Pittsburgh Pirates relief pitcher Daniel Hudson may be able to turn his season around if he starts to utilize his slider more often.
So far, the month of August has not been kind to Pittsburgh Pirates reliever Daniel Hudson.
He has appeared in three games for a total of two innings. He has given up six runs (five earned) in those appearances, including a disastrous third of inning on August 9th when he gave up four runs (three earned) against the Detroit Tigers. This appearance pushed his season ERA to 4.89 in just 42.1 innings of work. His FIP of 4.93 indicates that Hudson is pretty much performing as he should.
Since FIP explains what a pitcher’s ERA should look like if the results of his batted balls in play are league average, this is somewhat troubling for a player under contract for another season. Because of this and a few other factors that will be outlined below, Hudson is currently a -0.3 WAR player this year according to Fangraphs.
What is leading to Hudson’s issues on the mound? For one, he is walking batters at the highest rate since he made his debut in 2009, 4.7 every nine innings. He is giving up home runs at the second highest rate of his career, 1.5 per nine innings. However, he has shown the ability to still get a hitters to strike out with 8.9 per nine innings. This is more than his career average of 7.7 so he does feign an appearance where his stuff is working.
Issues in the mix
Perhaps some of Hudson’s issues are based on how often he throws the pitches in his arsenal. Over at Brooks Baseball, there is a breakdown of each of his pitches and the statistics to go along with them. This year Hudson has thrown three different pitches for the Pittsburgh PIrates: a four seam fastball, changeup and slider. His four seam fastball has been the pitch that he has used the majority of the time, throwing it 466 times as opposed to his changeup (123) and slider (158). However, even though he goes to his four seam fastball more often, that is the pitch that hitters seem to have the most success against it than his other pitches.
The results of each pitch really do show that hitters feast on Hudson’s fastball more so than his other two pitches. Hitters have clubbed seven home runs off Hudson this year, all off of his four seamer. They are also hitting .333 and slugging .656 against it as well, another indicator that perhaps he is going to that particular pitch a little too often.
In turn, the other two pitches in his arsenal are not used nearly as often as his four seamer, but hitters do not fair as well against them, particularly his slider. His four seamer has resulted in 15 extra base hits, while his changeup and slider have each resulted in just one double a piece. Batters are still getting a hit against his changeup 30 percent of the time, but almost always are limited to just a single.
Break-out possible?
If there is one pitch that has gotten great results for Hudson yet is not used as much as it should be, it is his slider. Opposing hitters have just a .106 batting average and .128 slugging percentage against that pitch, along with a BABIP of .172. His slider also has the highest whiff percentage of any of his pitches this season, sitting at 18.35. Clearly Hudson’s slider is giving opposing hitters way more trouble in 2017 than his other two pitches, especially his four seam fastball.
Hudson is under team control for another season after 2017 and has shown that at least one of his pitches can get the results that he needs to be a successful arm out of the Pittsburgh bullpen. Whether or not he goes to his slider more often this season is a question mark, but it cannot be denied that opposing hitters do not have the same level of success against it compared to his four seamer and changeup.
Image credit – Daniel Decker Photography
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