Jays Bullpen - PITCHf/x

The Blue Jays have a very good pitching staff. Their team ERA of 3.49 is 3rd in the American League. The only member of the current staff with an ERA above 4.00 is A.J. Burnett, at 4.98.

While the rotation is all righties, the Toronto bullpen is mostly left-handed. Closer B.J. Ryan leads the southpaws, and is joined by Jesse Carlson, Scott Downs and Brian Tallet. The righties are Jason Frasor, Shawn Camp and Brian Wolfe. Jeremy Accardo is on the DL.

Here's a break-down of the Blue Jays relief staff. This will be posted, rather updated, in two parts. Hopefully the Cubs will see a lot of these guys this weekend.

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Starting with Brian Wolfe, a righty who has pitched less than 10 innings in 2008. Wolfe has a full bag of tricks, without splitting his fastball by two/four seamers (although they may just be two-seamers).

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
CH	52	31	21	90.4	-6.6	7.3	222	1,291	2.6	11.54	38.46	15.00	20.00	17.39	1.9	0.600
CU	74	40	34	81.9	4.7	-4.5	226	753	2.4	12.16	36.49	22.22	24.00	27.27	0.0	0.200
FA	196	97	99	95.7	-5.2	7.9	214	1,301	2.6	15.82	54.08	11.32	37.27	17.95	0.0	0.229
FC	228	70	158	92.7	-0.6	6.9	184	916	2.2	10.53	53.95	13.01	29.57	17.52	0.9	0.554
SL	26	9	17	85.0	1.9	1.9	170	456	3.0	0.00	38.46	20.00	20.00	36.36	0.0	0.600
	576	247	329	91.8	-1.9	5.6	202	1,039	2.4	12.15	49.65	13.64	29.85	19.31	0.5	0.411

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
CH	10	6	2
CU	10	5	3
FA	47	27	11
FC	56	16	22
SL	5	1	1
	128	55	39

Wolfe likes the cutter, but his other fastball may be the better pitch - more grounders, less hard hit balls, apparently.

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Brian Tallet is part of the lefty flotilla. He's throwing two- and four-seam fastballs, a cutter, change and slider. He comes from a lower angle than the right-handed Wolfe, for comparison.

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
CH	131	2	129	83.9	10.1	5.0	118	1,343	4.4	13.74	50.38	39.39	38.46	15.52	0.0	0.421
F2	187	68	119	92.0	10.1	6.9	124	1,579	1.8	19.79	42.25	11.39	26.21	26.45	0.0	0.344
F4	183	58	125	92.3	8.7	10.0	139	1,721	2.6	12.02	44.26	12.35	31.73	30.69	0.5	0.536
FC	227	98	129	89.2	1.6	8.2	170	1,068	2.2	11.45	46.70	17.92	29.66	28.15	0.0	0.238
SL	212	152	60	83.7	-1.1	3.1	200	431	3.0	9.43	51.42	39.45	39.37	24.76	0.0	0.364
	940	378	562	88.4	5.2	6.7	154	1,191	2.5	13.09	46.91	24.26	33.15	26.15	0.1	0.364

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
CH	19	6	7
F2	32	11	11
F4	28	5	14
FC	41	14	18
SL	33	14	12
	153	50	62

Tallet has an effective change and cutter combo, but, surprisingly, doesn't get a lot of ground outs on either his change or two-seamer. His stuff does look pretty good, however.

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Ending part 1 (part 2 will be an update to this post) is closer B.J. Ryan. Ryan is yet another lefty, and, for the purposes of this discussion, is a two-pitch pitcher. Here's the whole PFX cloud. You can see a third pitch, a change-up, rarely mixed in. His arm slot is looking like it's over the top.

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
CH	2	0	2	86.0	4.9	12.7	159	1,686	0.0	0.00	50.00	0.00		50.00	0.0	3.000
FA	218	57	161	90.8	4.9	10.6	155	1,495	2.1	13.30	43.58	28.42	29.23	26.50	0.0	0.304
SL	74	24	50	83.8	-1.5	3.5	201	489	17.5	5.41	50.00	29.73	30.61	10.34	0.0	0.176
	294	81	213	89.0	3.3	8.8	167	1,243	2.7	11.22	45.24	28.57	29.61	23.65	0.0	0.317

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
CH	1	0	0
FA	21	7	8
SL	17	8	5
	39	15	13

Both pitches are tough, and neither gets hit hard. It seems hitters really struggle reacting to Ryan's slider, it gets chased out of the zone, but rarely gets taken for a strike. I guess that's why he's the closer.

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Part 2

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Next up is Jason Frasor. Frasor abandoned his curve for a slider while in the minors a couple years back. Along with a hard four-seamer and a sinker/change-up, he's a tough guy to face.

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
CH	47	33	14	86.2	-5.3	2.0	228	719	3.3	6.38	27.66	23.08	17.65	37.50	0.0	0.143
F4	609	246	363	95.2	-3.9	10.9	200	1,550	1.6	13.46	42.20	14.01	21.68	28.80	0.2	0.500
SL	203	57	146	84.3	4.9	-0.1	183	657	2.5	8.87	39.41	37.50	29.46	34.78	0.5	0.429
	859	336	523	92.1	-1.9	7.8	197	1,293	1.8	11.99	40.75	19.71	23.52	30.20	0.2	0.460

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
CH	7	3	2
F4	81	20	33
SL	35	14	9
	123	37	44

Not a lot to get off of Frasor. Hope for a slider up and over the plate, and watch-out for the change.

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Scott Downs is a lefty who has experience starting, including 18 for the Cubs in 2000, and throws five pitches. We've seen some fly-ball pitchers so far, but Downs is a grounder guy.

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
CH	5	5	0	82.0	10.1	8.6	129	1,541	4.0	0.00	0.00		0.00		0.0
CU	226	137	89	76.1	-7.1	-5.9	131	984	2.1	11.50	38.94	40.91	34.64	38.38	0.4	0.303
F2	313	156	157	90.9	10.7	3.4	110	1,427	1.8	13.10	46.96	17.69	33.52	26.86	0.3	0.394
F4	156	50	106	90.7	10.3	8.0	128	1,661	2.0	13.46	38.46	10.00	25.84	34.09	0.6	0.346
SL	71	41	30	82.3	-0.8	1.4	178	308	5.8	9.86	52.11	37.84	39.58	16.67	1.4	0.667
	771	389	382	85.7	4.3	1.4	126	1,242	2.1	12.32	43.06	24.70	32.70	30.61	0.5	0.387

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
CU	33	17	10
F2	65	34	11
F4	26	15	4
SL	12	5	3
	136	71	28

Downs' breaking stuff is tough, and even his four-seamer gets ground outs.

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Jesse Carlson is yet another lefty, with a less than 3/4 arm slot. He works with a fastball/slider combo. Here's the full cloud.

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
FA	116	41	75	89.5	9.6	6.7	125	1,477	1.8	12.93	42.24	24.49	26.79	34.67	1.7	0.750
SL	150	80	70	80.1	-4.2	0.6	189	530	1.3	8.67	49.33	20.27	36.23	34.04	0.0	0.382
	266	121	145	84.2	1.8	3.2	161	943	1.5	10.53	46.24	21.95	32.00	34.32	0.8	0.500

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
FA	16	3	7
SL	34	13	14
	50	16	21

Carlson may be as upside down as I've seen. Sliders out-number fastballs. The fastballs get pounded, despite the higher whiff rate.

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Last up is righty #3, Shawn Camp. He's fastball/slider/change-up. He's coming from a side-arm angle, based on the PFX graph.

cfx	#	L	R	mph	pfx_x	pfx_z	deg	rpm	B:CS	corner%	Sw%	Whiff%	SwOOZ%	TaISZ%	HR%	NKS
CH	39	23	16	86.4	-9.0	-0.2	161	1,114	15.0	5.13	58.97	13.04	44.00	12.50	0.0	0.364
FA	137	40	97	90.2	-8.9	1.9	237	1,175	1.1	16.79	40.88	10.71	25.42	36.63	0.7	0.600
SL	72	19	53	81.7	8.7	2.3	118	1,040	1.8	13.89	50.00	27.78	41.46	29.27	0.0	0.091
	248	82	166	87.1	-3.8	1.7	191	1,126	1.5	14.11	46.37	16.52	34.40	32.28	0.4	0.426

cfx	X+HR	GO	AO
CH	11	5	3
FA	25	13	2
SL	11	4	6
	47	22	11

The slider is nasty, and the fastball sinks and gets lots of grounders. Pretty tough.

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Once I get through the other two starters for the series, I'll post a summary covering all 10 pitchers the Cubs expect to be facing this weekend.