The Filthiest Pitches of the 2022 MLB Season So Far
These are hard times to be a hitter in Major League Baseball. The ball is dead, defensive shifts spare nobody and, oh yeah, pitchers are still throwing absolute filth.
To illustrate, we've rounded up some @PitchingNinja GIFs and numbers for what we think are baseball's nastiest pitches so far in 2022.
More accurately, these are the nastiest pitches that haven't quite gained mainstream recognition yet. To be frank, there's nothing left to write about Aroldis Chapman's four-seam fastball, Corbin Burnes' cutter, Kevin Gausman's or Shohei Ohtani's splitters, Edwin Diaz's slider, Devin Williams' changeup or Kenley Jansen's cutter.
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In addition to being lesser known, pitches had to be both aesthetically pleasing and actually effective to make the cut for this list. If a pitch rates very well in one of those categories but not so much in the other, we opted to leave it out.
For example, Jhoan Duran's "splinker" may be something of a sensation on social media, but hitters actually have a .318 average against it. On the flip-side, Nick Martinez's changeup isn't quite Pedro-esque in its looks despite hitters' 2-for-28 performance against it.
Now that everyone knows the ground rules, here are the pitches that have our attention early in the 2022 season. We've separated them into three divisions (fastballs, breaking balls and off-speed pitches) and broken them down one at a time.
Fastball Division
Ryan Helsley's Four-Seam Fastball
Lest anyone miss anything, we'll advise everyone not to blink while watching St. Louis Cardinals right-hander chuck this one at 103 mph:
Even Helsley was surprised that he hit 103 mph on that pitch to Ketel Marte, as he told Katie Woo of The Athletic: "I did look up when I struck him out. It just felt harder. Like that one came out a little better, and I looked up and was like, 'Wow.' It kind of caught me by surprise."
This kind of gas has been typical of Helsley in his eight outings this season. He's averaging 99.2 mph, which is in the 100th percentile for fastball velocity. He's also in the 98th percentile for spin rate, with more vertical movement on his four-seamer than most pitchers.
No wonder hitters can't hit his fastball. As in, literally can't hit it. The 72 fastballs he's thrown have yielded zero hits in 16 at-bats, with 11 strikeouts to boot.
Brusdar Graterol's Sinker
If you've watched much of the Los Angeles Dodgers over the last three seasons, this won't be the first time you've seen Brusdar Graterol throw a sinker like this one:
In fact, we're arguably breaking our "No Establishment Types" rule by including Graterol and his sinker on this list. But in our defense, this is the first time since he joined the Dodgers that his signature pitch is living up to its lofty potential as a silencer of bats:
- 2020: .263 AVG
- 2021: .289 AVG
- 2022: .111 AVG
Opposing batters are just 2-for-18 against Graterol's sinker, and neither hit is much to brag about. One was a jam-shot blooper into the outfield. The other was a shattered-bat infield single.
Of note is that Graterol has been putting more arm-side run on his sinker in 2022, meaning that batters now have so much more to contend with than just his triple-digit velocity.
Jose Alvarado's Cutter
Psst. If you want to catch a glimpse of what's arguably the single best pitch in baseball right now, keep a close eye on the second pitch in this sequence:
That is Jose Alvarado's cutter. Its run value per 100 pitches is currently minus-9.8. That's second best behind Sean Doolittle's four-seam fastball, though that pitch is responsible for a fraction of as many whiffs and strikeouts.
The cutter had always been in Alvarado's back pocket, but it's migrated to his front pocket in his second season with the Philadelphia Phillies. He's throwing it 33.6 percent of the time, or about twice his previous career-high.
Why do that? Well, why not? Just look at the darn thing. It's arguably as much a slider as a cutter. Either way, hitters have been powerless to avoid laying off it when it travels outside the strike zone. The chase rate against it is up nearly 20 percent from 2021.
The results: zero hits in 10 at-bats and nine strikeouts.
Additional Honorable Mentions:
Breaking Ball Division
Jordan Hicks' Slider
If you're a Colorado Rockies fan wondering why Chad Kuhl's slider isn't under the spotlight here, it's not because we're unaware that hitters are just 2-for-40 with 19 strikeouts against hslider. Sadly, we just could find a good GIF of it.
So instead, here's another one for Cardinals fans:
Of course, it's not the slider that Jordan Hicks is widely known for. He's legendary for bringing the heat on his fastball and often with absurd movement to boot. To wit, he once threw a 105 mph fastball that broke like a vintage Derek Lowe sinker.
Yet Hicks has been going to the slider more frequently this season, throwing it about three times as often as he did in his return from Tommy John surgery in 2021. It comes in about 15 mph slower than his fastball but with well-above-average movement both vertically and horizontally.
Bully for Christian Walker, who actually managed to a hanging slider from Hicks over the fence on May 1. That's the only hit against it in 15 at-bats, not to mention one of only four balls in play out of the 80 total sliders he's thrown.
Jesus Luzardo's Curveball
We see you, Shane McClanahan. Specifically, your McCurveball, against which batters are 6-for-42 with 22 strikeouts. It's a dandy, alright.
And yet, we can't help but lean ever so slightly toward Jesus Luzardo and his chameleon curve:
The curveball is a huge reason why Luzardo is finally on his way (3.08 ERA in five starts) to the breakout that never came with the Oakland Athletics before they gave up and traded him to the Miami Marlins last year. It's indeed his primary pitch, accounting for just north of 40 percent of his offerings.
The southpaw's hook isn't actually exceptional for its spin or its movement. Its velocity, though, is a different story. At 84.2 mph, he's tied with Atlanta's Kyle Wright for the top velocity on a curve that's been thrown at least 100 times.
Ultimately, batters are 6-for-44 with 22 strikeouts against Luzardo's hook. That's a .007 advantage in batting average over McClanahan's curve, which is good enough for us.
Additional Honorable Mentions:
Off-Speed Division
Pablo Lopez's Changeup
Why does Pablo Lopez lead all of MLB with a 1.00 ERA? Basically because of his changeup:
We're obviously exaggerating in pinpointing Lopez's changeup as the sole explanation for his big break, but not by much. He's already thrown the pitch 200 times, and hitters aren't giving him much cause to change course. They're 8-for-50 with no home runs and 17 strikeouts against it.
The conventional wisdom holds that a pitcher should have a sizable velocity gap between his fastball and changeup. Nonsense, says Lopez. At 87.4 mph, his comes in less than six mph slower than his 93.0 mph average fastball.
In the tradition of Felix Hernandez's changeup, it's more so location and movement that allows Lopez's change to work wonders. Its horizontal and vertical action are both better than average, and he's adept at using it to get called strikes on the corners and especially whiffs below the knees.
Felix Bautista's Splitter
Not many major leaguers throw the split-finger fastball, but the ones who do tend to thrive on it. You can ask Gausman. Or Ohtani, who's had exactly one of his splitters hit over the fence in five years with the Los Angeles Angels.
But if it's an emerging splitter you're looking for, consider Felix Bautista's:
Granted, the Baltimore Orioles rookie has only thrown 33 splits on the young season. But on those, he's collected nine whiffs on 17 swings. Of the five that were hit into play, none was above the hard-hit threshold of 95 mph. The one and only hit was a bloop single that landed just out of the reach of center fielder Cedric Mullins.
If a splitter is only as good as the fastball that sets it up, well, then Bautista isn't too shabby there either. He sits at 97.5 mph and can touch 100 mph.
In other words, the Orioles have a future closer on their hands.
Additional Honorable Mentions:
Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference and Baseball Savant.
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