Explain Reyes' New Problem

[TheoSqua]

This wouldn't be a problem if he had Santana control of these pitches, but he doesn't. The changeup has really good movement, and the fastball has decent action, but he hangs them too often for him to rely just on those two pitches.

That sums it up for me. He has no new problem, he has the same problem he had last year - not being able to put pitches where he wants (although I keep putting this out there and don't hear a response - the pitch to Ramirez looked like a pretty good pitch - was it?)

I thought it was a good pitch. That one was just a "stuff hapens" pitch. Sometimes you put the pitch where you want it and it does what you want it to, but the hitter just hits it. I think back to that slider that Tavaras threw before he punched the phone. The pitch was Perfect, but it went out of the park.

That happens, and it's why the best pitchers don't have 1.00 ERAs. You're going to give up a few runs and a few homers and it's going to happen on some good pitches. The difference is minimizing the damage. That happening with the double beforehand is what killed Reyes, not giving up a homer to a very good hitter expecting that pitch.

[jim]

That was my impression as well. Thanks for a confirmation.

Going on the assumption that Reyes got hit by a pretty good major league hitter on a decent pitch, and going back to his last four innings of his prior outing, maybe he's taking a turn in the right direction. He's certainly been better to my eyes the last 10 innings than he was his first 12.

[haltz]

Here's the clip Jim. It's not buffering for me for some reason so I can't watch it again, which is annoying to me considering I remember what I thought at the time, but you guys obviously have a different impression. I'd like to take a second look.

[jim]

Thanks haltz.

A tad higher and a bit more of the plate than I originally thought, but not that bad.

[TheoSqua]

Thanks haltz.

A tad higher and a bit more of the plate than I originally thought, but not that bad.

agreed, I still don't think it's a *bad* pitch. It's not the type of hanger where you go "oh )*#*" right when he releases it.

[greenback44]

Watching the slo-mo replay in that clip, it looks like a changeup that backed into the dead center of the strike zone.

EDIT: Reyes has some pretty nasty reverse platoon splits, which aren't surprising considering his outpitch moves like a screwball. Instead of learning a 2-seamer, I'd humbly suggest he work on a slider.

Haltz, I like Flip4Mac. It solved Windows Media Player problems on my Mac.

[bleacherbum]

Watching the replay it looks like Ray Charles could have hit that one out

[TheoSqua]

Watching the replay it looks like Ray Charles could have hit that one out

I still don't think it was a bad pitch. He gets away with that more than not, and more likely it's a single or a fly ball to someone else. He basically threw worse pitches that were fly balls than that.

[haltz]

Haltz, I like Flip4Mac. It solved Windows Media Player problems on my Mac.

Yeah, I do have that. The weird thing is that the subscription stuff loads fine, but the buffering for the free highlights is pausing and then stopping. Who knows. Thanks though.

Anyway, I watched the condensed game (which is a really cool feature) and it wasn't quite as bad as I thought, although it's hard to tell with no replay and a small screen. Maybe it was because Ramirez was not fooled whatsoever and mauled it that made it look a little worse. It wasn't as lifeless maybe, but it looks like it found its way to the middle of the strike zone.

I still think his problems working up in the zone are more or less relegated to the 85-87 MPH two-seamer, that's just a bad pitch and it's resulted in damage more than a couple of times this year. I was pretty close when he threw it to Barrett last weekend and I hear the crack of the bat in my nightmares.

I wonder if he's tried to learn a cutter?

[CarpMan]

Mind you, ONE GAME, of not giving up first inning runs does not mean he has solved that problem. He might be right back with that problem his very next start.