Two starting pitchers had 200+ strikeouts in 2015 for the Pirates – Cole and Francisco Liriano.
The paths each took to that lofty total were both unique and similar at the same time.
What I found most interesting in putting this study together is the degree in which Cole’s best two pitches – the four-seam fastball and the slider – comprise the bulk of his punch-outs.
Of Cole’s 202 strikeouts on the year, 81.2 percent came from either the four-seamer or slider. That’s best reflected by the table below, which shows Cole’s overall 2015 usage on counts with two strikes.
[table id=69 /]Contrast that to Liriano, who culled 66.8 percent of his strikeouts from his considerable slider alone.
While the two employ the same type of breaking pitch, they couldn’t be further from each other. By virtue of throwing with opposite hands, Liriano’s slider breaks away from left-handed hitters while Cole’s breaks inside. Liriano’s slider gathers effectiveness by a filthy drop out of the zone while Cole’s relies on a bit more precision. Both end up deceiving batters at very good rates.
You don’t have to enjoy analytics to know that a count with two strikes heavily favors the pitcher, but it is interesting to note that the slider had a .BABIP (bating average on balls in play) of .367 after an X-2 count. This suggests that if Cole misses a spot with the pitch, hitters got a little luckier than if they put the fastball in play, which had a .250 BABIP rating. It becomes very hard to quantify how that might happen, especially after considering that hitters hit just .146 on the slider after an X-2 count.
My point is this: if Cole’s slider becomes such a known commodity that batters begin to anticipate it with greater regularity, they may be able to square it up a bit more.
What can Cole do to maximize the pitch’s value in 2016?
The answer might lie not in how much he throws it, but when.
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