 |
| Brad Penner-USA Today Sports |
Despite having established himself as one of the Mets top bullpen
options during the 2014 season, Familia still has some work to do in getting
lefties out.
“His sinker (97 MPH) generates an extremely high number of swings & misses compared to other
pitchers’ sinkers, is thrown at a speed
that’s borderline unfair, results in somewhat more groundballs compared to
other pitchers’ sinkers and has slight armside run. His fourseam fastball (97
MPH) generates a very high amount of
groundballs compared to other pitchers’ fourseasmers and is blazing fast. His slider (87 MPH)
generates an extremely high number of
swings and misses compared to other pitchers’ sliders, is a real worm killer that generates an extreme number of groundballs compared to other pitchers’ sliders,
is much harder than usual and has primarily 12-6 movement.”
If
you were designing someone to come in from the pen late in the game, you could
do a lot worse than giving him Familia’s sinker, fourseam fastball, and slider.
You’ve got power, swings and misses, and groundballs, which is a great recipe
for success as a pitcher. Familia threw his sinker about half of the time in
2014, and his fourseam and slider about a quarter of the time each. As a side
note, Brooks also has him throwing 10 change-ups to lefties in 2014, which is
too insignificant a sample to be considered here. Although control problems
would flare up from time to time, his overall walk rate of 9.9% was much better
than the 17.3 BB% he managed in each of his 2 previous stints with the Mets.
While still an uncomfortably high BB%, Familia only allowed more than one walk
in 4 of 76 appearances, and only reached 3 walks once early in the season, so
he was able to avoid being burned by the base on ball. The bigger concern
moving forward is Familia’s L/R splits from 2014, which are highlighted in
Table 1.
