Garrett Olson's 2nd Game and Pitch f/x

So, yeah, I wrote that Garrett Olson was a prime candidate to get shelled in his next game when his unsustainable LD% becomes sustainable. I mentioned how his pitch counts were also going to hurt him. So what does he do? He 4 hits (w/ no extra base hits) the wild card leader and marks 7 K's and a single walk (to his last batter). Now, the caveats to this performance are: 1) the A's have no power and rank 13th in slugging in the AL, 2) Oakland Coliseum is a pitcher's park, 3) Frank Thomas would have had a homerun in almost any other park, and 4) Garrett is somewhat lucky. Now, that said . . . he did a great job with his pitching counts and seemed to be quite aggressive toward the batter. This is what he needed to do and he did it. I don't think he is an ace type of pitcher, but I think he can deliver a 100 ERA+ or a little below. So I'll go through some of the data from the Pitch f/x system:

Pitch Type

More curveballs peeked into the Pitch f/x data. I still don't know what I happening. I thought Olson threw a fastball, change, and curveball. It may be that the equipment here are recording lower speeds than those at Camden Yards and the logarithm that predicts pitch type is seeing the lower speed and calling more of them curveballs.

Fastballs appear to be thrown at the same frequency between the two starts with 57%. Changeups have increased from 10% to 18.75%, which is most likely due to the lack of left-handed batters. Garrett does not throw his change up to lefties. The curve/slider has decreased from 38% to about 24%. This is again most likely due to the heavily right-handed lineup Oakland uses.

All in all, 55 fastballs were thrown (69% strike or hit in play), 18 changeups (60%), and 23 slider/curves (70%). In terms of purely missing the ball, the harder curveball appears to be his major out pitch. He seems to have less control of the pitch as it decreases in speed (likewise, increasing in drop). The graph to the right displays strikes, ball, and hits in play.


Location


Lefties
Here are his location and pitch types (green=fastball, orange=slider, brown?=curve) for lefties. The first thing you probably noticed is that Oakland has far fewer lefthanders in their lineup (only 1). The next thing you probably notice is that Olson hit his spots against Oakland. He really is hugging the outside part of the plate. When you see this sort of difference between starts . . . you get led to release point and pitch breaks. The pitch breaks look the same, but the release point reveals a major difference between the two starts. On the April 29th game, his fastball release point varied horizontally by almost a foot. This looked a lot like Cabrera's typical release point. Against the Athletics, Olson actually narrowed his release point to a range of about 6 inches. I think him being able to position the ball is linked to that metric. That metric suggests that his delivery was more repeatable than it was in his 2008 debut. Oh, right, this is about left handed hitters. Not much can be said as he faced so few in his second start. He still isn't throwing his changeup to them. Three of his walks came against lefties in the debut and his only walk came against a lefties in this most current game. An issue? I don't think we have enough data on that yet. Last year, he walked lefties and righties at the same rate.

Righties
Olson's first game consisted of pitching insides as often as possible. It looks like he had more spray to his location. In Oakland, he did not focus inside much, but was incredibly sharp at keeping the ball in the lower 2/3rds of the strike zone. This may be the result of better command or a more uniform approach to each hitter. I'm not sure there is much else to discuss on how he pitched to righties. Feel free to comment if you see something.

Speed
Speeds were about 3-4 mph less than his debut. This may just be a difference in equipment between stadiums or he could have toned it down a bit. I'd bet on the former. Also, more of an appearance of the curves and sliders.



Pitch Counts
One of the problems I saw with Garrett last start was his inability to get ahead in his pitch counts. He was actually worse against the Rays than he was during his forgettable 2007 run. It was one of the major reasons why I thought he would get shelled. If you combine a lot of guys walked on base and an average line drive percentage (more on that in a moment) . . . you are going to get hit. Hard. Anyway, he turned it around rather dramatically. His behind counts went from 27% to 10%. His even counts went from 31% to 24%. His ahead counts went from 42% to 67%. Typically, when you are ahead in the count 67% of the time . . . you are going to do well. I wonder if the A's approach of only swinging at their pitches allows pitchers to get into favorable counts. I'm not sure. Anyway, he did a great job reversing these numbers from last time. League averages are 12% for behind counts, 29% for even counts, and 59% for ahead counts. His numbers are potentially sustainable. It also sheds light to how poor his numbers were before.

Hit Quality
The second part of my hypothesis about Olson getting shelled was that a 7% LD rate is unsustainable. I swear this line drive percentage is not sustainable. I'm not aware of another pitcher who is capable of putting up such a line. This is just crazy. So, yeah, 7% again. His groundball rate dropped to a more realistic, in my opinion, 42%. His left on base percent remains in the high 70s. So . . . either his stuff is nasty and no one can see that . . . or he benefited from a weak hitting Oakland lineup who somehow couldn't figure out how to earn a walk against him (A's are 3rd in runs scored).

Conclusion
That line drive rate will go up. It won't hurt him much if he can continue to not walk anyone. I'm still calling for him being a 3 (95 ERA+) or 4 (85 ERA+) this year. I guess we will see.

Garrett Olson's 2008 Debut and Pitch f/x

Garrett Olson pitched last year in the majors and suffered a forgettable 32.1 IP. He logged in 28 Ks, which is respectable. He also wound up with 28 walks, which is not. He was also whacked with 42 hits. It was a rather forgettable first taste of the majors and he was chased with a lot of criticism about nibbling down and away.

In spring training this year, he was touted as the most likely fifth pitcher. Instead, the team signed Steve Trachsel and Olson was sent to the minors. The Orioles pitching coach informed him that he needed to learn how to go after hitters and not pitch "scared." At Norfolk he pulled in this line:

24.1 IP 1.85 ERA 18 K 9 BB 1.36 WHIP

Without knowing much about his starts . . . that WHIP suggests to me that he is quite hittable to AAA hitters. They seem not to be able to turn those hits into runs, which means there is a lot of luck or that Olson knows how to pitch and change speeds.

This past Wednesday, Olson was called up to face the Tampa Bay Rays. He came out with the win and had this line:

6.2 IP 2 R 4 H 6 K 5 BB

That walk rate is troublesome. Doubly so when that was one of the main issues with his poor performance last year. The hit rate is nice, but one game hit rates are notorious for being misleading. It was not a dominating performance, but at his age . . . he has room to grow. It looks, for the moment, to be good enough to give him five or so starts and then reevaluate. So let's get acquainted with Olson.

Pitch Selection:
Olson appears to use four pitches based on the f/x data. He throws a fastball, curve, slider, and change up.

Fastball
His fastball tails about 9.5 inches and remains 7.9 inches up in the air (due to backspin) from a motionless pitch. It ranges from 88-93 mph. He throws this pitch 57% of the time and equally to each batter. With the small sample size of the number of pitches he threw, fastballs can be expected the majority of the time on 0-0, 1-0, 1-1, 2-0, 2-1,2-2, 3-0, and 3-1 counts. He never threw one on two 1-2 pitches and rarely threw it on 0-2 and 3-2 counts.

Curveball/Slider
I thought Olson threw a mid-70s curveball, but it looks like the f/x system is a bit confused on this. It says he threw three curveballs and twenty seven sliders. He either threw a hard curve or a soft slider as the two groups look more like subsections than different pitches. I'm going to assume that he still uses his curve, but throws it slightly harder than I remember. Anyway, speed ranged from 79-83. The release point drops slightly in comparison with the fastball. It comes in 11.6 inches below the fastball or 2.1 inches below the trajectory of a spinless ball. The pitch breaks across 2.5 inches horizontally. This sure sounds like a weak slider. This pitch is thrown 38% of the time. 80% of these pitches were thrown to lefties and it is often used as his secondary strikeout pitch with the fastball being the primary one.

Changeup
His changeup has a very similar release point to his fastball, which it should as it has to look like a fastball. Speed ranged from 79-83. It tailed slightly more than the fastball at 11.39 inches and came in about the same height. He threw this pitch 10% of the time and only to right-handed batters. He preferred throwing it at 0-0 and 1-0 counts.






Location
This is probably the graph that needs the least amount of explanation. He throws inside and down toward the righties. This graph is not separated between righties and lefties, but it appears he never go low and outside to righties or low and inside on lefties. It would be nice if I had a better source for this data. Oh well.









Pitching Counts
A big knock on Olson last year was his inability to stay ahead in the count. I decided to break down his counts from last year and this year. First strikes were recorded 50% of the time (0-0 balls in play not included). This was up from last year when 44% were first strikes. To evaluate his progression through the counts, I created a graph. I did not include 0-0 counts in the calculations. Counts I included in the behind category were: 2-0, 3-0, and 3-1. These are situations where less pitches are required to result in a walk than a strikeout. I thought it more important to define counts on the endpoint as opposed to the progression. Even counts were: 1-0, 2-1, and 3-2. Ahead counts were: 0-1, 0-2, 1-1, 1-2, and 2-2. The result is the bar chart to the right. He is actually getting behind more in the count than he did in 2007. This should be a concern. Of course, it may just be a single game event. I'm not sure. If this was his "issue" last year, then it seems like he has done little to correct it.

Hit Quality
Another part of the puzzle may be that somehow he is able to induce poorly hit balls. This may be a skill or it may just be luck. Here is a comparison of important hit categories:
Category........2007..........2008
LD%..............18%............6%
GB%..............34%...........53%
LOB%.............66%...........78%
Ok, so what can you tell me from that? If we think what Olson did on Wednesday will continue, then it seems we think he is going to keep these new rates. Well . . . there is no way he can keep a 5.9% line drive rate. His batting average against (BAA) would be about .180 and his stuff is not that good. Now, has he become a groundball pitcher? That is a large shift and I am inclined not to believe that is one. I think when the rates shift to something more reasonable, the number left on base will also decline. I am completely and totally confident that he cannot sustain that level of batted ball success. It has been mentioned that he is hiding the ball better this year and if that has anything to do with it . . . David Blaine is a chump. Olson would be the master illusionist.

Conclusion
Having only looked at the stats and not one second of video . . . take this for whatever you think it is worth. Olson is young and is bound to improve, but his rates suggest he just might get shelled in his next start. I hope I am wrong. One game is not much to base an opinion on. He needs to improve on the number of walks he gives up, his counts, and somehow retain a high enough groundball percentage (or else those eventual long balls are going to knock him out of games). He definitely has talent, but I doubt he has arrived. If we are able to acquire some of his pitching performance . . . Stotle will analyze it, put it up here, and tell me that I am wrong.