Pitching Grips

Brad Mills-Imagn Images After posting an excellent 125 wRC+ over his first two seasons, James Wood is establishing himself as one of the best hitters in baseball this year. The 23-year-old National is running a 169 wRC+, third best among qualified batters, and he’s on pace for 43 homers, 26 stolen bases, and 7.2 WAR. Everybody knows the parameters of Wood’s game by now. He’s 6-foot-6, extremely choosy at the plate, and so spectacularly powerful that his proclivity for whiffs and groundballs barely holds him back. This year, he’s improved on both fronts, dropping nearly 10 percentage points from his groundball rate and adding nearly four points to his contact rate on pitches in the strike zone. It’s huge news – James Wood-huge even – and if he can hold on to even some of those gains, he’s going to live at the top of the leaderboards for a long, long time. Today, however, we’re going to talk about a leaderboard where Wood ranks dead last. If you head over to Baseball Savant’s new ABS ...

Jerome Miron-Imagn Images On Monday night, the Astros celebrated Memorial Day by no-hitting the Rangers. Throwing to catcher Christian Vázquez , pitchers Tatsuya Imai , Steven Okert , and Alimber Santa combined for the 18th no-hitter in a franchise history that dates back to 1962. According to the great Sarah Langs , not only is that the most no-hitters over that period, but the second-place Dodgers are a full five no-nos behind with 13. Imai was making just his sixth major league start. Santa was making his major league debut. There must be something in the water in Houston. I didn’t catch any of the game live. I saw a supercut that shows all 27 outs the Astros got. This is it. You don’t have to watch it to enjoy this article, and it’s seven minutes long, but I at least wanted to give you the chance to experience the game the way I experienced it. Several things jumped out at me at the beginning of the video. It starts with an establishing shot of Imai. He’s toeing the rubber bef...

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, please visit our Patreon . Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Mason Miller ’s recent “struggles,” whether the Tigers will trade Tarik Skubal , and how different baseball would be if the Angels had traded Shohei Ohtani , plus (44:05) more than a dozen Stat Blasts. Audio intro : Beatwriter, “ Effectively Wild Theme ” Audio outro : PJ Harding, “ Effectively Wild Theme ” Link to previous Miller banter 1 Link to previous Miller banter 2 Link to Miller sample 1 Link to Miller sample 2 Link to article about Grogu promo Link to Grogu promo Link to Triton Ballpark wiki Link to Yaddle at Wookieepedia Link to Ben on The Mandalorian and Grogu Link to Kimbrel blog post Link to MLBTR on Kimbrel Link to Heyman on a Skubal trade Link to Murray on a Skubal trade Link to Olney on a Skubal trade Link to Skubal bullpen sessions article Link to trade deadline date article ...

Joe Puetz-Imagn Images It’s hard to know what to expect from a pitcher returning from a serious injury. In addition to velocity and spin rate, pitching is also about rhythm and feel, and that can take time to come back after a long layoff. But there was little rust for Gerrit Cole to shake off when he made his season debut Friday night at Yankee Stadium. In his first major league start since undergoing Tommy John surgery on March 11, 2025, Cole silenced the first-place Rays, allowing just two hits and three walks while striking out two across six scoreless innings. His only real trouble came in the first inning, when he gave up a leadoff single to Chandler Simpson and walked Junior Caminero to put two on with nobody out. After a Jonathan Aranda fly out, Cole picked the speedy Simpson off second base and then struck out Yandy Díaz looking at an inside fastball to end the inning. From there, he got in a groove. He averaged 96.1 mph with his four-seamer, and he threw 50 of his 72 pi...