Rates & Barrels - Why Is Arm Angle So Important to Pitcher Health?

Episode Date: April 10, 2025

Eno, Trevor, and DVR discuss the surging Kyren Paris and strange feats, in the face of Jesse Chavez signing with Atlanta for the *sixth* time in his career. Plus, they look at several pitchers that have significantly altered their arm angle this season in pursuit of staying health -- including Garrett Crochet, Paul Skenes, and Cole Ragans -- MacKenzie Gore's excellent start to the 2025 campaign, and they play the third installment in this season's 'Name That Dude!' series. Rundown 1:55 Kyren Paris' Red-Hot Start Continues 7:19 Jesse Chavez's New MLB Record 14:03 The Relationship Between Arm Angle & Health 18:40 A Look at Garrett Crochet's Changes 24:05 Paul Skenes' Adjustments 28:40 Biggest Arm Angle Changes From 2024 to 2025 41:32 Is MacKenzie Gore Making the Leap in 2025? 48:47 Name! That! Dude! (Season Series entering 4.10.25: Trevor 2, Eno 0) Follow Eno on Bluesky: @enosarris.bsky.social Follow DVR on Bluesky: @dvr.bsky.social Follow Trevor on Bluesky: @iamtrevormay.bsky.social e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris With: Trevor May Producer: Brian Smith Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm Dane Bruegler. I cover the NFL draft for the Athletic. Our draft guide picked up the name The Beast because of the crazy amount of information that's included. I'm looking at thousands of players putting together hundreds of scouting reports. I've been covering this year's draft since last year's draft. There is a lot in The Beast that you simply can't find anywhere else. You can get The Beast and all the great coverage my colleagues do by subscribing to The Athletic. You can do that at theathletic.com slash subscribe. What there is in barrels, it is Thursday, April 10th, Derek Van Riper, Enos Serres,

Trevor May all here with you. On this episode we discuss the importance of arm angle. We lucked out. There are a couple studies Trevor found that actually explain some things that are happening here in the early weeks of the season so I'm very glad we didn't talk about this topic last week because that information is going to add a lot to this conversation. We're going to take a look at Mackenzie Gore who appears to be having a breakout here in 2025.

His first three starts have been fantastic. We're going to name that dude coming up here in a little while and of course as we do each and every episode we've got some news to get to up top. If you haven't joined our Discord already You can be a part of that community Just hit the link in the show description if you're watching us on YouTube smash the like button or just hit the like button at a Force level that you're comfortable with really you don't have to smash it. Don't break your computer Yeah, we're not responsible for any broken computers. Everyone always says it smash the like button like just click it that works, too I don't know how much people say that anymore actually I'd be honest Eric more of a meme just saying oh no

Get out much you know this What do people say now they just say like the stream Saying smash Good you just actually behind man. It's okay It's you know it's fine. I'm always behind you're doing your best That's the sad part. I am doing my best and it's very very sad output Let's talk about Kyron Paris for a moment though before we could go and he's unstoppable to Homer game against the Rays Angel still lost but hey look if the playoffs started today

And they don't the angels would be in the playoffs So, you know to have that going for them on April 10th, which is nice, but Kyron Paris We talked about him briefly early in the week visit to teacher man throughout the offseason it maybe has changed his swing for the better and I just feel like I'm left out you know I didn't get in on the frenzy over the weekend I didn't pick up Kyron Paris anywhere and we're getting a lot of questions on discord is this real is he a breakout guy that's going to stick and have an everyday role and obviously not continue at the pace he's

on right now but end up being one of those pop-up surprise players or is it a more in the line of Kyle Lewis? I think that was the other comp that came up in Discord. A guy that comes up, gets red hot, and then just never quite plays at the same level that he did other than that one really nice stretch. Well, we had a nice piece of input from our resident hitting coach in Germany, Dominic,

which pointed out that teacher man who Kyron Paris went to, he's a famous hitting coach in Germany, Dominic, which pointed out that teacher man who Kyron Paris went to, he's a famous hitting coach that has worked with Aaron Judge. He is a terror to the internet and has been banned from almost every hitting forum and place imaginable. But he thinks he has this great idea that everyone should listen to.

It really works with certain players, as Dominic pointed out, and he thinks that it really works with players that hit too many ground balls and that there's something about the move that Teacher Man teaches, which is really, I think, about releasing the barrel. He talks about just an early move, I'm making this move, it's that hitter, it's like when you're when you're dumping the barrel. He has really Refined thoughts about that move and if that move was incorrect for Kyron Paris before This could be a breakout if you look at his ground ball fly ball mix It used to be you know, 55 for Kyron Paris and for ground balls now

It's 36 it used to be 36 for fly balls, now it's 55. So he's really changed something. He's changed his swing path. He's changed something mechanically, but he does have these inherent flaws he had before, which is he has a high swing strike rate. He had, you know, high teens swing strike rates before. He has a 17% swing strike rate now.

I don't think this is going to fix, you know, his strikeout before. He has a 17% swing strike rate now. I don't think this is going to fix, you know, his strikeout rate. So I still think he will have a poor average. He won't be hitting 440. Oh, this is really good analysis. But I mean, like, he could be like a 230 hitter with, I would say, let me give him the the upper ends let's say he's a 230 2020 guy that is what I'm comfortable saying in terms of true talent a 230 2020 guy who also draws some walks and gets on base at a decent clip is a heck of a player though like that's a good outcome overall for a guy they took in the second round the angels are just like they're in the business of getting lucky.

You know, they're not spending a lot on their player development. So they're just hoping that their guys are going to tread and drive line and to teacher man and whoever and they're going to get some opportunity on this team and they're going to come out of this, they hope, with three or four regulars that they can use going forward. Those numbers are, by the way, that's like Taylor Ward area for them and he's one of their three best players every year. So they can get another Taylor Ward,

I think, you know, if two or three war. Who can play defense on the infield, yeah. Yeah, two or three war out of a position player, that's a quality above average player that you want on your team. By the way, I just thrown out, I saw Paris's last homer, it was off Mason Montgomery, 100 down and in, oppo.

Like the swing looked sustainable at least. And now you mentioned like swinging strikes and stuff, a lot of that might be approach and you know, he is young and doesn't have a ton of experience. So maybe he cleaned some of that stuff up. But like getting to that pitch and then hitting it where he did and getting it out of the park, that's just not easy to do.

And you definitely saw, it's funny, I just turned on the game just to see what was going on because I didn't watch those teams much and he immediately hits it. And I also wanted to see Montgomery pitch. And I played against him when he was in, when I was coming back in 23 and he was in Salt Lake, he was on that team with Joe Adele and everybody.

And he didn't have that swing. He wasn't that player. So but I remember looking like, wow, that was a little Aaron Judgy. And that now makes sense that he's that he's a feature man disciple. Well, there you go. That's the path. And Paris is on right now. Does some different things, though, and for for a base dealer to chip in

and on that side as well, so a nice story so far for the Angels. I don't think the fast start is going to keep them in playoff contention all season. But if it does, we'll talk about it more at that time. Trevor, you were quick to point this one out yesterday in our production meeting. Jesse Chavez now has the record for the most stints with the same club. Yes, he now has six since with the Braves. He was helping his five of those are since 2020. Basically he's played for them every single year

since 2020 at some point. I believe he only started one of those five times with them started the season in spring training. So, you know, he's been, I guess just like, they just love having him there. We're trying to figure out, you know, what is going on. I hope I get to talk to him someday and just be like, hey, what do you think it is?

Like what, you know, what's so comfortable? But he did, do you guys know who he, cause he was tied with another guy with five until recently when he got picked up back by them. Do you know who else, who was the other guy he was tied with? I bet you, you don't. How far back in history do you have to go?

It's pretty far back. I was gonna say T.'t. How far back in history you have to go. It's pretty, pretty far back. I was going to say TJ McFarland with the A's. I don't even have a good guess. I know TJ McFarland has like three different stints with the A's. I think TJ's got like three with two different teams. I think he's got three with the Orioles too. But it's Bobo Newsome. Bobo Newsome. I was not, I wasn't going to pull that one. It went back to the Washington senators three times. It says Minnesota Twins on his on his thing. But it was it was back when they were the senators before they even went.

So this was the 60s. But you had some crazy stats about Chavez's like quality with the Braves. Like, what was it? I got some some quick ones for you if you want. It is that I know these ones on top of my head. Tale of Two Jessies was a story I told the other day on my show and shout out to a YouTube channel called Baseball Doesn't Exist.

If you guys haven't seen this kid, he's great. He finds stuff like this all the time. It was inspired by a video he did because I went and looked a little bit deeper into statistics, but in the five years, in the last five years in the five stints, Jesse's two wildly different people when he's on the Braves and when he's on any other team and he's been on nine teams. So this is pretty glaring.

He's thrown 1130 innings total in his career. 230 of those are with the Braves is 6.7 career war. 3.7 of his war is with the Braves in the last, in last five years even he's gotten three of that war so with the Braves so he's got like a negative one and a half with everybody else like a 70 hour and every other team he's got a two five seven with the Braves strikeout percentage is up eight percent with the Braves his walk percentage is down three percent his home run rate is like a third of what it is on the Braves versus the other teams. It's absolutely insane, the differences. And basically that's probably why the release happens or he like takes his opt out in April

and then ends up with the Braves. And they signed him immediately. It's like within hours he is signed by the Braves. And then as soon as someone struggles or get hurt, he's called up and he got called right up. And guess what guys, he's thrown well for the Braves again this year. I feel like he must've bought a house in Atlanta or something.

He'll probably loves the pitching coach and the staff. That's the constant, but there is a bunch of random pictures on the internet. Like whenever he's saying like, or finishing a game or it's always Darno catching. It was always Darno. So like him and Darno were, we're like yucking it up all the time, always smiling at each other. There's like more pictures of those two together than anyone else on his team.

So I'm like, maybe he just really liked Darno too, but Darno's not there anymore. So I hope that wasn't it because I want to keep, I want to see him continue doing what he's doing. It's a great random kind of Jason Starkian sort of thing that Jesse Chavez has that record. Do you guys ever see ridiculous records and then just want to break them yourself? Any facet of life?

You just see a thing walk into a restaurant and they got a food challenge or something. Literally anything. I'm going to break this stupid record. I had one one time in my Roto Wired days. I asked our CTO at the time. I said, what's the record for most player blurbs player updates written in a day and he It's like 92 updates in one day written by one person and I just said I'm breaking that I sat down on a Friday I worked extra for fun just to break this stupid record that no one cares about

Do you guys have any records like that? I'm always fascinated by the eating ones Whenever I'm in a place where they're like this person is eating, I'm like I could do that. I feel like that's the low-hanging fruit. I think that most people think food is the way. If you're wrong, you're miserable for a while. So I'm not interested. I know I can eat a lot, but I've run into too many people much smaller than me that can eat a lot more. So I'm not under any illusions. I eat a normal amount for a person my size. So being wildly uncomfortable for days is not something that's just full of pancakes or something.

So I remember I had the Guinness Book of World Records, it was like year 2000, so it was like the 50 year anniversary of it or 100 year anniversary of it. I remember flipping through those and deciding which ones I thought I would be able to break someday. But they were all like athletic, like pull ups. Which, by the way, David Goggins is a pull up record and no one's ever gonna break it

because he literally tore a bunch of muscles and his arm's doing it. So I don't think that's ever gonna happen because he's one of those people who break his feet to run a marathon and not care. So yeah, I don't think there's anything I could do at this point, but there's a bunch of weird. There's weird ones.

It's like you balanced a thing on a thing for this many minutes or whatever. I like the ones that aren't skill related. It's just like you're patient enough. Longest live stream ever, 11 days without sleeping. There you go. Oh my goodness. Can you imagine just how exhausted and dehydrated and miserable and 11 day live stream could make you be great people go? I did a 48 hour once no showers you did 48 hours

I did a 48 hour stream, but I did I will admit I took a four hour And it's like sleep in the middle and someone else played World War crap for two days. Never again, never again. Yeah, that's the thing about some of those records too, those personal records, you hit one, you're like, I will never do that again. Not even sure how I got through it the first time,

but I did. Let us know in the Discord, what silly personal records have you tried to break or have you broken? If you're in the Guinness Book of World Records, we'd love to hear from you. Let's get to the main topic for today. We were gonna talk about arm angle changes last week Have you tried to break or have you broken? If you're in the Guinness Book of World Records, we'd love to hear from you. Let's get to the main topic for today.

We were going to talk about arm angle changes last week because we saw players that were dropping with lower arm angles and it was raising our eyebrows. And it turns out, Trevor, you stumbled into some very recent research that might explain why there is a very select group of pitchers that are changing their arm angle in the early part of 2025. Yeah this was really interesting way I kind of stumbled upon this it was a series of a few events one was someone on Twitter posted a these are these arm angles of these like prominent opening day starters were all low on opening day

and at first I was like yeah you sometimes you go up and as your these arm angles of these prominent opening day starters were all low on opening day. And at first I was like, yeah, sometimes you go up and everyone was in warm climbs for spring and letting you go somewhere cold and suddenly you're like, I can't grip the ball, I gotta figure it out. So things change and then they usually settle. So I was like, all right, I'll give this a couple weeks.

And give them three or four starts and see if this stuff holds up. And then the next week or so goes by and there was a segment on MLB Network, Jake Peavy was talking about how Skeens, who was one of the names on that list, one of the highest changes in arm slot, had like all of his pitches had kind of reached

the same angle, but like they were all low. So like the point wasn't that they were low, it's just that they are all kind of, were the same for every pitch type. And I the point wasn't that they were low, it's just that they are all kind of were the same for every pitch type. And I was like, wait, those look low and that kind of lines up with everything was low with that other thing.

So what's going on here? And then suddenly randomly on Instagram, I got the algorithm gave me a post from a place called Velocity Academy. I think that's Velo Academy. So shout out to them for making this post that a study had come out that basically came to the conclusion that there is arm health related

to differences in arm angle. For every 10% you go higher or you get above your head or that direction up, it adds five to 10% depending on how hard you throw of like stress on the joints of both your shoulder and your elbow. So I was like, this stuff is all connected, it's gotta be because Paul Skeens, he just added two pitches and he goes and works

on this stuff immediately when the season's over. Like this is the type of stuff he would know about. He also had Wes Johnson as a pitching coach who like, kinda when you work with him, you start to think, like notice these things yourself. And I did it, so did Paul. And so I was like, this is a Wes Johnson. I'm not saying Wes found it,

but like a disciple of Wes Johnson would find something like this. So I was like, okay is a Wes Johnson. I'm not saying Wes found it, but like a disciple of Wes Johnson would find something like this. So I was like, okay, what does this look like? So I went and actually read the study. And then there's another study that came out a month before this one about the arm angles, just about generally how arm angle and trunk tilt when you release the ball are correlated

and also correlate with arm. So it was more of a general one for with like 500 pitchers in the sample size, which is huge, which makes me feel pretty good about it. Then the next one was 66, the arm angle specifically. They wanted to find an actual number like, and how force actually changes based on the actual degrees in the arm angle.

And they came to some pretty cool conclusions too. So that led me to believe now we have a few guys Cole Regans, Garrett Gautier and Paul Skeens to top that list all with differences consistent differences like five degree or more differences in their release angles on every pitch from 2024 to 2025. So they've been working on something mechanically that maybe we're not talking about. That is maybe it's the arm angle changing on purpose or maybe it's something else, which I think mostly it is some other mechanical adjustment that is leading to a lower arm angle which then generates better chance of staying healthy, which these guys are all

guys that have professed publicly that they want to throw 200 innings, all three of them. So it's like you guys are trying to throw more innings and stay healthy, and none of you have reached more than 140, well, Reagan's did last year, but he wants to get to the 200. But Skeens and Crochet specifically want to throw the most innings in their career this year, and that would all line up. So I think it's interesting to look at and you can extrapolate, is this the thing?

We're gonna see this happen with more and more pictures in order to help maybe alleviate some of these injury issues The pursuit of health I think is is where this is all coming from and it makes a lot of sense I think you put the overlays together for crochet and skeins will play them If you're watching on YouTube will dump them in the discord after the show too If you want to check them out if you're just listening wherever you enjoyed the podcast. But the crochet one, I think, made it really easy for me to see the relationship just between the rest of the trunk and the arm. Like it was a very pronounced difference. I grabbed a still of that, too. So if you missed it on the way by, you can tell is the old version of crochet. I mean, there's a lot of tilt down toward that third baseline

and that would potentially cause a lot of stress. The thing that stands out for me for sure is that this isn't necessarily, like if you draw a line through their arm across their shoulders, I think that you'd probably find that that line hasn't changed as much as the line that goes from their head to their legs. You know what I mean? And I've had

pitching coaches tell me that there's something a little bit innate about that relationship of your release to your shoulders, but that you can change things around that. And I talked to Casey Mize about being much more upright in his forward move. And you know that there is VELO in the, I think it's called like trunk flexion. They have a lot of these terms that's really hard sometimes with biomechanics, but the sort of forward move

with your spine. That's flexion, yes. Yeah. And tilt is the side to side. Right, so there's VELO in your forward tilt. And so, you know, that means that your spine is working and I think that your spine just works better if it's like vertical.

Stacked, stacked is what they would say. Because then you think about it, think about like your body is not stacked and you're off to the side. Now your spine is tilted, right? And think about how that goes into your legs, right? So you're tilted into your legs and then your body goes forward. Like, I feel like that could create hip issues.

It could create back issues, could create oblique issues. And it's probably not as efficient as you could be. Like we are upright walking people. We don't walk with our spines tilted. So like, I feel like, uh, people have wanted to, yeah, that's people talking about being stacked. People want to be upright through the delivery. And so I think what, what's happening here is maybe a confluence of things.

Maybe some people are like, Ooh, these lower arm angles are healthier. Maybe other people are hearing, hey, you wanna be stacked, you wanna be vertical through, and both of those things can lead maybe to slightly lower arm angles. If you could pull up the still one once more, there's a couple little things. Like you said, you mentioned the velocity,

like the flexion, the forward tilt, that is where you feel the power coming through and that's where you're, like that's your cue to I am throwing harder and I'm getting behind the ball the best when you feel most comfortable in your forward flexion. But a natural inclination of the body is to lean to your glove side because your arm is the one

that's extended, the other one is curled. So that's where you feel like you have space. So when you try to get more floor forward flexion, sometimes you tilt in that, trying to get that. But what happens then is the balance of your body, like you just said, is not stacked. So you tend to compensate with your front leg. Like right here, you can see Crochet's front knee

starts to wobble out to stay underneath him. Because if he doesn't, he's gonna fall down. Then you lose power there. So everything, once you tilt your top of your body, the rest of your body compensates underneath him because if he doesn't he's gonna fall down then you lose power there so everything once you tilt your top top your body you're the rest of your body compensates in order to get the ball there and then you can also see his wrist his wrist is bent slightly in and like a supinated position in the when the whites are in the white socks jersey and then the red socks jersey that is neutral that is straight through his wrist is the same angle as his arm which also creates a

little bit less like tension on the outside of your forearm versus the inside. So it's all about, your joints have a range of motion and you have a neutrals position where everything around your joint is almost, I won't say even, but is at rest, the most comfortable it can be. So you don't wanna pinch one side or overextend the other, and that looks like basically what the tilt does

when you're tall. All that other stuff kind of settles into where it Naturally can be within the joints that it is you want all the moving pieces to be as close to that neutral position as possible So that you are that is the minimal amount of force you can you are putting on each joint individually in order to get whatever you Throw whatever V lo or power you throw and because crochets are Thor and skeins We're gonna see in a moment is like it is in their best interest to make sure everything is, that's what cleaned up means.

That's what everything's in a neutral position in order to be the strongest they can be without creating as few compensations in your mechanics as possible. Yeah, that wrist position. I didn't notice that when I first looked at that still, you're right. That's a lot of extra tension.

You can kind of feel these things if you're just sitting at your desk or listen to the show you can twist your hands and move different ways and yeah you you get a little extra tension different parts of your arm as a result of those really seemingly subtle differences let's know the skeins on here too that one's more subtle I feel like did you grab a still off of that one yeah I got the still on this one too I thought the same thing I didn't see as much going on here, but that's probably a good thing that his mechanics weren't as far away

from what he's doing right now. That's my assumption anyway. Yeah, and he hasn't had injury issues. He just hasn't thrown a ton of minnix. So he was closer. Grochet has had really bad injury issues. His injuries where he was out for a really long time. He just had more work to do,

but I think that if you put crochet and skeins together, like flip one of them so they both are throwing the same arm, they'd be really close. Because this year he's very stacked. That looks really, really good. Like even his wrist is slightly more neutral. Like the other way was he was a little bit tense inside, I think, so he could feel like he was on top of the ball a little bit more and now it looks

like he's more comfortable like his arms just kind of going the way it goes because the rest of his body has done the work. Now the second piece was a little bit dense for me and had a lot of biomechanical stuff in it and you characterized that as saying that that there is not necessarily an impact on Velo by dropping the arm slot So the two studies the one was the more general one that wants to get like is basically like how do we keep guys healthier? And what mechanics it actually gives you it gives you like 11 mechanical things to check on Sequencing which is all the stuff we just talked about and then the next one is very specific to the arm angle

But again, I think what it is is all of the things in the first one, if you're cleaning up, like for example, your trunk tilt, so your arm angle's dropping, but that you're still throwing just as hard, their conclusion is you're not losing VLO by your arm angle dropping. By its nature, just because your arm angle

looks like it's dropping doesn't mean you're gonna lose velocity. And they're like, so don't worry about fixing your trunk, like your trunk tilt isn't the thing causing all the velocity. Or giving you velocity, yeah. Giving you velocity, like just leaning over isn't as big of a deal as it may seem. And being taller and feeling a little bit looser

is actually better for you health-wise and you will maintain your velocity better as well. You know, well one thing is you have, when you're coming up through Little League, they're all like, get on top of the ball, get on top of the ball. So like there's a lot of kids who who and then, you know, the glove, you know, is often the heavy, like kind of heavy for them. Because as a parent, you buy them a

glove and you're like, Oh yeah, I want you to play with that for three years, right? You know, buy the small glove and they want the bigger glove because they want to be bigger kids, right? You give them a big glove, the glove falls down, right? And then you start that movement where you start pulling that glove in and then they're telling you to get on top of the ball. So like, there are definitely a lot of kids who like the glove falls down and the arm goes up and they're trying to get on top of the ball

because that's what their coach is telling them to do. And so that I think led to also our fascination with ride, you know, I think led to a lot of over the top guys trying to get on top of that ball, trying to get ride, trying to convert that spin into vertical movement. And we may be in the midst of a kind of reaction to that where it's like, well, that might not be healthy for you. Plus we're finding out other ways to maximize stuff.

What makes it complicated is that these guys just lose velocity, like people just lose velocity over time. And so, Crochet's velocity is down. Skeen's velocity is down. But they were really high velocity guys and they might have lost anyway. I mean, Crochet is now, this is his second year starting after being a reliever. So that would be totally believable that he might lose some VLO and then maybe maybe it's good for them to lose a little VLO and have this new arm slot that's healthier so the last thing I wanted to add is just that we

know all about vertical approach angle now and so you know there is some value to being over the top and having ride because that keeps the vertical approach and go flat. However, you can get flat from a lower slot as well, because you're lowering your arm slot, you're lowering the release point. And so the ball can come out now and be flat from a lower release point, which is something that Stuff Plus loves.

So if you look at the guys who have raised and lower their slots, on the left the guys who have raised and lower their slots, on the left are people who've raised their slots and there's only really one success story and that's Jordan Hicks and I don't think that Jordan Hicks is a success story because he raised the slot. I think it's because his body is different and he's come in just bigger hoping to retain his VLO over the course of the season better. Maybe his arm slot has something to do with his 30-point change and stuff, but almost everybody else is zero or minus on this list of guys who've raised their arm slot.

And some of them have raised their arm slot to kind of ridiculous proportions. I mean Mitchell Parker at 61, that is really high. Nick Poveta was already high and he made it higher and lost Velo. 62 now? That's great. This is ridiculous stuff and I don't know that these changes have been healthy for these guys. On the right you see guys who've dropped their slots and for most of them it's been a good thing. Kikuchi has lost Velo and stopped throwing half of his pitches. He's now suddenly a two-pitch pitcher, throwing an 86, 87 mile an hour slider when he used to be throwing an 89, 90 mile an hour slider. So I don't know that his stuff loss is because of the arm angle difference, but you see a

lot more success stories. I mean, Cole Regans, despite the VELO not being up, his stuff plus is up. Garrett Crochet, VELO down, stuff plus up. Paul Skeens, VELO down, stuff plus up. Max Meyer is not necessarily a VELO change. That's just, you know, there's a pitch mix thing there. He's added pitches, so it's not just his fastballs. Maybe I should have just done fastball stuff change or whatever, in any case the outcomes here for guys who have lowered their slot seem better as a group There's one other really interesting theme I'm seeing on that right list here crochet injury a lot of long-term injury problems

Cole Reagan's had some injury problems before he went to went to the Royals before he went to the Royals. Kikuchi, injury problems. Lazardo, injury problems. DeGrom, injury problems. And Skeen's never thrown more than 130 innings, and he's just ahead of stuff. I wouldn't put it past me that he just is like, I'm getting ahead of this.

So, and Max Meyer got hurt last year. So it's like, all of these guys, these might be things that they're working on because someone's like, hey man, this might help you stay healthy as well. I mean, you could say, oh well, they're hurt again, and so they're just trying to find a slot that works. I would say they were hurt before

and they're coming out of this now with the rehab specialists. And I think the rehab specialists in some teams are the guys that know biomechanics the best, right? And they have an opportunity. A lot of times you're coming out of rehab, it's like, isn't that the time to really clean up your mechanics, right?

Isn't that when everyone's like you're meeting with the biomechanist you're reading with the rehab specialist and you have the time now you Have six months or whatever it is to make it right, you know And if you come out with a different arm slot, it was on purpose like that's not that's not feeling around the dark That's like hey We want you to look like this coming out of this injury. You spend that time on the comeback trying to be as clean as you can coming back.

You hear that in every single interview right after a guy's told he needs Tommy John. You say, well I'm gonna take this time, I'm gonna clean up my mechanics. Yeah. And it's true, like you get to go do all these weird little drills and you're doing like, you're in the pool doing like resisted

like little dumbbells and stuff and you can do all your little motions with no resistance because you don't have to pitch soon. So that is when you do it and that's when a lot of this stuff takes because you also can kind of get rid of all that stuff because sometimes it's hard to make that when you're healthy because you're like, it's working.

I know eventually this might lead to an injury but I'm not injured right now. And then sometimes just having to take a huge step back and not be on the field, you can like the longer the longer you're out the longer it is easier for your brain to reset not like worry so much about all the stuff you did more successful about like you can't really remember your most memory goes away a little bit so you're more open to changing things if you need to. It's a reprogramming

you know that's part of the rehabbing physically reprogramming your your biomechanical markers So along the way which with proper specialists, which before you were hurt how many times did you have? Opportunities to work with people who knew that stuff inside now like it's more common now than it used to be But for a lot of guys if they'd never really been hurt before They just cruise through and didn't want to mess with stuff because as you were saying it was working like why why rebuild something if it's actually working and getting good results if it ain't broke don't fix it you hear that a lot oh but that's baseball but that's like painted on some walls somewhere why wouldn't it be the

other thing I was gonna ask you you know is like looking at the the chart for the stuff changes too I mean even de Grom, so he's down two points, but he was kind of reliever ish, you know last year He wasn't yeah came back in tiny sample at a certain point. You could give up especially It's kind of like the velocity conversation too If you are phenomenal in stuff, you can give up a little bit of stuff in pursuit of health And it's probably a fair trade off, right? So a slight decline like that means very little. I think we were talking in the meeting yesterday, Mason Miller is down in Velo a little bit. Who cares? He's got room

to spare. He's at the top of the chart for velocity. So I think it's a little bit like that where you're okay making these trade-offs if you're getting something back in the long run. You know, there's more and more of us talking about, in the media, talking about injuries and health, and more and more of us are putting Glenn Feislich's study out there about how close you live to your maximum being stressful on your arm.

That's going to filter through to the coaches. That's gonna be something that you may filter past coaches. Your coach may be, at tread or driveline, may be like, yeah, throw as hard as you know, that's going to be something that you may filter past coaches, you know, your coach may be, you know, at tread or driveline, maybe like, yeah, throw as hard as you can, like make as much money as you can make us look good. But like the player is on Instagram or reading on the athletic or whatever and might say, Oh, hey, that's interesting. I'm probably still pretty good at 99. I don't necessarily have to sit 101, you know, especially if it means I'm out there longer.

So I think there's something to that. I also throw that back up on there real quick because you see that Emerson Hancock is the big minus there, you know, going down to 22 degree arm angle. And, you know, I think there's a lot of stuff going on there, but I also want to point out that I wouldn't be surprised if there's sort of an ideal arm angle for health and VELO, and that that it's not necessarily just

dropping down as good. I wanted to point out that I'd done a search for arm slots or just release points under four feet. And the hardest anyone's ever thrown for more than five points under four feet. And the hardest anyone's ever thrown for more than five pitches under four feet was John Schreiber, or is John Schreiber, with 92.7 miles an hour in the fastball. And the hardest anyone's done it

for a sustained amount of time is Tim Hill. Tim Hill is the hardest throwing side armor in history. 91.2. So I think- You think he knows that? is the hardest throwing side armor in history. 91.2. So I think- You think he knows that? I'm gonna tell him next time I see him. I'm hanging my hat on that dude, if I'm Tim Hill. I bet he knows that.

I'm gonna guess he does. I'll tell him about that, but I think that, of course the mechanics start changing. There's like a sort of 180 degree, you know, right out of your elbow, right out of your shoulder thing that when you start going under it, I think you start probably stressing other things. And having talked to Darren O'Day and Tyler Rogers

and a lot of these submariners about this, they say that you start stressing your hip labrum because you're using your hip as a big, it's almost like in softball, you're using your hip as the big it's almost like in softball using your hip as the big leverage point as opposed to your your shoulder, the overarm shoulder. So ends up being labrum tears in the hip. You know, for Darren O'Day had, I think, two hip labrum surgeries. And Tyler Rogers is like, I know I do yoga every day.

Well, I think you were saying, Trevor, at our meeting yesterday that a lot of softball pitchers have leg injuries instead. Like, it's lower half injuries instead of upper half injuries with the underhand delivery. That's where they generate their power mostly. Basically, their arm is not generating. It's just you're trying to get your hands beat up.

But like, their elbows aren't doing anything. Their elbows are going along for the ride. It's like shoulders sometimes, you know, they can get some extension like back a little bit if they go behind their body. But like it's hard to throw strikes like that. So most of them are pretty, it's pretty neutral. My sister played softball at college for four years

and was a pitcher and then had to went to the outfit because she tore both her ACLs. So she thinks it was like, she thinks it was where she got these both running, running for balls, but she thinks she would wore them down. Pitching. Yeah. Yeah. She, she thought that it was fraying and stress over time because you're blocking

you block so hard. And you like jump off the mound and you slide kind of like, and you like, you like jam your foot into the ground. Like that's, that's where a lot of that comes from, but they don't have arm issues like at all. Like no softball players. I don't know if there's any pitcher Tommy Johns they don't have arm issues at all. No softball players. I don't know if there's any pitcher Tommy Johns. There's probably some softball position players

because you're throwing a big ball like this overhand, which is tough sometimes, but it's just not an issue. Hips and knees are definitely a bigger issue. This is not on topic necessarily, but I just learned this today. Matt Trueblood wrote a piece about Pablo Lopez being hurt and his hamstring, and it's his push-off hamstring. And he said that that's actually good news

because people who've had push-off hamstrings have returned to duty quicker. And then another sort of doctor online was like, the blocking leg absorbs more stress. Like the blocking is harder on your hamstring pushing off, which is not something that I would have guessed, you know, before, you know, studying pitching. But blocking is a huge part of VELO, even for overhand pitchers.

But I could imagine it's it's like the thing for for for underhand pitchers, because if you like if you like just just mimic women softball players throwing it, it's like this pelvic shove. It's like a real blocking thing where you're just trying to use your whole pelvis and legs to stop everything, and your arm comes through. So it looks pretty aggressive on the legs. It's also harder for me to throw that way

I just can't can't do it. It's not not natural skill, man The really I saw there's a friend of mine played in a adult men's fast-pitched softball league and I looked at him like I don't I can't contribute anything. I don't think I can hit that I certainly can't pitch that way. So I'm useless out there. There's nothing I can do. Do you know about the famous men's traveling softball team? I think it's Kings in their court. It's three guys. And they would go play softball teams,

like three guys on nine and just destroy them. Wow. Because their pitcher could throw, he could throw like low eighties underhand and just unhittable. Like he'd throw no hitters every single time. And then they'd just all hit homers. Barry had a hard time hitting Jenny Finch, right?

That was that famous thing. Jenny Finch was really good and she threw hard. She was not even close to the hardest thrower on her team. Like she was like the third or fourth hardest. She threw like 70, which is hard, but she was playing with some girls who played through mid-70s. I think the hardest pitch ever now is 78-2.

A girl from Tennessee just did it. Kyron, Kylin, something. She just broke it and then like given she checked the thing gave a nod But it's the hardest hardest collegiate softball pitch ever thrown she just did it like literally a week or two ago That's a Ben Joyce move. Oh, yeah She yeah, that's exactly what it looked like. I Yeah, it was she yeah, that's exactly what it looked like Love that love that look back at the radar gun. Let's get to another topic here We've started to wonder yesterday is Mackenzie Gore's making the leap We talked about it a little bit on opening day cuz he had that great start against the Phillies just pitched really well against the Dodgers

And his third start of the season seven K's and six innings against that lineup very impressive We've seen three starts now this season. You know what is reliably different or new in the arsenal and approach for Mackenzie Gore? One thing that stands out for me is that the curve actually finally has the shape that he's been looking for all these years. He's been talking to me about how difficult it has been for him to get any glove side movement on his curveball, which I guess he's so kind of north-south and over the top, you know

Considering our discussion of arm angle that it is hard for him to get any wiggle on the curveball But this year he's getting you know, three point eight inches of glove side movement I mean he got arm side movement on it in 2023 so the difference between 2025 and 2023 on the curveball is five inches in that direction and I just think that it's You know what he needed. I mean he needed if you look at his pitch type chart, everything is north-south So to get more wiggle on that curveball, that becomes suddenly the thing that moves the most in that direction of his in his arsenal.

And I think it's it just sort of broadens, broadens his pitches and makes batters have to think about more things. They can't just see everything vertically. Yeah, but that slider usage up a little bit, too. That's the other thing that just sort of on a pretty basic level I noticed was a different thing in his approach. But yeah, different shape on the curveball, you're right. You can really see it from that savant player card view that we had on the screen on YouTube.

What's the ceiling here? One thing we talked about in the offseason, Trevor, was that the Nats defense was horrible last year. They did make some changes, especially at third base. Even just Paul DeYoung out there ends up being a pretty big upgrade because they ran out Nick Senzala. I think he was something like a minus seven or a minus eight by outs above average last year and it was other spots around the diamond too that were well below average. We talked about CJ Abrams defense, that needs to get better but where do you see this going from here? Is this a guy we're talking about

as a top 25 starting pitcher by season's end? I think it's absolutely possible. I think that that was a conversation that's happening a lot when he's with the Padres. They're just like, this guy could be the front of the rotation. He needs to improve his command. That was a big thing for me.

He was just kind of all over the place. But the stuff was very clearly there. Classic, I don't know, he's got a lot, at least in terms of, you know, canically and just how he looks when he's pitching. Like a lot of parallels with Reagans. I mean, I know they have completely different arsenals in how they approach them,

but one thing you need to know about lefties, specifically, especially guys with riding fastballs that like to throw up and throw hard, is they struggle to get, it's all about how well they get righties out, because most hitters are righties, and they have to face mostly those. And if they can get those guys out consistently,

that is what's gonna bring them the most success. And the way you do that is by using the inner half of the plate, your natural default is up and in with a fastball. And you just stay, that's where you get strike one, as opposed to just throwing guys away. One thing he has done, I think, and I noticed it in the first start of his and just kinda watched him last year, that lack of command meant he was kinda stuck

in this middle corridor of the plate, which made him not as effective, like, righties didn't feel pressured by his stuff inside. Adding a little bit of a horizontal movement on both of his breaking balls has been fairly helpful. You showed that chart just before. He had a bunch of curve balls that were backing up technically,

going like straight down or the other way. And like nothing in there shows you that a righty, this is last year, shows you that a righty needs to worry about that inner half of the plate. And for lefties that throw hard, they have to dominate the inner side of the plate or find a way to do it. Manaia's done it in a completely different way. David Peterson of the plate or find a way to do it.

Manaia has done it in a completely different way. David Peterson is another guy who has completely decided to do that and is getting better results because of it, just because he's like, one in doubt, I'm just going to throw a hard sinker in to a righty and I know I can get it in there and if I miss in, I miss in. Gore looks like he is commanding that side of the plate much better. That combined with the movement creates confidence. Lefties have never been an issue. Everything's, you can get everything away from them,

but it's just about commanding the inner half of the plate. So whenever you see a lefty that throws like this guy, Lazardo's another guy that most more recently, because he throws sinkers and they sink really hard, it's hard for you to command the inside of the plate. So far so good this year, he's commanding the inside of the plate and throws 96. Like you just have to get it in there for strike one.

And once you do that, like, doesn't matter how your other stuff moves You're gonna have some success, but of course potentially I think you know I don't think the 13 strikeout game was it was a fluke I think he's a guy who if he's rolling something would click and he could be a double digits regularly strikeout type guy Yeah So maybe you got it's even among the National League or league leaders in strikeouts this year as long as the volumes there I mean at 181 strikeouts last year and 166

into third innings. He's definitely shown that sort of skill, but if he's getting deeper into games more consistently and commanding everything better, then there's really like no no limit to what he could do. Also, with this curveball movement, it's easier for him to back foot the curveball, you know, lefty on righty. And if you look at his chart, that's exactly what he's doing. down righty and if you look at his chart that's exactly what he's doing and that creates a sort of vertical pathway for him where he's got up and in with the fore seam you know in on their hands with the slider and back foot with the curveball and he can play with you can play off those those three things so he's also been a guy that like hasn't had great command in the past but it

hasn't been terrible and so just any I mean, it was 97 location plus with San Diego, 97 first year in Washington, 101 last year. Right now 124, that's when he's rolling, rolling. But like, if it's just going to be like a 105 or something this year, he could easily have his career year. Plus he's 26. It's the perfect time for all this. And you go

from seven innings to 136 innings to 166. Like he's just adding and this is his year. I think this is his year. It's like it's just all coming together. And one last point, this did come up on Discord. If you're looking at past years, the Stuff Plus or Location Plus, that's all the same model. When we update the model, we retroactively, we clean everything up. So you're looking at the same model. So you're not looking at last year's model and trying to compare Gore to last year's model.

It's all one model. I would not be surprised if we ran a Location Plus risers leaderboard, if Mackenzie Gore was at or near the top of that. That's a big, big step forward that goes a long way in addition to changing some of the movement profiles on those pitches as well One more segment to get to it is the game that is slowly very slowly Sweeping the nation it is name that dude Season series now favors trouble prep work. I didn't I didn't search I'm gonna I'm just gonna I'm gonna bring up a leaderboard of mid 90s hitters

It's probably not gonna help you but you can try Any names you want to try and put on the screen just to jog your memory? Absolutely, go for it Trevor has a two nothing series lead so far in the 2025 installment Only gonna get bigger our simple game works this way I give a series of clues after each clue Trevor and you know can have one guess as to who the mystery player is today first Player to name the player gets the point. It's that easy You can play along with us usually our legendary producer B Smith is winning in the background trying not to spoil the game I could see his video. I could see him just like shaking his fist like he knows the answer and

Nobody on screen actually can see or hear him So it's pretty fun for me Just going inside the game a little bit there. So here we go first clue for today name that dude I was born May 3rd 1986 in La Grange, Texas Nolan Ryan, how'd you not get it out of Nolan Ryan when he was born in 1986? So I know someone from La Grange,

but he's from La Grange, Georgia. Oh. Texas. And that's about the right age, but this guy is a minor league guy. 86. Didn't think about the possibility of multiple La Granges, but yeah, sure, of course, why not?

A lot of repeat cities. I was drafted seventh overall in the 2004 draft Eyes got real big just on that clue that's a big leagues any guesses around 2010 No guesses, High school guy. Yeah. Move on to the next clue. I made my Major League debut in 2007 with the Reds and pitched in my final game in 2020 with the Twins. I feel like you guys are honing in on this even though you're not guessing. Tyler Clippard. That's not Tyler Clippard

It was he was if he was on my team. I should know it Because the very reserved Version of the Reds the Reds took him. Yeah debuted with the Reds 2007 final game with the twins 2020 It's not Maddie Belial is it? He's from Texas but he's a little older than that. Alright we'll move on to our next clue. I threw two no hitters including one on July 2nd. Homer Bailey!

Homer Bailey, yes a somewhat recent two no-hitters guy. I was at that second no-hitter. That was the connection. I was actually going to use this one for the Bear Bottle shows because of the connection to the Giants to give away a hat and our show was really long so we didn't do one that day. He's the Nolan Ryan of the 2010 Reds. I think Homer Bailey was on a cover of the Baseball America Prospect Handbook at one point too. He was a big-time prospect. People were really excited about Homer Bailey was on a cover of the baseball America prospect handbook at one point too. He's a big-time prospect

People were really excited about Homer Bailey last time I saw that guy maybe he got released a couple weeks before the end of the season in 2020 and He was gone. I don't think anyone saw him leave I think he just he like he like teleported we were like, how did he get out of here so fast? And he just disappeared. So, and no one's seen him since. So if you've seen Homer, make sure he's okay. Forward me please, thank you.

Wow. I don't know if this ever happens to you guys. I was on LinkedIn or something yesterday and I saw a post from Matt Joyce and I was like, what, huh, algorithm? Why has the algorithm served me a post from Matt Joyce? What's Matt Joyce doing? And I was like, the world is so weird. You just have like name that dude

Just appears sometimes for you in your life in places you wouldn't expect it to Homer Bailey though The two no hitters probably the you know, the individual highlight of the career What do you think his career war ended up being 14 seasons in the big leagues? We'll go be war cuz that's what I've got open right now 20 18 and point to 6.1 14 seasons in the big leagues. We'll go B-war, because that's what I've got open right now. 20. 18 and 0.2. 6.1. Wow.

I feel like he had a much better career than that. Less than Jesse Chavez. That's right, that's a very surprising thing for me. Oh, it's very different on Fangrass. Yeah, what's on Fangrass? We were much closer on Fangrass, 16.5. That's where, like, that would have been the same kind of number I would have guessed, so.

That's a huge discrepancy right there Yeah, not to be confused with the biggest though discrepancy Ryan Domet. Domet's the biggest? Oh that's huge Yeah, he has eight real war, bereft and negative eight on fingers. He's so bad defensively. Yeah, they don't have framing in V-war He's literally like the worst catcher defensively of all time. Has anybody ever talked to him about that? I think he knows. But does he laugh about it or is he kind of? Oh, he'd definitely laugh about it. Okay, good, I just, yeah.

Domens make fun of himself type of guy, yeah. I think Homer Bailey, I think there's gotta be an underlying injury that really changed things there. I'm just looking at it like, he has this thing where, I think that betting on a young starter is just really hard because he had Velo, he had Pedigree, he was supposed to do it right from the beginning, and the first three, the first year of his career,

like 45 innings, 5.76 ERA for Homer Band in 2007, then 8 ERA in 2008 in 36 innings. It's just really hard to put all the pieces together. In 2009, he throws 113 with a four, five, three, and then he has three years of row where he's like pretty good, but like Cincinnati's a tough place to pitch and he's getting it together.

Then 2012 to 2014, he actually is good. Like he has a ERA around three, six. He's a two to four win pitcher. He's a four win pitcher in 2013 by Fangraphs. Like he has a really good stretch there and he's sitting 93 to 95. And then he never gets that VELO back. And in 2015 he's down to 92.8 and he's missed a lot of time.

I would assume that he was cut short by injury, which sucks because it just takes a while to get going as a starter. He finally did return on the promise and people won't remember that because they'll remember how the beginning and the end went. Yeah. I think people get stuck on the last five or six years where you're trying to work through those injuries, trying to get back and it's not happening and it's not working. And I think that's why in my head I was so surprised when when I saw that war number, I was like, he was good. He had it.

He clicked. He was it took a little longer than people thought, but it was there. Brian has some constructive criticism for me. Yeah. Legendary producer Brian Smith says he needs to regroup and evaluate his name, that dude plan. You are down three in the season series, but it won't get any better. I tell you, I freeze up. I mean, the Nolan Ryan thing is just totally, I freeze up.

Like I heard Lagrange, Texas and I just said a word. Right, yeah, you dismissed born in 86 if you heard Lagrange, Texas. Not even, I am not clutch. Like you start talking trivia and I torpedo myself, my heartbeat goes up, and I'm like, oh God, I'm gonna screw this up again. And I did. You know, but I did wanna point out one fun thing

about one of our other co-hosts, Jed Lowry. It looks like he has 16 of his 20 career war with Oakland. So- A little bit of the Jesse Chavez. a little bit of the Jesse Chavez little bit of a Jesse Chavez story Three stints with Oakland always played his best ball with Oakland always went somewhere else on a deal and then came back afterwards Well to dig into that on Wednesday, but Yeah, a lot of ground covered today. Hopefully you all enjoyed it. We're all on blue sky You can find Trevor I am Trevor made up be sky that social you know Xerox eras that beast got it social IMD VR

Dot be sky that social I don't know if our producer Brian Smith's on there yet Gotta find that out throw his trying to gram some more. He actually is you're gonna get Instagram now, too I mean, I've always been there. I just you know I'm trying to you have to remember to take pictures I take him I just don't like posting them. Yeah. I don't know, it's just the way it is. But thanks to our legendary producer, Brian Smith, for putting this episode together.

That is gonna do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We're back with you on Friday. Thanks for listening. Woo! Woo!