Petti: Putting hitters away with heat
From SABR member Bill Petti at FanGraphs on June 22, 2013:
In his Major League debut for the Mets, 23-year-old Zack Wheeler struck out seven hitters in his six innings of work. Of those seven strikeouts, six came on fastballs — and of those six, four came on whiffs induced by fastballs.
This got me wondering, what pitchers this year have generated the largest percentage of their strikeouts off of their fastball? And how many generatedthose strike outs on swings and misses on fastballs*?
Yu Darvish had arguably the most impressive fastball-induced strikeout performance this season during his May 5 start against the Red Sox. Darvish struck out 14 batters (which he’s done three times this season), six (43%) of which came on fastballs. And each of those six came came on a whiff induced by that fastball.
Anibal Sanchez has the highest single-game strikeout total this season on April 26 against the Braves (17), with seven (41%) of those strikeouts coming via fastballs, four on whiffs.
Read the full article here: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/putting-hitters-away-with-heat/
Originally published: June 24, 2013. Last Updated: June 24, 2013.