Why Wang Got Whacked, Again

Because he sucks? Well, not quite. Although no one can say for sure, Wang's piss-poor performance, his second in as many starts, is, once again, most likely related to his out-of-whack release point, which is leaving the ball up in the zone and resulting in a somewhat troubling drop in velocity, according to Mike A: 

First of all, those post-May 18th points that are mixed in with the pre-May 18th points are scattered over several starts. It’s not like all those pitches came from one or two starts, they’re spread out over all six starts. Secondly, it’s very likely that the difference in the general horizontal location of the pitches is caused by Wang move more towards the first base side of the rubber, but we’re focusing on the vertical location since Wang said he wanted to come more over the top.

In general, Wang’s throwing the ball from a spot about six inches higher this year than he did last year, no matter if you consider the good ‘08 Wang or the bad ‘08 Wang. That contradicts what he said after the game, but that doesn’t mean he’s lying or the data’s wrong. It’s entirely possible that he wants to release the ball from an even higher spot than he currently is, but I have to ask why? I mean, if throwing it from a slightly lower slot worked last year, why change it? I’m no pitching coach or pitching mechanics expert, so I won’t even attempt to answer those questions. All I do know is that for some reason Wang is releasing the ball from a higher spot than last year and yet he still wants to come even more over the top. 

Like Mike A., I think the 10 months off messed up Wang's mechanics a little bit, and I assume Wang will get his groove back sooner rather than later. I'm not ready to give up on a pitcher who's won 19 games twice in four years. At least not yet, anyway. 

Incidentally, I'm not going to do this after all of Wang's starts. I'm just really impressed with the consistently sterling work by the RAB triumverant. It's really impressive, and deserves many, many looks. I'm crushing on them almost as hard as Andrew Sullivan does on Nate Silver. For serious. 

Why Wang Got Whacked

Because of his inconsistent release point, according to the wizards at River Avenue Blues. 

Pretty chart. But what does it mean? Mike Axisa explains:

Wowza. I used Wang’s complete game two hit job in Fenway last April as my basis of comparison (that’s a combo of both sinkers & four-seamers to make life easy), and look at the difference. His release point is off by about a foot both vertically and horizontally (FYI, the x-axis is the distance from the center of the plate, the y-axis is the distance above the ground, both in feet, each gridline represents one inch). This explains a whole lot, because it’s hard to get that sinker down with such a high release point. Now we know what the Wanger and Dave Eiland have to work on over the next four days.

Hopefully, Wang, like CC, can make the necessary adjustments to his helter-skelter delivery and inconsistent release point before his next start. Otherwise, it could be a long season for Wang and the Yankees.