Matsuzaka's changeup is supposedly his best pitch:



So where is it? In KC, he threw 2, both against lefties (link); I don't have a precise count from the Mariners game, but there weren't many there either, and tonight, I didn't see more than a handful, maybe three or four. What's going on? Has he completely lost the feeling for the pitch? Is Tek just not calling it for some reason? Or does it look so unlike a standard changeup that scorers just aren't categorizing it properly?

He K'd someone (Big Hurt, I think) tonight on a 83 MPH pitch. I thought to myself, 'that is a nasty change up', but then Remy said it was a cutter or something...

We've seen it more than a few times. He threw a bunch of terrible ones in the fourth today when he couldn't get anything over.

I remember seeing him throw a lot of them in one of his spring training starts, maybe the last one, but I could be wrong. It looked pretty filthy IIRC. Maybe check the game threads.

Yes, he did throw a lot of them in the spring, and yes, they did look filthy -- that's where I got the idea that it was his best pitch. But in his first three starts -- almost none. You're right that he appeared to throw a few in today's 4th, but I was too annoyed (and surrounded by heckling BJ fans at the Rogers Centre) to focus on pitch selection... in any case, "more than a few" just isn't right: it's been only a few, and far fewer than we might expect given the hype.

From Amalie Benjamin's game blog today (link):



Perhaps that's why it isn't scored as a changeup: because it's as fast as his fastball (kidding)...

On a more serious note, though, I'm not sure I can identify the "bunch" of changeups in the 4th. Some of the pitches to Zaun, maybe, but they're all on the fast side (mid-80s), as opposed to the nastily breaking 79-mile changeup he threw to Adam Lind in the first (the 5th pitch, called a ball, but seemingly a strike).

Perhaps the Sox don't want him to show all his pitches the first time teams see him. He has also used the splitter sparingly. Matsuzaka has mostly relied on his fastball, slider, cutter, and curveball with an occasional change thrown in there. Hopefully they integrate his other pitches the 2nd and 3rd time around.

How beautiful is it that he's only been using four of his (plus) pitches regularly, and that he's got at least two more in the bag?

To be fair, his cutter is basically the same pitch as his fastball but more of a two-seam movement on it. Most top-flight pitchers throw both versions of the fastball anyway.

However, I'd really like to see more of his forkball/split-change. It's a ridiculous pitch.

Don't cutters and two-seamers move in opposite directions? A cutter cuts, and a two-seamer tails. To me, the fine line is between a cutter and a slider.

Yes, you are right. Also, "most" pitchers don't throw a cutter.

Halladay, Pettitte, Rivera are the successful ones I can think of off the top of my head.

Daisuke's changeup is one of his best pitches, and I think it will be very effective for him, especially in the AL East. So far he hasn't mixed it in much, I can onlly speculate that he hasn't been comfortable throwing it just yet. He threw it a handful of times against Toronto, and mostly to left handed batters. His change has the nasty screwball movement that moves away from lefties, so it makes sense that he would throw it to them. However, almost every time he missed in the exact same spot... his changeup started near the middle of the plate and tailed outside. The hitters laid off, and it was continuously called a ball. I can't explain why he couldn't adjust and throw it for strikes, it is a good pitch.

He did throw it a good amount though.... I think he threw it to righties mostl in 2-strike counts, but it was fouled off a lot. I think Vernon Wells fouled off like 3 of them.

On a side note, Remy was listing Daisuke's pitches last night and he said 4-seam FB, 2-seam FB, Cutter, Splitter, Changeup, Curveball, Slider, and that's it. A gyroball would make 8, but he says that doesn't exist. I was under the impression that he threw a Sinker as well... was I just imagining that?

Perhaps Daisuke is still getting used to the slightly bigger and slicker ball and that's making his change a less-than-go-to out pitch. Or perhaps the cold weather (not a factor last night) had somethign to do with it too. It's hard to finesse the strikezone when the ball is cold, hard and slick and your hands are frozen.

It's important to remember that he's only made 3 big-league starts. It's possible the whole "play book" hasn't been opened up. He's got a lot of things going on right now, and if he's the slightest bit uncomfortable with a certain pitch, there's no problem with holding it back a bit, especially when he's got 4 other pitches to go to.

I have a feeling that if he was 3-0 (which he would be with a bit of offense in his starts) and carried this 2.70 ERA and 24 K's in 20 IP we wouldn't be looking for his changeup.

Quick note: He has 24 K's, tied for the most with Tim Hudson by any active pitcher over their first 3 ML starts. (Wakefield was #5 with 22).

One thing I noticed last night, particularly in the 4th inning when he was having command issues was that while he diligently rubbed up every ball he was thrown to pitch, he never once went to the rosin bag. Considering he had almost no control of any of his pitches in the 4h inning, I was surprised he didn't try to improve his grip by going to the bag.

He's gotten 1 run of support in his last 13 innings pitched. Very disappointing. He's our new Tim Wakefield.

Yeah. I'm really not that worried about what pitches Dike-K is and isn't throwing because whatever he's been doing has been very effective. I'm more worried about the Sox finding a way to give him some run support when he pitches. The Seattle game you can't really say much because when a pitcher of King Felix's caliber gets everything working, you're gonna have a difficult time plating anything. However you gotta get more than 1 run on a night like last night. Whatever, its early in the season. I'm not really worried about anything. Our pitching won't be quite this good for the enitre year, but our bats will be more consistent.

Just to clarify: I'm not worried either. While he's missing his spots more than I would have hoped, some of the explanations offered (especially the point about different balls) make sense, and it's certainly true that he's been effective all the same. I'm just puzzled (not troubled) by the fact that we've seen so little of his vaunted changeup -- and that's an observation I stand by.

Silly, there is no such pitch as a forkball/split change. It's just a myth invented by some bored physicists overseas, and propagated by an uninformed/lazy media.

What you're seeing is nothing more his gyroball.......

Ol' Blue Poop makes a good point (as does DJ).

We ain't seen nothing yet.

Fair enough. It's possible that he feels like he needs to establish his fastball in hitters minds over the course of many games, not just over the course of one game. Maybe they feel like hitters need to be thinking more about his fastball, with all its variations, in order for his changeup to be effective and Dice-K and tek think that will take several times of facing a lineup, rather than happen over the course of a game. This is just a guess of course. I think its also possible, as others have suggested, that he's adjusting to the MLB ball and his changeup is the slowest to adjust, which would make some sense because changeup grip is so important.

I'm not sure the TV/radio people are correctly identifying the pitch. It moves so much that I've had a lot of trouble picking it out against some of his other breaking pitches at times. I haven't had the chance to watch enough of his starts to know for sure but I really wouldn't be surprised at all if he's throwing it and people just aren't identifying it correctly.

He didn't throw his splitter very much in Japan IIRC. I agree though that he should throw it more often as it is definitely a plus pitch for him. He probably doesn't like that he can't throw it for strikes. He seems like to be able to throw everything for strikes.

Couldnt' this be intentional? A lot of pitches are meant to dive out of the strike zone prior to the pitch getting to the place, like a splitter. If he's leaving his change up that tails away out over the plate, there's going to be some serious damage done by the opposing hitters when he doesn't locate it perfectly. Just a bit over the plate and they'll probably start teeing-off on the ball.

I'd rather have him throw it for a ball 10 times in a row rather than locate it perfectly 8 out of 10 times and have 2 of the balls crushed.

I see what you're saying, and it may have been intentional. What I'm saying is, when he started falling behind guys and wasn't throwing strikes, why would hecontinue throwing changeups away, intentionally throwing balls? If you're ahead in the count, maybe you can get them to lunge for it. But when you're behind, obviously they're going to lay off.

When he's really on, he can start the change-up letter high and middle-in to a lefty, and it will sink and tail across the plate and pickup the lower-outside corner, which it usually does because it freezes them. Last night, he threw it over the middle, and it ran outside too much too quickly. It wasn't appealing (especially considering many times when he threw it he was behind in the count)

He threw a couple yesterday that weren't where he wanted them. I don't think location mistakes are going to get hit, the ball moves too much...it moves as much as any change I've ever seen, including Pedro's. The issue is that he's got to locate it to get hitters to chase it or to get it called for a strike.

It could be any number of things yesterday...

-He's relied a lot on his curve and slider so far...maybe he has a lot of confidence in those pitches right now and didn't feel the need to expend a whole lot of effort working his change in.
-Toronto's strength is all the right-handed power in their lineup...his change isn't going to really do a whole lot against them, so maybe he was trying to show them to be conscious of his slider and curve.
-He's trying to keep it from the scouts so he can wreak havoc with it later.
-Likewise, he's trying to show advance scouts his fastball is better than advertised (it is) so hitters don't spend the entire season sitting on it.
-It's been cold.

Frustrating that he's got 2 losses 3 starts into the season, but he was terrific yesterday. Even in a bad inning, he gave up an infield single, a hard ground ball that could have been a double play, and some walks that were more a case of him rushing his delivery than of him being "too fine" or something. He gets into some serious Pedro-esque grooves where he goes 2 or 3 innings without throwing a hittable pitch. We can scrutinize his bad inning, but if Wells gets rung up or is called out at first, that's a 2-hit, 15 K shutout. He was as dominant as a pitcher can be before and after that inning.

Here is what I have noticed from Matsuzaka so far, that suprises me. First off let me say that this guy has exactly three major league starts. We really haven't seen or learned what we will be the middle or end of the year.

First, his fastball has much more life on it than first expected. I watched him a lot in the off-season and I just don't remeber seeing this type of hair on his fastball. There is no doubt he is going to get less swings and misses as the year goes on after people see him, but its not the "Dead straight" fastball it was labeled as.

Second, his mechanics are really streaky. I thought he was quite the opposite of this in that he had the same mechanics all the time. Instead his mechanics are all over the place. He gets in these zones where he is perfect, perfect balance, perfect release points, perfect everything. Then he gets into these spells where he really flies open, he doesn't stay balanced and he gets bad recoil on his arm motion.

Third, he isn't the same pitcher out of the stretch. His breaking balls don't have the same bite and his fastball loses location. This is probably why he tends to give up baserunners in bunches. Again though, I wouldn't be suprised if this was just early season struggles on his part.

Fourth, his cutter is an amazing pitch. I'm starting to think its his best pitch. The front-door cutter he got screwed on to Wells last night was quite possibly the best pitch I have seen this year, as far as actual skill needed.

First of all, great post, SouthernBoSox. I think that's an excellent evaluation of his first few starts.



Yeah. Remy pointed this out during the game, and it's worth mentioning here: how RHP throw sliders inside to RHB? It's insane, and it's awesome.