Comments on: Where did Phil Hughes’ curveball go?

By: Mason

Mason — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 01:34:34 +0000

I had heard that Mo had been working with Phil on a cutter. Maybe he’s just throwing that with enough bite to make hitters miss. I dont know how valid that information is but its possible. And if there is one guy who can live on the fastball alone, its Mo.

By: Bo

Bo — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:55:50 +0000

I wouldnt worry so much about it. They obviously had a plan when pitching to the Twins hitters. It was fastball heavy thinking perhaps they couldnt catch up to it. Maybe they make an adjustment here.

By: Bo

Bo — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:53:01 +0000

How can you say its sharp when we’ve havent seen it??

By: Tank the Frank

Tank the Frank — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:47:13 +0000

I think that was the gameplan for the entire Yankees pitching staff vs the Twins; right or wrong. They went away, away, away and forced the Twins to go opposite field, especially in the bullpen. The Twins did a good job IMO. They had a lot of opposite field hits and outhit the Yankees overall. But in the same regard, that also took away their power. They had zero HR and only 2 or 3 XBH off the top of my head.

By: Jerkface

Jerkface — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:23:26 +0000

Someone who isn’t at work right now, or maybe someone at a lax work, should check out Hughes’ location to RHB and LHB. I feel like Jorge/Eiland/Whomever have Hughes pitching hard away almost exclusively.

In his last ALDS appearance Hughes threw 1 inside pitch to a lefty, which punto swung through. It was a 94 mph fastball. Everything else to lefties was away, same with righties.

He did not throw 1 ball in to a rightie. What the hell? What kind of gameplan calls for eliminating an entire half of the plate? its not like he was fighting David Ortiz.

By: Doug

Doug — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:06:10 +0000

well, i don’t have the raw data in front of me, but according to the chart, it says just under 10%.

By: JRVJ

JRVJ — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:05:16 +0000

Tank the Frank kind of alluded to this, but my big question is why isn’t somebody questioning Girardi’s pitch selection? (or to a lesser extent, Posada’s).

I always thought that Girardi and/or his staff gave instrutions as to which pitches they want their pitches to throw.

By: TheZack

TheZack — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:04:43 +0000

No, it’s really not, especially considering how many times he threw it. And if a guy is throwing 95 and throws a 75 mph curve, its just really dumb baseball

By: Johnny

Johnny — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:38:13 +0000

I think his curveball is still sharp… It seems to have good break when he throws it. It looks like he’s always trying to get a strike with it though… He should bury it in the dirt occasionally.

(This is coming from someone who has never pitched in his life)

By: Tank the Frank

Tank the Frank — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:06:38 +0000

To further that point, I think he was more successful when he was mixing his location up. He got a lot of strikeouts with fastballs up in the zone. He now seems to be going exclusively with fastballs on the outside corner with every batter, righty or lefty. It looks as if that’s led to a lot of deep counts with hitters knowing where the pitch is going and fouling his fastball off until they get a mistake. That could be more Jorge Posada than Phil Hughes.