One of the most massive disappointments of 2021 has been Alex Colome. A proven veteran who’s been a consistently good pitcher for years, brought in by the Twins hoping to add some stability to that BP.
Instead Colome took a job as the team chef, and he served up some of the best tasting meatballs you’ll ever try. They were so tasty that they were spread all over the AL for other teams to try, and it didn’t disappoint.
I wonder why he took this route…
On a more serious note though, Colome has been a total disaster. Wanna see evidence? Well here, take a look:
The results of 2021 compared to other years for Colóme speak for themselves. There’s no reason to analyze them, if it could be said it has been. Instead, let’s take a look at specifically the kind of pitcher Colóme is. Specifically, the kind of pitcher he is in 2021 in comparison to the kind of pitcher he was in 2020.
So let’s take a look:
The first thing that pops out to me is that, in 2020 and 2021, he only has two pitches. But he’s had mostly two pitches throughout the last five years. He has had a changeup a couple of years, but he threw it less then 5% of the time (fourth number = %). If you ignore the changeup, he’s mostly been the same over the last five years:
A cutter that averages about 90 MPH that he throws 65-70% of the time
A 4-Seamer that averages about 94 MPH that he throws about 30% of the time.
The thing that sticks out to me most about those statistics is in 2021, he threw his 4-Seamer more than in previous years.
Let’s look at another piece:
If you look at his cutter, the Inches of Drop has hung around 26-27 vertically, and horizontally it’s been all over the place. But in 2020, it was about 4 (which is quite a bit higher than any other year of his career).
Yet the results (his stats) are absolutely awful this year.
I know there’s probably more to look at here but when I look at his pitch arsenal I don’t see why it would lead to such a dramatic dropoff.
On an unrelated note, why do I want to eat Italian food all of a sudden…