Sunday Will Be Biggest Game of Twins' Season and David Festa's Life—So Far

[Matthew Trueblood]

The overnight low in the Twin Cities Saturday night was 50 degrees. Nature itself wants you to feel the frisson of October as you prepare for Sunday, an August showdown that will savor heavily of September.

Image courtesy of © Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports

Baseball's many layers sometimes swirl and stack in their chaotic drifts until they look like a thoughtfully constructed painting. Even if the Twins and Guardians wanted to do so, they couldn't have consciously set a finer or more dramatic stage for the final game of this four-game weekender. Everything that has happened over the last week has set this game up to be one of the most important and hard-fought of the season to date, anywhere in MLB.

Monday night in Chicago, David Festa mowed down the Cubs, striking out nine in five scoreless innings. He allowed just two hits and two walks in that outing, setting up what became a 3-0 win. Two days later, though, the Twins were in a rubber match against the sub-.500 Cubs, and Joe Ryan snapped under the tension. A strained teres major muscle will almost surely end his season, though he and the team are holding out some measure of hope for now. Losing that game meant the Twins would come home having lost two of their last three series, but losing Ryan was much more ominous.

Meanwhile, though, the Guardians stumbled badly in their path to this series. They had a seven-game homestand against two very tough opponents, and after starting it with two wins over the Orioles, they lost the final two against them, then three straight against the Diamondbacks. Meanwhile, their ace, Tanner Bibee, missed a start due to shoulder soreness--almost as ominous as Ryan's departure from his start Wednesday.

Then, the teams perfectly divided these last three games to maximize the drama of Sunday's. The Twins swept Friday's doubleheader, and the crowd was loud and the mood was jubilant. Cleveland flexed its impressive run-prevention muscles and hit a couple of solo home runs Saturday, though, not only clawing back half the ground the Twins gained the previous day, but making Sunday feel like a crucial test of the legitimacy of the Twins' threat. Friday ensured that they wouldn't lose ground to the Guardians during the series, on the whole, but now, there's a risk that they'll have lost half of their remaining head-to-head games with the leaders and four precious games off the remaining schedule without gaining any ground.

To avoid that, poetically enough, the Twins turn to Festa, who became very much a vital cog in the rotation the moment Ryan went down. While Pablo López and Bailey Ober are a stout top two in a potential playoff starting hierarchy, Simeon Woods Richardson is the type of hurler you're only comfortable turning to in Game 4 of a series. It's Festa who can be more, and has shown that ability recently. Sunday is a chance for him to show just how high that ceiling is.

Don't underestimate Festa, merely because he's a rookie with modest but non-premium prospect pedigree. The data says he belongs in a class with two aces who were traded over the offseason and are leading their teams toward the playoffs while racking up punchouts: Tyler Glasnow and Dylan Cease.

Here's a scatter plot showing the horizontal and vertical movement of the four-seam fastballs of all 207 right-handed pitchers who have thrown at least 100 such pitches at 94 miles per hour or more. That might sound like an overwrought set of parameters, but it's important. When looking at movement, it's important to control for handedness and for velocity.

Among hard-throwing pitchers, the most comparable to Festa in terms of movement are Cease and Glasnow. All the other points adjacent to them (guys like Jeremiah Estrada, Nick Mears, Pete Fairbanks, Ryan Pressly, and José Léclerc) are relievers. Festa, Cease, and Glasnow have the best cocktail of speed, ride, and cut on their heaters among right-handed starters.

But wait, there's more! Here's a similar plot for all the right-handed pitchers who have thrown at least 100 sliders this season.

These three are even more tightly clustered in this regard. Glasnow and Festa are almost perfect matches to each other. All three have tight sliders, with roughly average vertical movement that plays way up because of their high-rise heaters and considerably less sweep than most righty sliders--only further increasing the difficulty for hitters, because their fastballs already work in the same horizontal lane as those sliders.

Now, each of the other two has something that separates them from Festa by a bit. Cease throws almost 2 miles per hour harder. Glasnow throws his slider at 90 miles per hour, which gives it some extra filth factor relative to Festa's, which hums in at 87. Glasnow also has a curveball and a sinker, and Cease has a curveball and a sweeper (plus show-me changeup and cutter offerings), so each is a four-pitch pitcher. Festa only has three.

On the other hand, though, Festa's third pitch is a weapon Cease and Glasnow really can't match. The Twins rookie has a changeup with only a modest amount of drop, but lots of run to the arm side--particularly relative to that cut-ride heater. Against lefties, he uses the high fastball heavily, and once they're looking up and in, he throws them the changeup fading off the outside corner. The pitch is inducing whiffs on over 38% of swings by lefties so far in MLB.

Even more impressively, the polished and intuitive Festa (along with his catchers and the Twins' pitching instruction team) has figured out how to effectively deploy the changeup against same-handed batters, too. With the slider featuring more heavily in those matchups, Festa really gets righty hitters looking away, away, away. That's the direction they perceive his fastball and slider to move, and where he locates them best. Then, when he throws the changeup and it skids in under their hands and under their bat speed, they're befuddled. Righties are actually whiffing even more than lefties do, in the small sample so far, when Festa uses his changeup on them.

On Sunday, he'll take all this talent to the mound, in a showdown with Bibee. After a bullpen session Thursday, Cleveland cleared him to retake the bump, so presumably, his shoulder is ok. That will make Sunday something really special: one team trying to get out of town with the split they needed, turning to their ace in a triumphant return, against a pursuer needing to finish a series win and turning to a dynamo of a rookie whose upside might be very high and not far away from being realized.

Festa's readiness for this role and this moment just gained a whole lot of import. It's only mid-August, but this game will inform everything that happens between now and these two teams' matchup in Cleveland in mid-September. It should also be a joy to watch, for fans of good pitching and urgent baseball.

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[Karbo]

I would think this is as close to a must win game as you can have in August. Win and they send a message to Cle. Lose and they're right back to where they started on Fri. Good test for Festa so early in his career.

[Brandon]

No pressure. 

[Linus]

Geez, this isn’t football. There are seven weeks left in the season. I hope the Twins win today but there is a long ways to go. 

[tony&rodney]

11 minutes ago, Linus said:

Geez, this isn’t football. There are seven weeks left in the season. I hope the Twins win today but there is a long ways to go. 

Loved the article, charts, information, and all but this was my reaction too .... immediately. The Twins have three football seasons of games left or close to it. I don't follow so have no idea how many games are played in American football. 

Festa has an important assignment because he feels he is ready to be a regular member of an MLB starting pitcher rotation and this is an opportunity. There are 45 games remaining after today. The Twins need the bats to become productive and more consistent. 

[Richie the Rally Goat]

Great article @Matthew Trueblood

How large of a sample size to be statistically significant? Is 97 changeups, 125 sliders, 160 fourseamers enough?

[Whitey333]

Well researched article.  But you lost me when trying to make comparisons with Cease and Glasnow.  Really?  After a couple of good starts?  Now we all hope Festa does great again today.  By making comparisons with proven major league starting pitchers after such few samples is ludicrous.  But I don't go along with the Twins philosophy of oh if we lose it's just another game.  There's only 45 games left and history shows it takes time to gain ground and move up in the standings.  Just as trying to compare football schedules to baseball schedules is also ridiculous.  They are two vastly different games and schedules.  Go Twins.

[JD-TWINS]

Festa has good enough stuff to be toward the top of a rotation in another year or two - very good stuff now - needs some seasoning.

SWR …..20 starts with an ERA of 3.78 …….he has been seasoned. I see him as the #3 through the balance of the season. His pitches don’t have the “jump” of Festa’s fastball but he battles & battles and generally does a nice job getting guys out.

IMO, not just in this post but generally, SWR should get a bit more respect for the job he’s done consistently. His FIP & ERA are only .01 points apart, so he hasn’t been lucky getting to this point.

[Rufus]

biggest day in his life? Really?

[tony&rodney]

6 minutes ago, JD-TWINS said:

IMO, not just in this post but generally, SWR should get a bit more respect for the job he’s done consistently. His FIP & ERA are only .01 points apart, so he hasn’t been lucky getting to this point.

Absolutely. Woods Richardson made such a huge improvement in velocity and has maintained a consistent approach. He looks unfazed by the last pitch and sticks to what he wants to do. Notably, for me, is that he shook off the signs several times which tells me that his understanding of what he wants to do on the mound is solid. TD should be on board with Simeon by now.

I like Varland but I don't ever see him shake off a sign and he has shown he gets a little rattled. I do believe in him though.

Festa is largely untested but he can be really tough for 80 pitches. The focus and mental toughness takes some time. The article was a good way to show his potential. Will he reach it?

[Squirrel]

1 hour ago, Brandon said:

No pressure. 

Yeah, seriously

[Doctor Gast]

SWR is underrated. IMO the most important day of the season was the double-header where we clinched a series tie. Yesterday was important as well as today. This is a very important game in Festa's career but I don't want to put too much pressure on him.

[LambchoP]

I think SWR has been very underrated all year long. Without him stepping up this year our rotation would be bad. Good test for Festa today. Just hope to see all our big bats in the lineup. Imo it was dumb to have Royce on the bench yesterday in a very important series. With the injury bug hitting hard lately with Ryan, Stewart, Topa, Lee and Correa, our depth is sure being tested, especially pitching. Do we trust Varland to make anymore starts? I sure don't, I think he'd be a good bullpen upgrade though. Of course that means relying on someone like Zebby for some starts before he's probably ready...

[insagt1]

 Not sure many had the Twins competing for the top this year specially after being down by as many as 9 games. But here they are..banged up bruised and ready to take a legit kick at the can. A win today and it's just a 1.5 game deficit AND finally a much needed series win against those guys. So yeah if 1stis the goal today is huge. If not still time to make up ground. And let's not forget KC. There will be lots of pressure games down the stretch. I agree..comparing this in any way to football is disingenuous. Totally different in every way. Should be fun. We need Carlos back. When?

[wavedog]

Understand the article and the size of the moment for Festa but the offense will need to produce more than one run against Cleveland's ace for Festa's performance to even matter so the pressure in this game may be more on the offense.     

[Matthew Trueblood]

1 hour ago, Richie the Rally Goat said:

Great article @Matthew Trueblood

How large of a sample size to be statistically significant? Is 97 changeups, 125 sliders, 160 fourseamers enough?

Good question! These samples are more than enough to evaluate his movement and say that this is who he is, in terms of pitch shape, velocity, release point. The results take longer to stabilize, though you saw me cite whiff rate because that's a relatively quick one to become reliable. It's only on the edges of fair to expect from him something akin to what Glasnow and Cease are giving their teams, but it's certainly not too soon to say that the similarities between them are real, important, and likely to last.

[Patzky]

Sets the stage perfectly for this afternoon's game..

[Matthew Trueblood]

1 hour ago, Rufus said:

biggest day in his life? Really?

"Game" isn't the same as "day". Haha. I make no assumptions about his work-life balance or what he's been through in his years on this Earth, but it's really not even controversial to say this is the biggest game he's pitched to date.

[Brandon]

1 hour ago, Whitey333 said:

Well researched article.  But you lost me when trying to make comparisons with Cease and Glasnow.  Really?  After a couple of good starts?  Now we all hope Festa does great again today.  By making comparisons with proven major league starting pitchers after such few samples is ludicrous.  But I don't go along with the Twins philosophy of oh if we lose it's just another game.  There's only 45 games left and history shows it takes time to gain ground and move up in the standings.  Just as trying to compare football schedules to baseball schedules is also ridiculous.  They are two vastly different games and schedules.  Go Twins.

The Twins went from 6.5 to 1.5 games out in a week and the 87 Tigers gained 3 games on the Bluejays in the last 7 games to overtake them.  But it usually takes time to catch teams in the standings.   1 game per week is normal progress.

[wabene]

Another creative piece of writing by Mr Trueblood! A wordsmith he is. 

It's hilarious to me that people find something to complain about with an article like this. This shite is fun, you've got a big series at the beginning of the stretch run. This is exactly the kind of game this long suffering Twins fan has been craving. Hype me up man, hype me up!

[tarheeltwinsfan]

Great article Mathew. Totally got me fired up for today's game. Today's game is truly "the most important game of the year". As will be tomorrow's game, tomorrow, and the next day's  game, and the next. It is why it is called "the present". 

[tarheeltwinsfan]

1 minute ago, wabene said:

Another creative piece of writing by Mr Trueblood! A wordsmith he is. 

It's hilarious to me that people find something to complain about with an article like this. This shite is fun, you've got a big series at the beginning of the stretch run. This is exactly the kind of game this long suffering Twins fan has been craving. Hype me up man, hype me up!

My feelings exactly. Thanks for your post wabene! It was excellent.

[bean5302]

3 hours ago, Whitey333 said:

Well researched article.  But you lost me when trying to make comparisons with Cease and Glasnow.  Really?  After a couple of good starts?...

As I was reading that I was like woooooooooowwww. All aboard the ultra hype train.

[bean5302]

Festa's improved a lot after he stopped trying to be something he isn't (a control pitcher) in his first couple starts. It's improved how his stuff works

Stuff+
Fastball 105 (average). 50 grade
Slider 120 (plus pitch) 60 grade
Changeup 78 (borderline MLB caliber). 35 grade

That profile might allow him to stick in the rotation, but comparing him to potential ace-like results pitchers? Both Cease and Glasnow have multiple plus pitches, and neither of them are throwing a pitch as dicey as Festa's changeup, though I do expect Festa's change will at least grade into the 40 range as his opportunities increase.

Cease
Fastball 124 (plus pitch) 60 grade
Slider 132 (plus pitch) 60 grade
K. Curve 109 (average) 50 grade
Glasnow
Fastball 119 (plus pitch) 60 grade
Sinker 102 (average) 50 grade
Slider 110 (borderline plus) 55 grade
Curve 141 (plus plus) 70 grade

Festa's been looking good out there in a number of ways recently, including limiting fly balls which reduces the homers, but he's done it pretty unconventionally. By becoming a "line drive" pitcher, which would normally be the worst possible scenario. Still, he's been limiting hard contact over his last couple starts. Have to see what happens as Festa is definitely putting up some weirdo outlier stats right now, haha.

[JADBP]

Big day for any pitcher but the hot seat belongs to the HITTERS!  One run yesterday is just confounding. What happens to the hitters when facing good SP?  They just get flummoxed!  Sure, I get it, they are harder to hit but it seems like they just start flailing at anything trying to get a hit. They lose all patience and pitch recognition.  So yeah, Festa could do an SWR and hold CLE to 2 runs and we end up with….????

GO TWINS!!!!