Randall Delgado’s First Night Out
April 12, 2012 at 11:56 am by David Lee under Atlanta Braves
Randall Delgado had a superb first start for the Braves, allowing two runs on five hits in five innings, walking two and striking out six for a .072 WPA.
Delgado showed solid command throughout the five innings, and even though he allowed a run in the fifth as his pitch count increased, the ball never left the ground in the inning and he didn’t lose control of the situation.
Delgado’s four-seamer sat 92 and touched 95, which is right in line with his scouting report. He threw 63% strikes on the pitch, totaling 54 of them. What Brooks Baseball classifies as a two-seamer was thrown at almost the same speed but with a little tailing action, enough to make a difference on the map. But he was reported to have thrown only nine of them, five for strikes.
The changeup is what gave Delgado success against the Astros. He threw 17 of them, 11 for strikes, and received five swinging strikes, which is the second-highest swinging strike percentage of any pitch from any Braves pitcher so far this season – second to Tommy Hanson’s nine swinging strikes on the slider against the Astros the day before. Delgado’s changeup sat 81 and touched 84, and he showed excellent command of it.
I count just two changeups up and over the plate, the rest being in, out or down. When he missed, he missed down consistently, and that’s exactly what you want.
Delgado’s one big shot allowed was to J.D. Martinez in the first inning, a solo home run to center field. The pitch was a grooved fastball at 94 on a 3-1 count, and as any major league pitcher will tell you, you can’t groove a fastball at 94, no matter who you’re facing. It appeared to be the one slip-up in Delgado’s command on what was otherwise a fantastic first night for the rookie.
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I don’t even blame Delgado for the HR pitch. That 3-1 fastball to J.D. Martinez was preceded by two excellent fastballs painted on the black that were both called balls. Delgado had no choice with the bases empty and 2 out but to challenge Martinez and put a fastball over. It happens to the best of them. Great outing for the kid.
There was one definite strike in that was a ball and one that could go either way, but was probably a ball. Even so, a 2-2 count is much different than a 3-1 count.
Great analysis. Great job on the blog this year. I’m looking forward to the new site!
Are pitch fx/brooks baseball info available for minor league games? I would doubt it, but was just curious.
Curious to see what’s going on with Teheran, even if it was just one start.
Nope, some minor league ball parks carry the system, but it’s very rare. Same with spring training.
I thought it was a little interesting though that Delgado did get a little rattled when runners got on base. Only interesting because its not like it was his 1st career ML start. I guess some is just nerves of 1st start of the season. We will see how he pitches next time. I feel like you will see him go after guys more since he did seem to nibble a bit.
Great analysis. Just wanted to say thanks for giving us content worth reading multiple times a day now. I’ve always enjoyed the site, but in the past I felt like I only wanted to come to the site every few days because there was only so much info. Now I feel compelled to visit on a daily basis due to all the good posts. Great job. New layout looks great, too!
Can someone explain how Delgado ended up with a .072 WPA for a great pitching outing, while for example Heyward had a .330 WPA in a recent game for some clutch hits? Is lower WPA better for pitchers/defense?
The bloggers here are much more qualified at answering this question, but I believe WPA is calculated the same for every player, regardless of position. As I understand, WPA presents the plays that have the greatest effect on the overall outcome of the game… game changing plays, in other words.
So, I believe it would be hard for a pitcher to have a higher WPA because their efforts stretch over a large number of plays rather than one single big play.
Hope that helps.
Indeed, for instance, it’s all about the situation. Matt Downs came up in the biggest situation yesterday, and a hit or out recorded would have resulted in either the highest WPA play of the game (most likely, unless a bigger situation occurred) or the lowest WPA of the game (which it did).
Randall had a good game, but he didn’t exactly dominate throughout the game and at times got into a bit of trouble. He also didn’t go deep into the game, so his WPA wasn’t tremendous. A great WPA from a starter will be a 8 inning performance with 10 strikeouts and 1 walk, for instance — something close to that.
Correct me here please if I am wrong, but that same 8 inning performance with 10 strikeouts and 1 walk would result in much different WPA sums for the starting pitcher of team A in the two following scenarios: 1)Team A is away. Team A scores 6 runs in the top of the first inning. 2.)The game is very close throughout.
Also in this a Pitcher who can hit can have a very good WPA if he makes important RBIs or for example the game last year where Hudson was the offense and pitched for the win he should have had the highest WPA.
Funny tweet from Peter while watching the game. Delgado seems more uninterested while on the mound than any pitcher I can remember. Zero emotion… Which I think is a good thing as emotion causes anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to zambrano
Not taking anything away from Peter, but that was my tweet. I’m only saying this so that you know I am @kevinorris and Peter is @capitolavenue.
Touché I stand corrected he retweeted you
Sounds like Glavine.
Nuh uh, Minor is Glavine, duh. Jair is Maddux and Hanson is Smoltz. Delgado can be Kevin Millwood.
jair is maddux? oh how i wish
Considering the very tough strike zone and the long lay off, I thought RD looked really good. He has the chance to be a very good pitcher. The Braves pitching future appears very bright. Any time that you see a young pitcher command the chang up with he does, you have to be trilled.
On Sweetspot they did a post on the Mariners potential Homegrown team. The Braves would have potential.
C McCann
1B Freeman/LaRoche as backup
2B Prado/Kelly Johnson
3B Chipper/DeRosa/Betermit
SS Andrus/Escobar/Furcal
LF A Jones/Francour
CF Schafer or Heyward
RF Heyward or Francour (Depends on if you want Francour or Schafer)
They also could put prado in the outfield and try Escobar at 2B.
Starters
Wainwright
Hanson
Beachy
Minor
Delgado
Teheran
Feliz (as starter or reliever)
Harrison
Bullpen
Kimbrel
Venters
Medlen
Yeah, this is a good team.
Since this is a numbers organization, (which is great) I wonder what you guys think a win of this type is worth numbers wise? What I mean is our number 5 against their maybe number one on the road…like 1.2 or 1.5?? The question seemed clearer in my head? Since were chasing 91-93 wins, not every win is the same……..thoughts??
Doesn’t mean much — you’ll have these types of performances all the time. The Braves and their number five should beat the Astros and their number one more frequently than the other way around. I’m sure it’s different for many situations.