What's Eating Pablo López? - Caretaker Exclusive

[Matthew Trueblood]

The Minnesota Twins' ace hasn't quite been ace-like this season. He's shown flashes of being his dominant self, but there have been too many tough innings, leading to some uneven outings. What's wrong?

Image courtesy of © Rafael Suanes-USA TODAY Sports

On one level, this is all pretty simple. Has Pablo López been good enough this season? There's a nuanced, layered, difficult, even self-contradictory answer, but there's also a pretty simple one: his ERA is 4.72. That's not good enough--not for a hurler the Twins needed to pitch like the ace he was down the stretch last season, and not as a highly-paid veteran on a team that cut back its payroll for 2024 and doesn't seem eager to raise it again for 2025 and beyond.

That doesn't mean López isn't a good pitcher. By no means does he seem to have totally lost his good stuff, and despite a couple of starts in which his fastball has been noticeably diminished, both he and manager Rocco Baldelli insist that he's healthy. He's struck out 27.9% of opposing batters, and walked just 4.0% of them. That's ace-caliber work, and his stuff remains ace-caliber, when he's commanding it. We can sum up the "yeah, but" pretty succinctly: he's giving up home runs at exactly the same rate at which he's issuing walks, and as a result, opponents are slugging .437 against him. Preventing home runs is the least stable of the three bedrock skills a pitcher can demonstrate, but when you struggle to do it, the other skills don't matter as much as one might like. López is giving up harder contact and getting fewer ground balls this year, and when hitters hit him hard, they're getting a lot of juice out of the squeeze.

Evaluating López is difficult, then, because he's winning as many at-bats as ever--as many pitches as ever. Sometimes, baseball is a game defined by probabilities. Win more matchups than the average pitcher (or batter, if that's your role), and you help the team win. This is why batting average was the first metric by which fans measured players for the first 70 or 80 years of professional baseball, and why on-base percentage is now recognized as the best individual indicator of a hitter's performance.

Now, however, we live in a somewhat different era. On-base percentage still matters a lot, and (flipping the image to read it from the pitcher's side) strikeout-to-walk ratio is still an excellent barometer of pitching ability. More than in the past, though, danger lurks throughout a big-league lineup, and runs are scored in sudden thunderclaps, rather than insistent showers of singles and runner advancements. The game is less about probabilities and more about payoffs than it used to be, which means that a vulnerability to the home run on the mound is more damaging and limiting than it used to be. López and the Twins are feeling that in a big way right now.

The gopheritis afflicting López lately is not a merely abstract concept, though, and we don't have to treat it as an inscrutable mystery. There are a couple of material problems at play. Let's identify them, so we can watch for signs of López fixing them in future starts.

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[Schmoeman5]

Isn't what we're seeing this year pretty much what Pablo has been doing his entire career? 

[Azviking101]

What’s eating 90% of the team? The results of almost everyone on the team are not in line with the expectations. We keep breaking these players down individually but when nearly everyone is having a down year or regressing then you can only blame the system and coaches.

Duran said it out loud the other day. The plan is f***** 

If this continues, coaches and front office need to be let go 

[bean5302]

1 hour ago, Schmoeman5 said:

Isn't what we're seeing this year pretty much what Pablo has been doing his entire career? 

Pretty much exactly how I feel about it. 3.53 FIP this year, 3.65 career FIP. Career ERA 3.92 is 0.28 higher than career FIP. Pablo Lopez is prone to giving up home runs when more runners are on base than expected.

Primarily, I think what's eating at Pablo Lopez is the declarations of "Cy Young Favorite!!!!!" on Twins sites before 2024 began despite Lopez really not fitting that mold.

[Aggies7]

The gem he threw in game 2 of the ALDS (and game 1 of the WC) put the expectations off the charts, simply because twins fans hadn’t seen a postseason performance like that since probably Johan in ‘04. Then of course the marketing wizards jumped on the opportunity to create “Pablo Day”, to help sell tickets and merch. It was almost impossible not to disappoint after that.

Pablo seems like a pretty good starter to me, but is he a true “ace”? Not been ace-like this year. Pretty much all our starters seem to be at the same level of performance. Above average, but none are shut-everything-down dominant. 

[Fatbat]

Hitters are eating up his hangers. 

[Markdumont25]

4 hours ago, bean5302 said:

Primarily, I think what's eating at Pablo Lopez is the declarations of "Cy Young Favorite!!!!!" on Twins sites before 2024 began despite Lopez really not fitting that mold.

This is my view as well. Expectations were unrealistic. Pablo is a very good pitcher who I'm glad is on the team but he's elite only as a #2...as a #1 he's closer to average

[Karbo]

Pitching is like real estate. Location, location, location. When any pitcher misses on location in the middle of the zone, major league hitters will hit it, hard. 

Interesting theory about Vazquez though. Moving target? I see why he would do it, but if its affecting any of the pitchers it should be addressed.

[JD-TWINS]

13 hours ago, Markdumont25 said:

This is my view as well. Expectations were unrealistic. Pablo is a very good pitcher who I'm glad is on the team but he's elite only as a #2...as a #1 he's closer to average

For all the analytical fans out there - Lopez had the best xWOBA against in ‘23 (I believe .258) than any pitcher in the game. This is a Brian Kinney stat from MLB TV. He picked Lopez as his Cy Young candidate in March…..not just locals drinking the Kool Aid. That’s not meant as a slight - his stats backed up the adoration. It’s not solely a reaction to a couple really solid playoff outings.

He’s not right, consistently, in ‘24. It’s May 21st though so lots of starts left to get things squared away.

[JD-TWINS]

54 minutes ago, Karbo said:

Pitching is like real estate. Location, location, location. When any pitcher misses on location in the middle of the zone, major league hitters will hit it, hard. 

Interesting theory about Vazquez though. Moving target? I see why he would do it, but if its affecting any of the pitchers it should be addressed.

 

[JD-TWINS]

Just now, JD-TWINS said:

 

 

54 minutes ago, Karbo said:

Pitching is like real estate. Location, location, location. When any pitcher misses on location in the middle of the zone, major league hitters will hit it, hard. 

Interesting theory about Vazquez though. Moving target? I see why he would do it, but if its affecting any of the pitchers it should be addressed.

The Vazquez floating target as an excuse seems really weak to me. If a pitcher isn’t locating based on a faux target, the pitcher has a problem. If it’s that big of a deal, have to assume there has been communication about this during/between games. The coaches and pitchers and catchers all see the video as well and they are professionals…..,to assume they don’t understand or pick up on details that are affecting a guy’s location just seems silly to me.

Duran missed Location twice in 2 games with his curveball. Got hammered both times. The second was after a four fastball - zero strike at bat……poor Location. Lopez has missed spots - he knows how & where to throw pitches, his command (ability to locate) has been seriously off in 2-3 games. Completely agree on your premise that Location is king!

[Hosken Bombo Disco]

The teaser text needs to be clearer in my opinion, but it is intriguing, but get to the point faster…  I don’t necessarbuy the premise that a high K rate or low walk rate signifies an Ace. 

Carlos Silva, Kevin Slowey and Phil Hughes had low 4% walk rates. 

That said, Lopez is our ace in the same way Berrios was, even though another pitcher may be pitching better at any given time (right now Joe Ryan). Does the article mention anything about Lopez’s dip in velocity in a recent game or two, or anything about his comments thereof? I would be interested in exclusive information like that. 

@Matthew Trueblood

[Matthew Trueblood]

18 hours ago, Hosken Bombo Disco said:

The teaser text needs to be clearer in my opinion, but it is intriguing, but get to the point faster…  I don’t necessarbuy the premise that a high K rate or low walk rate signifies an Ace. 

Carlos Silva, Kevin Slowey and Phil Hughes had low 4% walk rates. 

That said, Lopez is our ace in the same way Berrios was, even though another pitcher may be pitching better at any given time (right now Joe Ryan). Does the article mention anything about Lopez’s dip in velocity in a recent game or two, or anything about his comments thereof? I would be interested in exclusive information like that. 

@Matthew Trueblood

There's a lot of extra detail in the Caretakers-exclusive part of the piece, I can promise you that. Not much on the velocity; it's more about location and command. But that's as much as I can tell you! We always welcome window-shoppers into the store, but we can't give away all the merchandise. 😆

[Squirrel]

On 5/22/2024 at 4:43 PM, Hosken Bombo Disco said:

Does the article mention anything about Lopez’s dip in velocity in a recent game or two, or anything about his comments thereof? I would be interested in exclusive information like that. 

Become a Caretaker and find out! 🙂

[Parfigliano]

On 5/21/2024 at 12:25 PM, Azviking101 said:

What’s eating 90% of the team? The results of almost everyone on the team are not in line with the expectations. We keep breaking these players down individually but when nearly everyone is having a down year or regressing then you can only blame the system and coaches.

Duran said it out loud the other day. The plan is f***** 

If this continues, coaches and front office need to be let go 

Not likely

[Rosterman]

Attack! Attack! Attack!