This article is part of our Collette Calls series.
If you've read this column over the years, you know I like to hold myself accountable and I put my money where my mouth is. If I recommend someone in a write-up, I draft them. If I trash the guy, it isn't part of some nefarious plot to create a smoke screen and lower his market value for my fellow league mates that are also subscribers.
Back in November, I broke down what I liked and did not like about Matt Moore. I said there were indeed flaws, but that there was some hidden upside and people should look at him in the late rounds. In fact, I spent $5 on him in AL Tout Wars and during the month of April, that looked like a great investment as he came out firing. Since April became May, Moore has been flat out unwatchable as a fan and unrosterable in mixed leagues. I am writing about him once again because I've received so many inquiries about him on Twitter as people wonder what they should be doing with Moore.
When Matt Moore returned to the Rays after his long layoff recovering from Tommy John surgery, it was tough to watch him pitch. He was blasted for six outings before going down to Durham where he turned things around and came back to the Rays in September and closed out the season on a high note. 2016 began where 2015 left off, but after a strong April, Moore is once again
If you've read this column over the years, you know I like to hold myself accountable and I put my money where my mouth is. If I recommend someone in a write-up, I draft them. If I trash the guy, it isn't part of some nefarious plot to create a smoke screen and lower his market value for my fellow league mates that are also subscribers.
Back in November, I broke down what I liked and did not like about Matt Moore. I said there were indeed flaws, but that there was some hidden upside and people should look at him in the late rounds. In fact, I spent $5 on him in AL Tout Wars and during the month of April, that looked like a great investment as he came out firing. Since April became May, Moore has been flat out unwatchable as a fan and unrosterable in mixed leagues. I am writing about him once again because I've received so many inquiries about him on Twitter as people wonder what they should be doing with Moore.
When Matt Moore returned to the Rays after his long layoff recovering from Tommy John surgery, it was tough to watch him pitch. He was blasted for six outings before going down to Durham where he turned things around and came back to the Rays in September and closed out the season on a high note. 2016 began where 2015 left off, but after a strong April, Moore is once again struggling to help the team on the mound.
Any time a pitcher is in a funk as Moore is, we tend to look at a few things that we can quantify with public data: velocity, trouble with a particular pitch, or mechanics. Moore's velocity has fluctuated a bit in recent weeks as his average fastball velocity had dipped about 2 mph, but it has recently been trending back to previous levels.
The drop in mid-May could be just noise as he's back in line with where he was earlier in the season when things were going well. The velocity is not the issue as much as what is happening off his fastball.
Moore's fastball sets up his other pitches. To lefties, he throws fastballs, cutters, and curveballs while he adds the changeup when throwing to righties. So, if he's having trouble with his fastball, he's likely also having trouble with his cutter, which allows batters to sit on a single pitch. Not surprisingly, lefties (.311) are hitting him better than righties (.286) overall.
In terms of the fastball, the difference is much larger than that. Here are how the numbers play out:
Note that the batting average and slugging percentage off his fastball are significantly worse since the end of April yet the contact levels and the strike levels off the fastball are not that much different? When you see that, it's a tell-tale sign of a pitcher not being able to command his fastball. He is still throwing strikes with the pitch, but he is not hitting his spots with it.
When things were going well for Moore, he was moving the fastball up and down in the zone and was challenging batters up in the zone. During this recent stretch of bad baseball, many of his fastballs are middle/middle and he's not working up/down or even left/right. It is highly unlikely he is trying to throw so many of his fastballs belt high over the middle of the plate, but that is what is happening in his recent outings. It wouldn't matter if he was throwing 92-94 or 102-104; if you throw enough fastballs in the same spot, hitters are going to get to that pitch.
The same thing is happening with his other pitches as well. Here are the stats and images for his curveball (first) and changeup (second) during this bad run:
Moore is throwing his curveball for more strikes, and batters are thus making more contact with it, putting it in play safely more frequently, and slugging it better. It is finding too much of the zone and is often coming in just below the fastball and not something batters are chasing. The changeup is laughably ineffective these days as batters are making too much contact with the pitch when he throws it and batters are hitting it hard as well because too many of them are elevated and out over the plate not too far below the fastball.
Mechanically, Moore looks fine but he is not that much distinguishable from fellow stinking lefty Drew Smyly. Both guys looked great in April but have been dreadful since (for more on Smyly, see this). It is worth the reminder here that control is the pitcher's ability to find the strike zone while command is the ability to locate pitches where you want them within the strike zone. Moore does not lack control here as much as he lacks command of his pitches. I encourage you to watch his next outing against Arizona this week and watch where the catcher sets up and where they receive the pitch or attempt to receive it if the ball is struck.
As to whether you keep or cut Moore, I could make the argument for either at this point. He isn't hurt and is throwing with velocity, but not with any conviction. To me, he's aiming his pitches and they're ending up in undesirable locations. I think if he were to get back to working up and down and creating weak contact versus going for the strikeout, he would be more effective. As it is now, he's a five-and-diver who can't pitch a clean inning. In fact, 35 of his last 40 innings pitched have involved at least one baserunner and that's not rosterable in just about any format.
Update: There was a delay in publishing this piece this week, which actually worked out well since Moore dominated the Astros on Sunday.
Moore's challenge against the Astros was to throw strikes. Houston batters average four pitches per plate appearance, which trails only Milwaukee and Toronto on the season. The Astros' team swing percentage is below the league average, but when they do swing, they tend to miss as their 27.6% Miss% is only bested by Moore's teammates at 28.7%. The Astros also do not chase that much as they chase a lower percentage of pitches than the league average.
Moore did his job Sunday, and then some. Seven innings pitched, 114 pitches thrown, 79 for strikes. He generated 21 swings and misses on the day, 15 of which came off his fastball. He was working 93-96 mph all game and held the velocity through the entire outing. More importantly, he located his pitches in, out, up, as well as down.
Note the location of the curveball (yellow squares) where it is mostly out of the zone. He did throw several up in the zone, but mostly avoided the middle/middle area where he had been living in recent outings.
This was the kind of outing that makes it impossible to cut Moore because he's capable of these gems when everything is working. The Astros don't swing frequently, but when they do, a lot of the batters are in launch mode so Moore challenged them up where 93-96 is tougher to catch up to as well as get under to drive out. Additionally, 72 of his 112 pitches were fastballs and he changed eye levels with 31 breaking balls that created 15 swings and just one ball safely hit into play. More impressive was the fact that of the 72 fastballs Moore threw Sunday, only nine were put into play and only one was done so safely.
His next outing comes against a better San Francisco Giants lineup which will be a big test to see if Moore can string together two good outings; something he hasn't done since April.
