Ian Desmond Seeing Sliders

Ian Desmond is seeing a heavy dose of sliders this season.  Last year, only 18.3% of the pitches he saw were sliders.  He also leads the league in sliders seen in pitcher's counts at 34.5%.

Oddly enough, Desmond is hitting .269 off sliders this season, which is about 50 points higher than league average.  Last season, he hit .222.  And while that was slightly below league average, it wasn't enough to explain why pitcher's are going hard after Desmond with the pitch this season.

It's possible teams are taking into account Desmond's struggles against sliders prior to 2011.  In his rookie season in 2010, Desmond hit just .165 against sliders, putting him in the bottom 16% of the league.  He also posted a lowly .191 slugging percentage on sliders that year, good for 6th worst in the majors.

So far, Desmond has been doing better against sliders. However, he is still chasing them out of the zone at high rate (37.8% in 2011; 45.8% in 2012). While the results have improved, a high chase rate will eventually catch up to him. Unless he learns to lay off those sliders that miss the zone, pitchers will continue to throw the pitch and his numbers will more than likely decline.

The Arrival of a Hero: Harper makes his Big League Debut

On Saturday April 29th, 2012, Washington Nationals fans witnessed a historic event, the debut of the prophesied savior of the yearly cellar dwellers of the NL East: Bryce Harper. This youth phenomn was the number one overall pick of the 2010 draft at the age of 18 and has been heralded as one of the greatest prospects of all time. After taking the fast track to the major leagues, Harper was called up to replace Ryan Zimmerman, who landed on the 15 day DL. 

In his first professional AB, Harper showed off the kind of hustle that most managers have to drive into their players on a day to day basis; on a slow ground out to the pitcher, Harper flew full speed down the baseline coming a stride from beating it out.

Later on in the game, Bryce picked up his first professional hit, stroking a double off the centerfield wall on a pitch left up in the zone. He also managed to pick up his first RBI, one that Nationals fans hope is the first of many to come. What's most impressive is that Harper saw seven pitches in that at bat, wearing down starter Chad Billingsley. 

If Harper continues to hit, the number 34 jersey could become a staple in Nationals park for the rest of the season. 

Harper's First Hit of the season(The next night, Harper followed up his debut with a single and a leaping catch against the wall on a Jaun Uribe fly out: http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=21027101&c_id=mlb)

Wilson Ramos' Walkoff Home Run

Heat map data taken from 2010-2011 (Click image to enlarge)

Last night, Wilson Ramos of the Washington Nationals hit a three run walkoff home run off Seattle Mariners' reliever David Pauley in the ninth inning.  The above image shows the pitch sequence superimposed on his slugging percentage heat map.  Pauley threw the Nationals' catcher a 1-1 changeup inside, right to Ramos' hot zone.  Dating back to the beginning of 2010, Ramos has a slugging percentage of .526 on changeups, with 4 doubles and 2 home runs in 41 plate appearances.