Baseball’s most frequently used pitch is, and will probably be for a long time, the fastball. A good four-seamer will give the hitter less time to react, and if it is well-placed and it has some sort of movement, it could be a deadly weapon. However, a pitcher can’t get by with just fastballs, unless his name is Mariano Rivera.
Breaking balls and changeups are equally necessary for a pitcher to have some sort of success in the major leagues. MLB.com reviewed some of the league’s best changeups, and as it turns out, the New York Yankees are represented in the list.
Tommy Kahnle has a great changeup, but in 2019, it was something extraordinary. The pitch generated 13.0 runs above average in Fangraphs’ pitch value, a number that led the league over Tommy Milone’s 10.0 and Evan Marshall’s 9.6.
The Yankees’ reliever had a stellar campaign
Kahnle rode the changeup to a successful season of a 3.67 ERA and 12.91 K/9. It’s a good thing that the change was so good, since he had negative values with his fastball (-2.4) and slider (-1.5.)
Here is MLB.com’s writeup about Kahnle’s changeup: “Of the 229 pitchers who threw at least 1,000 pitches in 2019, only one used his changeup more than half the time. It was Kahnle, at 51.9%. But even with the predictability, batters still couldn’t hit him. The right-hander allowed a .181 wOBA on changeups last season, the best in MLB among regular changeup users, and he collected 68 of his 88 strikeouts with the pitch.”
Next on Kahnle’s priority list is to improve his fastball and its command, to make it a more effective pitch, which could also help his changeup even more and his slider. He is well-equipped to do so.
For now, the New York Yankees know that they have quite the changeup artist in the team. Other prominent names that appeared on MLB.com’s list are Luis Castillo, Stephen Strasburg, Kyle Hendricks and Chris Paddack.