Cristian Javier: Strong Big League Starter
Javier's Had No-Hit Stuff Yesterday in the Bronx for the Same Reason He Has Succeeded Throughout the 2022 Season--His Four-Seam Fastball Has Improved
Last April, I wrote about the question of whether Cristian Javier would end up as a starting pitcher, or as a multi-inning reliever? And I wrote that “to succeed as a staring pitcher, Javier needs a 3rd pitch,” and the article focused on the potential for Javier to develop a curveball as his 3rd pitch.
On Saturday in Yankee Stadium, Javier finally buried the last remnants of that question I asked. It is clear that Javier’s best role is as a starting pitcher. And as evidence, we can present Javier’s 7 innings from yesterday, where he facet the highest scoring offense in the American League, and allowed allowed no hits and runs while striking out 13 and walking only 1.
Hector Neris and Ryan Pressly finished off the Yankees for a combined no-hitter. It was the first time that the Yankees has been no-hit since 2003. Happily for us, that previous Yankee Stadium no-hitter was the famous one thrown by six Astro hurlers.
And yet, Javier has succeeded as a starting pitcher by focusing only on two pitches. We saw that yesterday in the Bronx, where Javier threw 115 pitches in his 7 innings on Saturday in the Bronx, 62% of them for strikes. He threw 79 fastballs and 30 sliders, which accounted for all but six of his offerings to Yankee hitters.
His slider was effective, inducing six whiffs, four foul balls, and four called strikes. But Javier relied mostly on his 4-seam fastball to retire Yankees today. And it worked. The Yankees swung-and-missed at 13 of Javier’s four-seamer. And they only put the ball in play nine times, with only two of those going >95 MPH in exit velocity (that’s the measure Statcast uses to determine if a ball if “hard hit”). It was the star of Javier’s outstanding performance yesterday.
What we saw yesterday in the Bronx is similar to what we have seen from Javier all season. He has relied heavily on only two pitches, and has succeeded because those two pitches are very good. In particular, Javier has improved his four-seam fastball. And if you don’t believe me that’s he has improved that pitch, go ask the Yankees lineup from yesterday.
Javier’s Best Season
Javier’s 7 shutout innings puts him at a 2.73 ERA in 62.2 innings this season with a 1.05 WHIP in 62.2 inning pitched. He pitched 4 games out of the bullpen in April, but joined the rotation in the latter part of that month and has now made 10 starts.
It is the best season of the three he has had as a major leaguer, in part because he has improved on the weaknesses he has shown in his previous two seasons.
Javier was called upon to join the starting rotation in 2020 due to Justin Verlander’ injured elbow. His surface numbers for that season were good, posting a 3.48 ERA and a WHIP of 0.99. But below the surface, his numbers were not as good. He gave up 1.8 homers per nine innings pitched, and struck out 8.9 batters per nine inning, which produced a FIP of 4.94. These numbers suggested that Javier’s good numbers in 2020 might not last.
In 2021, Javier threw 101.1 regular season innings. And he adjusted to the major leagues by getting more strikeouts. He struck out 11.5 batters per nine innings. His pitchers were sharper, as he reduced the contact rate that opponents made when they chased his pitches out of the strike zone from 63.2% in 2020 to 51.4% in 2021. But with an increase in strikeouts came an increase in walks. He walked 4.7 batters per nine innings, negating much of the good that he achieved by increasing his strikeout rate.
This season, Javier has combined the best of both his 2021 and 2020 seasons. Which is to say, he’s kept the gains he made in strikeouts in 2021 while returned to the better walk rate that we say in 2020. So far this season, he has struck out 11.6 batters per nine innings, which is very similar to his strikeout rate from 2021. But he has reduced his walk rate to 3.4 per nine innings, just above the 3.0 per nine he had in 2020. Those numbers are of course buoyed by his performance yesterday in New York, when he struck out 13 while walking only 1.
Succeeding as a Two-Pitch Pitcher
Last season, I wrote that Javier needed to develop a third pitch to succeed. But he hasn’t. All season, he has thrown his curveball and change up rarely (a combined 10.7% of his pitches), and almost never to right handed batters. And Statcast data shows that he is smart to do so. He is giving up a wOBA of .512 on his curveball and .532 on his changeup in 2022.
So how has Javier succeeded as a pitcher who relies only on a four-seam fastball and a slider? He has made those pitches better, particularly his four-seam fastball.
Javier has an unusual fastball for a major league pitcher. In a 2020 article about Javier, Jake Kaplan of The Athletic wrote that Javier’s “wrist positioning allows him to stay behind the ball and create backspin…Backspin is what creates ride, also known as hop, and the illusion to the hitter that the ball is rising.” Ride creates an illusion for hitters, as they think the ball will drop more, but it stays toward the top of the strike zone, which makes batters swing under the ball.
Statcast data shows Javier at the 89th percentile in major league baseball on spin on his fastball. And that high spin produces vertical movement on Javier’s four-seamer is 3.2 inches less than the average major league four-seamer. That’s the 9th lowest of any major league pitcher, and all but one of the pitchers Javier trails is a one-inning reliever. These swings under the ball induces lots of pop ups in the infield, and lots of swings and misses.
Javier has improved his fastball mostly by improving his command of the pitch. Earlier this season, Cody Poage of The Crawfish Boxes noted how “there is noticeably better consistency in Javier’s horizontal release points this season compared to last…Establishing a more consistent release point, especially on the horizontal plane, has allowed Javier to improve his command.”
That improved command means that Javier is throwing his four-seam fastball more consistently in the strike zone. And by throwing it in the strike zone, he is generating more whiffs on the pitch; Javier has increased his whiff % on his four-seamer from 19.5% in 2020 to 26.2% this season.
And while Javier has put the ball in the strike zone more, he has not been hit hard for doing so. Opposing batters had a slugging percentage against Javier’s fastball of .442 in 2020 and .421 in 2021. In 2022, Javier has limited opposing hitters to a slugging percentage of .273.
Opponents are less likely to make contact with Javier’s four-seam fastball in 2022. But when they do, they are also likely to do less damage against it. It’s a great combination for a pitcher.
Statcast uses these data to help create an estimate of how many runs each pitch has helped a pitcher keep off the scoreboard (or put on the scoreboard if it’s an ineffective pitch). The “run value” for Javier’s fastball in 2020 was -6. In 2021, it declined to -1. And in 2022, Javier’s fastball has a run value of -13. Now, keeping 13 runs off of the board seems good. But how good is it? It’s the 6th highest run value of any single pitch in major league baseball in 2022.
An Improved Javier
The statistics and data tell the story of how Javier’s improved. He has harnessed command of his pitches—especially his four-seam fastball—to reduce his walk rate while maintaining a very high rate of strikeouts. His improved command has not only led to more strikeouts and less walks, but it has also led to less damage against his four-seam fastball.
Or, you can watch Javier’s performance in Yankee Stadium yesterday. Javier’s improved command has seen not only by allowing only one walk, but also in allowing only two hard hit balls. And eight of his thirteen strikeouts came against his four-seam fastball.
Javier’s had a big performance yesterday for the same reason he has had a big performance all season—he has greatly improved his four-seam fastball. The Yankees couldn’t touch it yesterday, but they’re not the only ones.