He is 5 - 3 with an impressive 3.17 ERA after beating the Indians tonight. Will he eventually revert back to 2007 form?No, but the odds of him being as good as he was in 2005-2006 while striking out 4.8 batters per nine are very slim.
White Sox watchers say that Contreras might very well keep putting up some good numbers all year. His off-speed pitches are working much better, particularly his forkball, which was the key to his initial success in the bigs. He's also added a cutter to his repertoire. Some reports say his fastball has better velocity than it did last year, but that I'm not so sure about.
So Contreras might be somewhat better than he was last year. The problem I have with buying into his comeback as a complete success is because I think it will be next to impossible for Contreras to put up a 2.6 G.F ratio all season long. If he somehow does this, then he deserves all the success he can garner. My other problem is that even if Contreras is throwing the most varied array of junk balls in the history of pitching, it's a little easier to catch up to a pitcher throwing off-speed than to a fireballer throwing gas. I think the league will catch up to Contreras to some degree. How much they catch up is an open question. I could see Contreras putting up a 4.5 ERA the rest of the way. It certainly won't put a smile on your face, but Contreras could be passable as a back of the Roto rotation guy.
3 comments:
According to FanGraphs at least, he's throwing the exact same pitches (at the same percentages) as he always has, and his average fastball velocity is up - a whole 0.2 mph. Maybe he is throwing some fastballs faster (but that would also mean he's throwing others slower, which seems unlikely - though maybe he is intentionally varying the speed of it).
Anyway, like you mention, his success is due to his crazy GB rate and his low HR rate. A decrease in HR rate is of course expected when you're doubling your GB/FB rate, but he's even been lucky on fly balls (HR/FB of 4.3% which should be around 9). Also with a line drive rate of 19%, his BABIP should be over .300 and it's currently at .268.
So luck is playing a part, but not a huge one.
I'm interested in how exactly he's increased his GB rate so much, when he's throwing the exact same pitches at the exact same speeds at the exact same rates, and was so consistent in GB rate from 2004-2007:
2004 - 44.1%
2005 - 44.5%
2006 - 44.6%
2007 - 44.9%
2008 - 57.3% (!)
One other thing to note is that the improvement over last year isn't as big as it seems, because he was pretty unlucky then.
Regardless, given some evening out of his luck and regression in GB rate, I'd expect an ERA in the low 4s or so from here on out.
The cutter is what interests me most. It's not a pitch he's really thrown all that much, and it seems to have become his out pitch against right-handed batters. As he starts wearing down, he's been going mostly with the forkball against lefties but throwing the cutter against right-handers. The off speed stuff, if it's down in the zone, is probably what's generating more grounders. His numbers on pitches 76 and up are actually much better than on pitches 31-60, where he's actually had the most trouble. It's entirely possible that he's found a new comfort zone working with more off speed stuff, but I'd like to see him pitch more than the one time I have before being too comfortable with that assessment.
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/contreras-20/
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