Anthony Banda Changed. Or Did he? It's Complicated, But the Numbers Aren't

It was May 8, and Anthony Banda had a problem. He stood on the mound in Cleveland, a journeyman: the common clay of MLB relievers. Guys like him barnstorm across the league, offering their services in low-leverage situations for a relative pittance—in this case, $1.625 million and whatever future considerations the Twins gave to the Dodgers in exchange for the lefty hurler. The problem? Banda entered the game with an 8.04 ERA, and would crank it up to 8.27 following this outing. Something had to change. 

And so it did. Banda pitched 1 ⅓ scoreless innings two days after that appearance at Progressive Field, with a pair of strikeouts. Can you spot the adjustment Banda made between outings?

Instead of the high-leg kick he’s used since his second season in MLB, Banda switched to a simple slide-step, and the results so far have been promising. He has since experimented with a modified, medium-sized leg kick, starting with the Astros series, but May 10 remains a sharp line between his old style and his new one, given that the new leg kick isn’t as extreme as the previous one.

Banda’s main issue early in the season was a ghastly lack of control. He had already plunked six batters and uncorked four wild pitches as of May 8, pushing previously shaky command to untenable levels. Nor was it just one offering suffering: he hit three batters each with his heater and slider. After that last brutal outing, his rate of pitches in the “waste zone”—the part of the strike zone so utterly out of the way that it rarely ever results in a positive outcome for the pitcher—was 12.4%, the 4th-highest total in the league among hurlers who had thrown at least 400 pitches. Life is hard when an eighth of your pitches are uncompetitive. 

Since the switch, his waste rate hasn’t improved. It actually crept up a little, to 12.9%, though no pitch (save a back-foot slider to Rhys Hoskins) came close to hitting someone. Is the mechanical change a red herring? Is the sample too small? Five of those misses came on the day he made the change—perhaps a sign of growing pains—and two came in the rain-soaked Boston game on Sunday. Perhaps this is simply something that should be earmarked to return to at a later date.

Not all pitches to the waste zone are created equal, though. The real difference, it appears, is part mechanical, and part managerial. Before May 10, 40% of Banda’s pitches came against lefties, but since then, 55% of his offerings have come with the platoon advantage. As a result, he’s been able to pitch more against lefties. Unsurprisingly, he's been better against them throughout his career. You can also live a bit more in the waste zone left-on-left, with the slider that makes Banda good when he's right moving well out of the zone but inducing chases. What else happened on May 10? Travis Adams re-joined the Twins bullpen, giving them more relief depth against right-handed hitters. 

To this author, the change in usage goes hand in hand with the adjustment Banda made: seven of the awry balls from the lefty since he cut down on his leg kick have been sliders against lefties, pitches that will almost never result in a hit by pitch. It appears he’s gripping and ripping at the same rate as before, but with better matchups, he's able to do without fear of plunking batters and with a better chance of getting a hopeless swing from an opponent.

In conceiving of and writing this story, the conclusion changed a few times. Obviously, something had happened to unlock a better version of Banda, but what was it? The slide step sparked the notion, but the numbers don’t lie: Derek Shelton simply has been able to find better spots to use his lefty hurler. His cobbling of loose pieces and unrefined goods early in the season resulted in awkward fits—pushing guys into situations they don’t excel in—which likely resulted in Banda’s ugly stats. Since then, though, Banda has culled two runs off his ERA, and he now looks like a somewhat reliable arm, given the right context. As long as his save Friday isn't indicative of a future as the team's closer, Banda appears to have found his way back to a successful groove.