Cutters and Hit By Pitches

Jon Lester of the Red Sox explained why the cut fastball is a tough pitch to avoid after he hit Mark Teixeira of the Yankees in the knee Tuesday night.

“The Teixeira ball was obviously a terrible pitch,” Lester said. “It’s what comes with that pitch, sometimes it gets away from you. That’s the bad thing about it. A lot of guys don’t move because of that pitch. It looks like a fastball and breaks in and they don’t have time to react by the time it gets there. It’s tough to hit a guy like that and see him go off the field.”

It sounds like a good explanation, but does it hold water?  The following table shows the most common pitches as percent of the total since 2008, and the HBP for each of those pitches:

Pitch Type	% Pitches	% HBP
Fastball	47.3	48.5
Change up	11.5	5.5
Curveball	9.3	11.9
Slider	15.4	13.3
Cutter	5.2	7.6
Sinker	9.6	11.4

Pitches that move a lot, or are fast, appear to be tougher to avoid.  The cutter is both.  There is about a 50% increase from the percent of cutters thrown to the percent of cutters that hit batters.  For Lester, change is even more pronounced:

Pitch Type	% Pitches	% HBP
Fastball	37.4	11.1
Change up	10.7	0
Curveball	13.8	22.2
Cutter	24.9	55.6
Sinker	12.5	0

Lester hits a lot of batters with his curve ball compared to all pitches thrown, but you can see why he thinks his cutter does damage.  Over half the batters he hit since 2008 came on his cut fastball.  Of course, that means his cutter is a good pitch.  It moves a lot, and that makes it tougher to hit.

The So "called" Strike

Earlier this week Jonathan Scippa highlighted pitchers that appear to be getting "squeezed" based on MLB Pitch f/x pitch location data. Now let's take a quick look at hitters that appear to be hindered by "strike calls" when taking pitches outside the zone.

While Daric Barton has had the most "balls" called "strikes", Ike Davis (NYM) has been impacted the most with 9 pitches outside the zone resulting in strike outs. Other hitters hurt by the called third strike looking include Mark Teixeira (6), Stephen Drew (6), Brett Gardner (5) and Adrian Gonzalez (5).

We will keep an eye on this as the season progresses and the sample size becomes a bit more statistically relevant. 

Expanded Strike Zones

Most Called Strikes Outside of the Zone

While Daric Barton (OAK) tops the list, Ike Davis (NYM) has endured more strike three calls on pitches located outside of the zone (9) this season as determined by PitchFX. Arizona's Stephen Drew comes in second with 6.

Of course, you must consider volume when reviewing players' ball/strike data. While Daric Barton leads the league in taken called strikes outside of the strike zone, he also ranks twelfth in taken strikes within the strike zone (86), and 2nd overall in all pitches taken (355). So it's not necessarily the case that umpires have been favoring the opposing pitcher over Barton. He simply takes a ton of pitches, increasing the chances of bad calls by umpires. However, other than Barton, only two other players in the top 25 in called strikes out of the strike zone rank in the top 25 in total pitches taken, Carlos Santana (CLE) with 352 and Mark Teixeira (NYY) with 301.