It's opening day! Yeah, sure, there were a few games doled out like pieces of bread to the starving masses yesterday but today is the real deal! So, grab a pal and a Bacardi Breezer or whatever YOUR beverage of choice happens to be, and duck out of work (quit if necessary) and bask in the glory!
Rich Hill Pretty Much Abandoned His Fastball
I don’t think I’m telling tales outside of school to say that Rich Hill throws his curveball a lot. In 2016, for example, he threw it literally half the time. With good reason too: amongst major league starters who threw at least 100 innings, it ranked 3 rd in Pitch/FX’s pitch value metric behind the late great Jose Fernandez and the just great Corey Kluber. By shirking tradition and using the curve as his primary pitch, Hill managed elite numbers through his injury-shortened season: 10.5 k/9 and just 2.7 bb/9 supporting a 2.12 ERA (backed up by a 2.39 FIP). He may have gotten a little bit lucky with just a 0.33 HR/9 allowed, but there’s no denying that curveball is tough to square up. This leads to the central reason for writing this post. Rich Hill made his season debut last night with the Dodgers and while watching the game I thought that he was throwing a lot of curveballs, even for him. Here’s a second inning at bat against rookie Hunter Renfroe, in which the black dot represe...
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