To the casual observer, and generic baseball talking head, Oakland A’s starter Jharel Cotton’s season debut against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim was a rough outing. Cotton surrendered 5 earned runs, on 8 hits and 2 walks in less than 5 innings last Wednesday. The results were far less than ideal for the young righty trying to entrench himself in the Oakland rotation.
The box score backs up the assertion that Cotton did not pitch very well. Statcast, however, tells a different story.
Process Versus Results
Statcast tells us that the hits that Cotton allowed that resulted in runs for the Angels were not well-hit balls. In fact, they were weakly hit and are the result of poor batted-ball luck.
From chat now:
— Eno Sarris (@enosarris) April 6, 2017
Dolomite” Exit velo of each RBI hit off Cotton last night:
Simmons - 65 MPH
Espinosa - 65 MPH
Trout - 76 MPH
Pujols - 80 MPH
xStats are a nifty concept developed by Andrew Perpetua and are described as follows:
xStats are calculated using Statcast data in an attempt to make more objective observations of the game. Only the vertical and horizontal launch angles, exit velocities, batted ball distances, game time temperature, and ball park are taken into account. All other factors are ignored.
What do xStats have to say about Cotton’s poor performance against Anaheim?
xStats claims Jharel Cotton "should have" given up 1.6 runs on 3 hits as opposed to 5 runs on 8 hits. Dude got unlucky.
— Andrew Perpetua (@AndrewPerpetua) April 8, 2017
Despite the poor results there is reason for optimism. Check out the sequence of pitches that led to Cotton striking out baseball giant Mike Trout in the first inning of last week’s game.
Cotton vs. Trout
Player | Pitch | Velocity | Spin Rate | Inning | Batter | Result |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Player | Pitch | Velocity | Spin Rate | Inning | Batter | Result |
Jharel Cotton | Fastball | 94.3 MPH | 2,428 RPM | Top 1 | Mike Trout | Ball, 1-0 |
Jharel Cotton | Slider | 87.9 MPH | 2275 RPM | Top 1 | Mike Trout | Called Strike, 1-1 |
Jharel Cotton | Curveball | 79.9 MPH | 2505 RPM | Top 1 | Mike Trout | Called Strike, 1-2 |
Jharel Cotton | Changeup | 80.6 MPH | 2244 RPM | Top 1 | Mike Trout | Swinging Strike, 1-3 |
Not only is there nearly 15 MPH difference between Cotton’s fastball and his changeup, his changeup and his curve are almost identical in terms of velocity, despite being two different pitches.
Yesterday Cotton lived up to the hype we all placed on him during the offseason. In 7 innings pitched Cotton allowed just two hits and 3 walks while surrendering zero earned runs and striking out 6. Through the first week and a half Cotton has put up some impressive numbers in the contact management department.
Among starters with 50 or more pitches thrown this season Cotton ranks 12th in exit velocity allowed. Sean Manaea actually ranks second among starters in exit velocity, but this post isn’t about him.
There’s strong evidence to suggest that we’re likely to see more of the Cotton we saw in his second start than his first start.
Cotton’s Changeup
I can’t write this many words about Cotton without including this wonderful video footage of him doing insane things to a baseball while he makes an opposing hitter look silly.
Jharel Cotton's Changeup was all types of awesome yesterday against the Royals. pic.twitter.com/RsFY112cK6
— Pitcher List (@ThePitcherList) April 11, 2017
Last year Cotton’s changeup induced a swinging strike 17% of the time. So far in 2017, it appears Cotton has a 25% whiff rate on his changeup.
Other Notes and Results
Khris Davis hit two more home runs this week, each was a 405 foot blast within 2 MPH of exit velocity from each other, but one was hit at a launch angle of nearly 10 degrees higher than the other.
Here’s a list of other Oakland Athletics home runs from last week that were barreled balls:
Oakland A’s Hitters: Week 2
Player | Event | Distance | Exit Velocity | Launch Angle |
---|---|---|---|---|
Player | Event | Distance | Exit Velocity | Launch Angle |
Ryon Healy | HR, 1st Inning, 4/4/2017 | 420 Ft. | 108.2 MPH | 21 Deg. |
Ryon Healy | HR, 3rd Inning, 4/6/2017 | 430 Ft. | 106.7 MPH | 32 Deg. |
Khris Davis | HR, 4th Inning, 4/7/2017 | 405 Ft. | 106.7 MPH | 24 Deg. |
Matt Joyce | HR, 3rd Inning, 4/7/2017 | 410 Ft. | 106.6 MPH | 38 Deg. |
Yonder Alonso | HR, 8th Inning, 4/8/2017 | 407 Ft. | 103.1 MPH | 34 Deg. |
Khris Davis | HR, 4th Inning, 4/10/2017 | 405 Ft. | 104.8 MPH | 33 Deg. |
For those keeping score at home, here is a leaderboard of all Oakland A’s home runs year, sorted by average exit velocity:
Oakland A’s Statcast Season Leaders
Events | Player | Avg. Exit Velocity | Avg. Launch Angle |
---|---|---|---|
Events | Player | Avg. Exit Velocity | Avg. Launch Angle |
2 | Ryon Healy | 107.5 | 26.9 |
4 | Khris Davis | 106.8 | 28.5 |
1 | Matt Joyce | 106.6 | 38.5 |
1 | Stephen Vogt | 104.3 | 23.6 |
1 | Yonder Alonso | 103.1 | 34.3 |
1 | Jed Lowrie | 98.1 | 31.2 |