Information on Hunter Brown’s Rebound…And Notes on the Astros’ Standings
Hunter Brown experienced a bad pitching start for the ages against the Royals, and we didn’t know what to expect in Tuesday’s start against the powerful Braves’ offense. Fortunately, Brown rebounded with a solid 6 inning start, allowing only 2 runs. If Brown had been removed a batter or two earlier in the 7th inning, when he showed signs of tiring, it might have been a 1 run outing instead.
Brown’s mental fortitude Tuesday should be commended. The terrible results from his brief encounter with the Royals didn’t drag him down or demoralize him. Allowing 11 hits and 9 runs in 2⁄3 of an inning in that outing was so notable that Fangraphs’ Jay Jaffe raised the possibility that he was tipping his pitches.
But maybe the real Hunter Brown is the pitcher in both outings. His stuff was decent enough against the Royals, and maybe he experienced a perfect storm, so to speak. His pitch locations were sometimes bad, some soft contact hits preceded some very hard contact for hits, and he was pitching amidst a worn out bullpen situation, which caused Manager Joe Espada to leave Brown in the game even as the hits piled up.
However, Tuesday’s start against the Braves was very encouraging. If he can keep providing that quality of performance, he can be an important cog in the rotation. Following Brown’s Tuesday start:
- Hunter Brown’s Stuff+ rating is quite good (105) —good enough for third best among Astros’ starters (only Javier and an injured Valdez are better). The Stuff+ ratings of his slider, cutter, and knuckle curve are exceptional (116, 110, and 139). The Stuff+ rating of his 4 seam fastball is not the best (89), although it improved in the Braves game (95). Command continues to be an issue, as indicated by Location+ (96).
- Hunter Brown induced more ground balls in Tuesday’s start—59% GB rate in that game. Brown continues to allow above average exit velocity (93.3 mph), but a high ground ball rate mitigates the hard contact. Hopefully he can continue to induce ground balls.
- Although Brown has allowed hard hit balls this season, batters have had difficulty barreling up the ball (1 barrel in 55 batted balls).
- The average velocity of Brown’s pitch repertoire so far: Fastball 95 mph; Cutter 92 mph; Slider 87.5 mph; Curve 81 mph; and Splitter 88 mph.
Rookie pitchers Shawn Dubin and Forrest Whitley also made notable appearances in Tuesday’s game. The sample size is so small for their Stuff+ that we should avoid drawing firm conclusions. Dubin’s earned run line will look a lot worse than how well he pitched. In my opinion, he should not have been sent out to pitch the 9th inning. It would have been better for both the team and his confidence.
Despite the caveat about tiny sample sizes, it’s interesting to note that Stuff+ likes both Dubin and Whitley. In 3.1 innings, Dubin’s Stuff+ rating is more than respectable (104). Whitley’s Stuff+ rating in only 2⁄3 of an inning is an exceptional 128 (the same as Bryan Abreu). Maybe that is an artifact of Whitley’s tiny sample, but it may give you some hope for his ML future.
Base Runs
According to Base Runs the Astros’ should have a .520 W/L record. With the way that the offense has performed, the Astros should be 10-9 instead of 6-13. This means that the Astros are -4 games based on their Base Runs result. Base Runs is a statistic that simulates the relationship between the combination of players in a lineup and runs. The statistic recognizes that this relationship is not linear and estimates the expected runs based on overall offensive performance. The stat provides a result similar to combining the Pythagorean Record and individual offensive performance stats.
The Base Runs result confirms that the Astros have experienced bad luck in terms of sequencing. One can speculate on various factors which might influence the sequencing luck (like base running, pressing during RISP situations, and lineup construction). But in most cases sequencing luck is mostly random variation and tends to regress toward the mean over the course of a season. How long will the Astros have to endure the poor sequencing? That’s the million dollar question.