Game 6 — Award Tour for the Tribe?
Hi folks.
Harry Doyle here, back in Cleveland for the 2016 Word Series to break down game 6, as the tribe tries to go on an award tour.
No graphs for the pre-game, just good old fashioned SQL.
Note: You can build similar analysis yourself by plowing through this document and hacking on BigQuery and Datalab. Thanks to my friends at Sportradar for the help.
Cubs fans were treated to major “electric relaxation” in game 5 through a strong performance from Lester, as the Cubs bats rattled Bauer to bring the series to 3–2.
During the series I have been spending most of my time looking at performance v.pressure metrics — trying to see how pitchers are dealing with control and game management. I call it the Vaughn score. However, in this post I am going dig elsewhere and explore a “low end theory”.
The game 6 “scenario” brings us Arrieta (Cubs) v. Tomlin (Indians) and tonight the Indians are going to be tough to beat. Here’s why.
Cleveland starting pitching is getting better during the series. They have a plan. They started pitching backwards — throwing more off speed pitches on first at bats — and overall got more efficient as the series has progressed. Check it…both Kluber and Bauer:
- reduced their pitches per batter faced
- increased their ahead in count metric
- increased their percentage of strikes for pitches outside the strike zone (chasing junk)
- increased strikes on first pitch swinging and increased outs on first pitch (me hit ball far now!)
Some of this improvement can be attributed to execution, but that has to be met with ineffective pressing by the Cubs. As more pressure is applied the Cubs have been pressing harder.
Cleveland’s pen is also crushing it, in particular the petite 6'7" Andrew Miller — who we should definitely see tonight modulo the Cubs being up by 50 runs.
Kluber changed his pitch type distribution in game 4, shifting more pitches to curve balls (CU), creating more outs on grounders and fly balls.
To be fair, Lester has has improved as well and Arrieta is sitting on an impressive 2 hit game in game 2.
Net-net Cleveland has been very surgical about their pitching strategy.
Ok. So what does this all mean? What about game 6?
First, let’s talk about Arrieta. What concerns me with Arrieta is his count management. In game 2 — 40% of his pitches were from behind in the count and he gave up a couple of key walks. Harry Doyle does not like this stat. Now — Arrieta was able to get out of these situations with accuracy and forcing lots of fly outs, but that was earlier in the series when hitter pressure on the Indians was different.
Arrieta loves to throw fast balls, especially when behind in the count as he relies on the fastball to groove a strike.
I can imagine that the Indians’ hitting psyche tonight, if Arrieta is behind in the count, will be “Like It Like That”. The pressure will be on Arrieta, not the Indians. Due to the pressure, I could see more of those fly outs turning into hits and possibly a home run. This of course, is all dependent upon the Indians getting some hits. The Indians’ BA v. Arrieta in game 2 was .091 — that is tough to beat.
With the Indians having the pressure advantage on Arrieta, let’s look at Tomlin.
Tomlin had a mixed up regular season with an “Oh My God” August where he pitched himself right out of the starting rotation. So how does Tomlin go from being kicked to the curb to starting game 6 to possibly win the World Series? He pivoted, he tweaked his mechanics, and started to rely less on his fastball. And boom — after August — he didn’t allow a walk in 26.2 IP (including 4 starts) and he was able to work more ahead in the count.
As a friend of mine says, “Strikeouts are boring and fascist”. This would make Tomlin a very exciting pitcher as he created outs on grounders 32%, 45%, and 41% on batters faced in his last three appearances and has been ahead in the count in all three games.
Cubs fans should be “Buggin’ Out”. Here is the scenario broken down just a bit more.
If Tomlin brings a controlled, ground ball inducing performance and keeps walks to a minimum he will frustrate the heck out of the Cubs. We will then most likely see Miller come in and if he performs as usual, the Cubs maybe sitting on 1 run, 2 at best.
If Arrieta brings his typical performance (pitching behind in the count) AND if the Indians are patient, I can see the Indians getting at least 2 runs tonight. However, if the Indians press we will see lots of too high, but not far enough hits. If the Cubs are ahead late I would not be surprised to Chapman again.
If the Cubs win game 6 they will more than likely face Kluber in game 7 going up against Hendricks. If this is the case you can run the same analysis and come up with “8 Million Stories” why the Cubs may not win.
Good luck to both Chicago and Cleveland — we hope to see an amazing game.
Note: You can build similar analysis yourself by plowing through this document and hacking on BigQuery, Datalab, and Google Cloud Platform. Thanks to my friends at Sportradar for the help.
