Phil Hughes' Location (briefly)

(Click to enlarge)(Click to enlarge)

Although it came in a rain-shortened victory for the New York Yankees, Phil Hughes' pitch location last night was the best it has been in his somewhat short 2011 season.  He kept the ball away from both lefties and righties consistently, throwing just 8 total pitches on the inside part of the plate.  Of those eight inside pitches, he recorded 5 outs and no hits, with one strikeout of A. J. Pierzynski in the second inning.  He also allowed no line drives in his 6 innings of work.

Alex Rios -- Dead Last Pull Hitter

Alex Rios of the Chicago White Sox sports the lowest OBP in the major leagues among players with at least 300 plate appearances, .256.  Interestingly, Alex does chase more pitches than usual outside the strike zone, but in general, he swings at strikes more often than he swings at balls.  His problem lies in his approach at the plate, and approach that pitchers easily exploit.

In 2011, pitchers work Alex away:

Alex Rios, pitch frequency, 2011.They are pitching to Alex's weak zones.

Alex Rios, in play average, 2011.Alex can hit the inside pitch, but that's about it. Why is that?  Look at where his hits wind up:

Alex Rios, hit locations, 2011.Alex likes to pull the ball.  If you divide the field into third, you see there are almost no hits to the rightfield slice of the pie.  When pitchers work batters away, they batters that pull the ball often hit weak grounders.  Rios's ground outs look like this:

Alex Rios Groundouts, 2011.Pitchers are giving Alex rightfield.  Unless he takes the ball the other way, he'll keep making outs at a prodigious rate, and cost the White Sox runs in the process.

Dunn Against Lefties?

As a follow up to Bill Chuck's previous post on Adam Dunn of the Chicago White Sox, a reader asked to look at his struggles against lefties.  There are two major changes that help account for his poor performance.

Pitchers are attacking Dunn more when the count favors the hurler.  From 2008-2010,  Dunn tended to see pitches away when he was at a disadvantage:

Adam Dunn versus left-handed pitchers, count favoring the pitcher, 2008-2010.Now they are busting him inside.

Adam Dunn versus left-handed pitchers, count favoring the pitcher, 2011.From 2008-2010 Dunn hit .159/.177/.270 in that situation for a wOBA of .194.  This season, he's hitting .000 across the board.

The second change is one that might explain why pitchers are willing to pitch him inside.

Adam Dunn fly ball distance

Pitcher handedness	2008-2010	2011
Right handed	343	328
Left handed	337	320

Adam can't hit the ball that far any more.  There may be many reasons for his, but since his distance dropped against both right-handed and left-handed pitchers, it may be Adam more than the way he's being pitched.  Given that opponents are more likely to pitch him inside, it seems Adam lost some bat speed.  Maybe a lighter bat will help, but it could also be that at age 31, like Pat Burrell, he physically lost part of his ability to hit.