a problem if he had Santana control of these pitches, but he doesn't. The changeup has really good movement, and the fastball has decent action, but he hangs them too often for him to rely just on those two pitches.

That sums it up for me. He has no new problem, he has the same problem he had last year - not being able to put pitches where he wants (although I keep putting this out there and don't hear a response - the pitch to Ramirez looked like a pretty good pitch - was it?)