The season is nearly one-third of the way complete, and so far Masahiro Tanaka has not just been the Yankees best starter, he’s been one of the best starters in the entire American League. Look over the AL pitching leaderboard and you’ll see Tanaka in the top ten of pretty much every meaningful statistic. In many cases he’s in the top five. He’s been awesome.
Tanaka, as we’ve already discussed, has made some significant changes this year. Most notably, he has basically replaced his straight four-seamer fastball with sinking two-seamers, perhaps in response to last year’s homer issues. Tanaka went from 18.6% four-seamers and 13.6% sinkers last year to 2.7% four-seamers and 37.2% sinkers this year. As a result, his ground ball rate has jumped from 47.0% to 55.1% while his homer rate has dropped from 1.46 HR/9 to 0.83 HR/9.
That’s not the only adjustment Tanaka has made this season and it’s not even the most recent. In his last two starts, Tanaka has changed his position on the mound. He’s now standing on the far first base side of the pitching rubber. Check it out:
Those are the dead center field cameras at Fenway Park (April 29th) and Tropicana Field (May 27th), so there’s no camera angle funny business going on. Tanaka is, very clearly, standing much more on the first base side of the rubber. The PitchFX data shows the drastic change in his horizontal release point. From Brooks Baseball:
Tanaka’s average horizontal release point has shifted roughly 12 inches towards first base in his last two starts thanks to his new position on the mound. This is not insignificant! It changes everything, really. The pitches come out at different angles now, and standing so far to the first base side means Tanaka has to adjust the way he pitches to both sides of the plate.
Why did Tanaka change his position on the rubber? Brendan Kuty asked pitching coach Larry Rothschild that exact question:
“He came up with it himself to move over, for angles to the fastball more than anything else,” Rothschild said. “We’ll see how we go as it plays. Right now, it seems like a good thing, but it’s a long season and we’ll see. As long as he can throw the split as well from that side, because that’s an important pitch for him.”
Shifting to the first or third base side of the pitching rubber is not rare, but it’s not exactly common either. After getting traded to the Cubs, Jake Arrieta shifted to the third base side and became a super-ace. A few years back Fernando Rodney shifted towards first base and became a dominant closer with the Rays. Others have changed their position on the rubber too. Arrieta and Rodney are two examples of extreme performance improvement.
Tanaka has allowed one run on seven hits and two walks in 14 innings in two starts since moving to the first base side of the rubber, so, at the very least, his new position on the mound isn’t hurting his performance. That’s not much of a sample though and it’s still too early to fully understand what kind of effect standing closer to first base really has. This is a very recent adjustment. Very, very recent.
The biggest concern with Tanaka is health, not performance. He’s never not been good when healthy. Even last year’s home run problems did not stop him from posting a 115 ERA+ and +3.0 WAR in 154 innings. Tanaka started throwing more sinkers to counter that home run problem and by and large it’s worked. He gave up three dingers in a bad start against the Royals on May 10th and he’s given up three homers total in his other nine starts combined.
This new position on the pitching rubber is designed to … do something. I’m not sure what. Rothschild says it’s for “angles to the fastball,” whatever that means. Could it be to change the way the splitter and slider play off the fastball? Or make the sinker look way off the plate away to righties before darting back and catching the corner? I’m really not sure.
Tanaka will make his 11th start of the season tonight and his position on the mound is something worth watching going forward. If Tanaka stays on the first base side of the rubber, then we’ll know it’s working as intended. If he goes back to where he was before — or even to the extreme third base side, I guess — then we’ll know he’s still tinkering.
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