Small Mechanical Fix Has Made Big Difference for Taj Bradley

[Matthew Trueblood]

Image courtesy of © Kiyoshi Mio-Imagn Images

There have been several theories advanced to explain the unhappy denouement of Taj Bradley's tenure with the Rays. A promising prospect, Bradley did establish himself in the majors with Tampa, but he never got over the hump and made it even as a mid-rotation starter. After stalling out so profoundly that he was optioned to Triple A in July, he was dealt to the Twins in the Griffin Jax deal. For Minnesota, it made sense to roll the dice on Bradley, and Jax wanted out anyway, but it wasn't exactly an exciting time to get into the Taj Bradley business.

So far, results have been mixed, but Bradley has shown some irrefutably intriguing things during his first handful of appearances with the Twins. As hideous as his ERA is, it's important to notice that his strikeout rate is slightly up; his walk rate is down; and he's allowing less hard contact. With better defensive support, he'd be looking like a perfectly viable starter.

Besides, the under-the-hood stuff is much more encouraging. Bradley's fastball velocity is significantly higher since joining Minnesota. His 96.9-mph average on the heater in September is the highest he's posted in any month in his major-league career. Opponents are whiffing on 26.1% of swings against his four-seamer this month, the highest rate he's ever induced.

To get from where he was to where he is now, the Twins had to clean up a delivery that had gotten downright hideous. Here's a fastball he threw on the mound at Target Field, but as a visitor, back in early July.

Obviously, this pitch is a mess on multiple levels. It's poorly located, in a way that doesn't even tempt Matt Wallner. It's also only 94.8 miles per hour, slower than his average even for that month. But a lot of his pitches looked like this during the last few months of his time with Tampa. Now, compare the above to a pitch he threw against another Twins familiar, but this time for the home side after the trade.

This baby hums in at a robust 98.4 miles per hour, and it has some serious carry. It earns a whiff from a guy whose whole thing is not whiffing. Bradley has made some important strides. Let's talk about how.

Some of his added carry comes from throwing from a slightly higher arm angle. The Twins have him getting down the mound slightly better and throwing with more extension, but his arm slot is higher even though his release point (relative to the ground or the batter's eye level) hasn't changed. That's a small help.

There's a more important change to spot, though, because it informs that angle but also drives the uptick in velocity—and gives him a better chance to command the ball, to boot. Take a look at where he is when his left foot lands in the clip from July. This is what pitching people refer to as 'foot strike', and it's a crucial moment in the delivery. To understand what's going on with a pitcher mechanically, you have to know where they are and what they're doing at foot strike.

Bradley had something really strange (and bad) going on in the back side of his delivery, back in July. After reaching back with the ball upon breaking his hands, he was bending his elbow to bring the ball back toward his head and start moving forward quite early, and quite flat. There's a movement the pitcher's arm has to go through to wind the ball up behind their head, to build tension and torque through the shoulders and upper arm muscles. In this clip, though, Bradley isn't getting the ball up high enough, early enough. Nor is he creating flexion in his spine, to store energy that gets released when he launches into spine extension by getting over that landing leg.

Compare that image to where he was at foot strike on the pitch to Arraez.

He's driven off the back leg better. That creates initial force. The ball is up higher, and will be on time, so less of that initial force will be wasted. And his spine is flexed, which will create more snap into extension in the next moment. This is the difference between 94.8 and 98.4, in a nutshell. Obviously, if you take any two given heaters, the differences won't always show up as this extreme, but there's a meaningful difference almost every time he fires. 

Bradley's stuff gets intense in a hurry, working with this improved mechanical profile. He can give hitters trouble in a lot more ways, even without an elite out pitch. His cutter, curveball and splitter probably need further refinement, but he's already killing spin better on the latter and throwing them all harder, too.

Again, he's far from an ace, but the upside is apparent again. Bradley's heat plays very differently at 97 than it does at 95, and so does the rest of his arsenal when those extra ticks are there. As he takes the ball a couple more times to close out 2025, the Twins remain in evaluation mode, but Bradley increasingly looks like a good investment. They bought low, and the stock is already rising.

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[Patzky]

The possibilities are promising! Let me be the first to say, the article about the demise of SWR was proven wrong. The piece about the improvement of Zebby was blown up last night.

 

Couldn't this article have waited until tomorrow.. 🤔😁

[Doctor Gast]

I don't know if Bradley is ready yet. But IMO, Bradley has been the best value in the sell-off, which isn't saying much.

[LA Vikes Fan]

I agree. Jax for Bradley may turn out to be the one trade we won. 2 months of Bader for Mendez also looks like it could be a winner. 

[Parfigliano]

We will find out what the little tweak did/didn't do because he pitches in about 30 minutes.

[DocBauer]

"His cutter, curveball and splitter probably need further refinement, but he's already killing spin better on the latter and throwing them all harder, too."

THAT'S THE KEY IMO.

The Rays are a well run organization with a history of producing quality arms, or finding new ways to use them. But even with their smarts, they missed the potential on Ryan. 

Did they miss on Bradley? Did they promote him too soon on potential and not fully develop him? It's entirely possible. A better, smoother delivery to increase velocity is nothing but a good thing. But that only takes you so far.

As the quote from the OP states, work on his secondaries needs work. Pure velocity doesn't make a good pitcher.

SWR is starting to refine his splitter to go along with his velocity in his 2nd season, with some injury hiccups interupting.

Matthews has the frame, velocity, and pure stuff to be very good. He's still learning a bit about command if his stuff and "pitching" which is different than pure stuff.

Honestly, all of this applies to Abel as well.

 

[Sjoski]

3 hours ago, Patzky said:

Couldn't this article have waited until tomorrow.. 🤔😁

You nailed it...just like the ball Grisham just mashed for a 3 run bomb.  Taj has nothing to get excited about.

[USAFChief]

Bradley seems like an obvious pen candidate to me.

Max effort for an inning. Fastball prolly plays up. Less need for secondary pitches. Shaky command less exposed.

He doesn’t look to me like a guy likely to turn into someone who regularly gets guys out over 6 inning stretches. Too many misses, can't maintain velocity, secondary pitches exposed.

[thelanges5]

Whoops

[ashbury]

I'm starting to hate these articles.  😀

[Danchat]

18 minutes ago, ashbury said:

I'm starting to hate these articles.  😀

Twins Daily writers jinxing players on the day they release an article is a tradition at this point!

[glunn]

I would assume that the Rays saw some of this and made a decent effort to fix it.

[Doctor Wu]

Very informative article. I like this type of analysis, looking at factors in the pitcher's approach that I wouldn't normally notice. But, unfortunate timing after Bradley's rocky start. Get 'em next time, kid.

[SarasotaBill]

Great article. Thank you for the insight.

The comments seem that wins matter this year.

Spoiler Alert - wins don't matter in 2025 for the Twins

It's about development. Obvious Bradley needs more development and refinement. 

That's why the Twins are letting him pitch through these horrible outings. 

[rv78]

We'll start getting excited when he starts getting batters out on a consistant basis so his increase in velocity doesn't mean poop. Until then, he sucks.

[jmlease1]

Not great timing on this one. But Bradley has shown an ability to chew up innings that could make him impactful in the back of the rotation. He's got to find a way to draw back on the homers in big situations and be less hittable. 

Maybe the Twins can finish cleaning up his delivery and get him some consistency, but there's a fair bit of work to do. Seeing him walk a guy at the bottom of the order and them give up the bomb as the lineup turned over is exactly the sort of sequence that will have him flaming out as a starter. The stuff is good, but it's unclear if he'll be able to master it enough.

[LakesPibble]

Short answer to the question in the heading - No.

[LakesPibble]

On the bright side, he did say (supposedly) that he's started looking at scouting reports, so that should only help.

[AKTwinsFan]

He's just a sinker and slider away from being truly dominant. 

[Patzky]

9 minutes ago, AKTwinsFan said:

He's just a sinker and slider away from being truly dominant. 

Me too!

[TopGunn#22]

It's gotta be frustrating to write an article that on the surface seems very logical and well researched, only to see the subject (Taj Bradley in this case) get absolutely blown up not 3 hours later.

However, I understand the "gist" of the piece.  Bradley, Matthews, Abel and I'll include SWR and FESTA all have a certain degree of potential that is quite intriguing.  Of the bunch, SWR has the least raw "stuff" and I've been trying to trade him for what seems forever.  But his performance against the Yankees was the best I've ever seen him pitch.  I've always thought SWR struggled to get past the 4th inning.  

I may have to reassess my thoughts on that.

Bradley, Matthews, Abel, and Festa all have big fastballs and capable stuff.  But none of them seem to be able to consistently throw strikes or effectively locate.  That is what's separating each of these guys from being a solid major league pitcher vs a guy that makes you tear your hair out.

The continued ineffectiveness of Matthews is probably what frustrates me the most.  He had a reputation coming up thru the minors as having pinpoint control.  His walk to strikeout ratio was outstanding.  Home plate is the same size.  It's the same 60 feet, 6 inches from the pitching rubber in the majors as it is in the minors.  And for these last couple years he's been up in the big leagues, Zebby Matthews can't locate consistently at all. 

I know facing Aaron Judge is NOT like facing your typical AA or AAA hitter.  But often times, pitchers are at their best when they pitch their game, to their strengths, locate the ball effectively and attack the hitter...no matter who it is. 

I'm willing to see these guys take some lumps now and then.  Frank Viola struggled badly his first couple of years, but once he consistently started commanding his pitchers he went from bad to good, good to very good and very good to a Cy Young Award.  My frustration is that these young pitchers (with the exception of SWR's last game) just aren't showing the kind of progress they should.

I'd love to see each of these guys spend a month in the Dominican Winter League further refining their pitches and command.  I don't think any of them are at a critical innings limitation point.  Maybe Maki should be spending a week with each of them sometime this winter.

Guys with "stuff" like Bradley, Matthews, and Abel shouldn't be getting shelled on a consistent basis.  They have to start showing major league improvement, especially with how good they look at St. Paul (Mick Abel).  The key to the Twins in many respects lies with how these 5 pitchers develop over this winter to 2026.  Yes, Prielipp and Dasan Hill and others are coming in the future.  But Bradley, Matthews, SWR, Abel and Festa, whether starting or closing games need to start actually producing positive results.    

[Linus]

So the premise is the Twins will fix something that the Rays couldn’t?  Not sure I like the odds on that one. 

[bunsen82]

https://www.mlb.com/twins/video/taj-bradley-s-nine-strikeouts-x4204

Its seems many wanted to throw out Bradley's improvements after a bad start.  The issue with Bradley was his quality of pitches had become average to below average prior to the trade.  The Rays had tried to tweak Bradley and the results were bad arm angles,  poor stuff, less utilization of the splitter and affectively a pitcher and an organization that were no longer on the same page.   

Beyond just the improvements that he has begun to implement on the mound,  he also stated 2 weeks ago that he is just starting to implement utilizing pitching reports and starting to do the homework necessary to be a good pitcher.  Bradley had flown through the minors purely on his stuff.  Its become apparent in the past he merely needed to show up to achieve success in the minors.  The issue is at this level you not only need the skills but in most cases you need to put in the mental work to be successful.  No different than the struggles Kyler Murray had early on in his career.  

So we are now seeing a player whose pitches are improving in quality (significantly),  arm slot is improving,  and he is putting in more preparation work before the game.  Its not by happenstance he had an extremely strong outing last night - 9 strikeouts.   The upside on a very good Bradley is a #2 or better type pitcher.  Its why I have always said to take the end of the season with a grain of salt for both Bradley and Abel because the Twins would be implementing quite a few changes and more during the offseason. Go look at the pitches,  not only is the location on most of the strikeouts very good,  you can tell he has several of the hitters just completely guessing.  He was in complete control during that outing.  His confidence had to be sky high and was a great stepping board for continuing to improve in the offseason.   

Now I still do have some concerns on Bradley on whether he is willing to continually put in the effort.  I am hoping this is a reset and I am very impressed with what I have seen so far,  but I think we could see some bad habits pop up in the future again, effort is generally a personal trait that is engrained and is difficult to incorporate into a normal routine.  Call it a character flaw, or being young,  I truly hope he has turned the corner on this front.    Its also a reason why I if I was in charge of the Twins I would keep one of Ryan or Lopez for next season if not both.  Both are high character, strong students of the game that can show the young players a good routine to be successful in the future.  Personally I really do think Lopez has the mental makeup to be the best leader of the pitching staff even if we are paying him a higher salary.  I really hope the Twins are not short sighted enough to not realize the value of having a veteran leadership presence on the staff.