Aroldis Chapman on Target

Right now, Aroldis Chapman is scary. And not scary in the "might decapitate some dude in the third row" way that he was last season. The lefty with the turbo fastball has stepped up with Ryan Madson out following Tommy John surgery, striking out fifteen batters in eight innings pitched. Perhaps more importantly, Chapman hasn't given up a single walk after issuing 7.4 BB/9 in 2011.

Chapman has made grown men with immaculate reflexes look like late-inning beer league softball players by pounding the strike zone with his fastball. His velocity is "down" a tick, but he's hitting his spots and inducing swings and misses like no other reliever in the game:

Aroldis Chapman's fastball

Year	Fastball Zone Pct.	Fastball Miss Pct.	Velocity
2011	45.3	31.2	98.1
2012	67.9	47.6	97.1
Avg. RP	51.9	18.2	91.6 (for LHP)

Chapman's fastball zone percentage is fourth-highest among MLB relievers, behind just Javy Guerra, Fernando Salas and Greg Holland. And no other 'pen arm comes close to Chapman in whiffs: Kelvin Herrera (36%) is a distant second in fastball miss percentage.  

In 2011, Chapman often missed to his glove side and high out of the zone with his fastball...

Chapman's fastball location, 2011

Early on in 2012, however, Chapman has pelted hitters with high fastballs catching the plate: 

Chapman's fastball location, 2012

Opponents are a combined 2-for-20 against Chapman's fastball in 2012. Props to Jose Reyes, the only batter to get an extra-base hit on a Chapman heater (he tripled back on April 8).

Chapman's game revolves around his fastball, which he has thrown nearly three-quarters of the time. But he has also done a better job of locating his slider and changeup in 2012 (65 Zone%) than in 2011 (37%). It's only mid-April. But there might not be a harder late-inning assignment right now than squaring up Chapman.

Votto's All-Fields Slugging

The 12-year, $251.5 million guarantee that the Reds have given first baseman Joey Votto through his age-39 season has baseball pundits divided. One one hand, Cincinnati is not a huge market, Votto's salary could take up a quarter of the club's expenditures without a payroll boost, and the Reds don't currently have a mega TV contract bringing in big bucks. On the other, Votto's best historical comps among first basemen have aged rather gracefully, Cincy will share in the higher revenue streams from MLB's national TV deals (and perhaps an overall increase in franchise values in the wake of the Dodgers sale), and they're in a better position to get a big local cable TV deal in 2016 with Votto than without him.

Regardless of which side of the fence you stand on, one thing's for sure: Votto can clear it. The lefty is one of the game's true all-fields sluggers. Check out the location of Votto's home runs over the 2009-11 seasons:

 

Votto hit 39 homers to left field, 24 to center and 28 to the pull side. Overall, he has put the ball in play more to the opposite (33.8 percent) and middle (38.4 percent) fields than to right field (27.8 percent) over the past three years.

When it comes to going oppo, Votto is topped only by Ryan Howard among lefty hitters:

Highest slugging percentage to the opposite field by LHB, 2009-11

Hitter	SLUG
Ryan Howard	.870
Joey Votto	.805
Adrian Gonzalez	.782
Lance Berkman	.733
Brad Hawpe	.695
Joe Mauer	.678
Adam Dunn	.669
Mark Teahen	.660
Shin-Soo Choo	.648
David Ortiz	.622
AVG LHB	.430

To center, Votto is also comfortably in the top 10:

Highest slugging percentage to the middle field by LHB, 2009-11

Hitter	SLUG
Ryan Howard	.731
David Ortiz	.687
Jack Cust	.684
Carlos Gonzalez	.655
Josh Hamilton	.612
Joey Votto	.600
Jim Thome	.599
Prince Fielder	.598
Russell Branyan	.590
Adam Dunn	.586
AVG LHB	.437

Votto doesn't stand out quite as much to the pull side, but we're talking in relative terms here.  His .808 slugging percentage to right field is about 60 points above the big league average for lefties.

Left, center or right -- Votto makes loud contact in all directions. Pretty appropriate for a guy who could now buy his own chain of islands.

Sean Marshall's Yakker

With Ryan Madson sadly joining Joakim Soria and Arodys Vizcaino in the Tommy John queue, the Reds figure to name fellow offseason pickup Sean Marshall as the club's closer. While Madson may end up costing Cincy $8.5 million without throwing a pitch ($6 million in 2011, plus a $2.5 million buyout on an $11 million option in 2012) and his loss shifts innings from one of the best in the game to lesser bullpen lights, Marshall is plenty capable of handling high-leverage work. And for that, he can credit his knockout curveball.

Marshall's curveball has limited hitters to a .235 slugging percentage in the two seasons since he was shifted to the 'pen full time, about 60 points below the big league average for relievers. Here's more trivia on the lefty's big-breaking yakker.

- A hanging curveball from Marshall is as rare a sight as Dusty Baker sans toothpick. Take a look at his pitch location with the curve in 2010-11:

Marshall's curveball location, 2010-11Marshall threw just 11% of his curveballs high in the strike zone in 2010-11, well below the 18% average for relievers.  With him keeping the ball down so well, it's no surprise that Marshall has racked up a 55% ground ball rate with the curve.

- Marshall has used his curveball about 40% of the time over the past two years, the second-highest rate among relievers:

Pitcher	Curveball Pct.
Daniel Schlereth	45.0%
Sean Marshall	40.0%
Jose Veras	34.3%
Collin Balester	31.9%
Yoshinori Tateyama	31.4%
Heath Bell	29.0%
Mark Melancon	28.0%
Fernando Rodriguez	27.6%
Chris Jakubauskas	27.3%
Jeremy Affeldt	26.4%

- His curve isn't reserved just for pitcher's counts, either. Marshall threw a first-pitch curveball 36% of the time in 2010-11, the highest clip among all relievers. As is the case with most first-pitch breakers, hitters didn't offer at many of Marshall's curves (13% swing rate on first-pitch curves, 15% average for relievers).

- Marshall's curve gets much more sweeping action and downward movement than most from lefties. On average, the pitch breaks away from lefty hitters nine inches compared to a pitch thrown without spin, and drops 6.5 inches. The averages for lefty curveballs are 4.3 inches for horizontal break, and 5.3 inches for downward break.

- While Marshall's curve averages 77 mph overall, he varies the speed on the pitch from 73 to 83 mph. He sits in two ranges: 73-76 mph (28% of his curves overall) and 77-80 mph (71%). The slower curves are more effective, holding hitters to a .125 slugging percentage.