Collin All Angels: The Rebirth of Collin McHugh

Hey sports fans, I’m back this week with my first deep dive in a hot minute. Sometimes life can get a bit overwhelming yeah? You gotta take a deep breath and lean into your support system. Things have stabilized a bit now, and here we are… and here I am. Life, love, and baseball. 3 things that get me stoked. Baseball really is a magical thing.

One thing I always love to see: the archetype of the phoenix rising from the ashes. The reinvention. Somebody comes back with a new wrinkle, new process… maybe just a new perspective that changes the game for them in a positive way. Could be a guy that was formerly on top or someone that never was. Maybe because it says something about the “resilience of the human spirit.” Yes, it’s just baseball, but sport is a microcosm of the human condition (see my connection?). Either way, I love it. And what I love most about writing and talking about baseball, is the players’ stories. I love storytelling and a well-told story.

Enter one Collin McHugh, stage right.

I was sitting in my pseudo-office at home with shades drawn with the phone pressed to my ear. Leaning back in my chair, as I once again stared at the ceiling fan as I often do, I began thinking about—you guessed it—BASEBALL. I grabbed an old baseball from my desk and began spinning it in my fingers finding a grip. Looking at my phone on the Twitterverse, I came across this:

In all seriousness. I got better by watching dudes pitch on @PitchingNinja. Nobody gets better by accident. We saw/heard something and tried it for ourselves. https://t.co/IXUHkc6J93

— Collin McHugh (@Collin_McHugh) August 17, 2021

Still on hold… I thought to myself, I have him rostered on a couple of teams down the stretch, but I hadn’t looked at just HOW good he’s really been. What is he talking about? What was he doing differently? Since when did he start throwing frisbees? And thus began my journey…

The righty pitcher missed the 2020 season while recovering from an injured flexor strain in his elbow. The rehab drew on and after not quite getting back to where he wanted to be, he decided to opt-out of the 2020 season with the Red Sox and avoid the COVID mess altogether and spend the time with his family. This proved to be a win as the Red Sox were terrible and he didn’t miss much. Now we come to 2021… new season, new team. The Rays brought him in to pitch out of the pen much like his role in Houston and the rest, they say, is history. And that’s exactly what this is, his_story.

This is his story of reclamation. The reclamation of THIS season is a story in itself to be told for sure (as you keep reading), but it’s only the most recent chapter. *Flashback Sequence* In 2012 He was drafted by the Mets and then traded to the Rockies for Eric Young Jr. in 2013 where he then went 0-3 with a 9.95 ERA through a disappointing 4 starts and was then DFA’d at the end of the season. A Rockie start to a career if I ever saw one. That winter though he was claimed by Houston, and over the next 3+ years, he posted a 43-26 record and a 3.71 ERA over 543.0 IP. After an elbow injury derailed his 2017 season he came back in 2018 and reinvented himself as a shutdown reliever out of the pen.

What worked for Collin then? He ditched his sinker and changeup, used the slider more, and threw his fastball for a career-high 48.8% of the time. Coming out of the pen he was able to up his velocity with the 4-seamer and use it as the primary setup for his other pitches. And since it was in relief, he didn’t need the full drawer of silverware. He increased his chase rate on pitches outside the zone and drastically reduced his outside contact rate. Instead of fouling off balls batters were whiffing and becoming outs.

A disappointing 2019 ended in surgery. It was likely an injury that he played through for much of the season and included a few IL stints. Then skipping over the 2020 season with the opt-out we find ourselves in the present, 2021…

Not only is his swing and contact profile back to where it was in 2018, but he has also improved on it. Now his contact rate inside the zone has dropped more and he’s continued to raise his outside swing rate. Collin is getting batters to swing outside the zone 1 out of every 3 pitches. Translation, 1 out of every 3 would-be balls is being counted as a strike. What other effects is that having on opposing at-bats?

This year, he’s lowered his pitches per plate appearance by .25, which means he’s throwing roughly 1 less pitch per 4 batters. Not a big difference but still an improvement. Batters are fouling off fewer pitches yet more pitches are being counted as strikes, which confirms they missing more with his career-high 15.2% Swinging strike rate. And perhaps the biggest improvement, nearly a 7% bump in 0-2 counts. He’s working faster and getting ahead of more batters. When you stay ahead of batters good things happen. So, what’s the secret to this new version of Collin McHugh?

Not only is he getting ahead of hitters, but McHugh also changed his pitch mix. He’s now throwing his slider at a career-high 51.1% clip and he continued to de-emphasize his 4-seam fastball (in addition to the drop in 2019) now down to only 13.9%. And the key here… his cutter is back up to where it was during his 2016 campaign at 31.5% usage.

“Why is the cutter important and not the 51% sliders?” you might ask. The cutter is the setup. The slider is more effective because of the cutter. Depending on your grip, the cutter is essentially a ‘hard slider’. And in a way can appear exactly the same but with different timing, shaping, and break. Then he still mixes in the straight fastball occasionally to throw batters off his scent.

But that’s not all, folks… Take a look back at that Pitching Ninja video. What do you see with his pitch? Yes, the crazy frisbee break… but what else? *Jeopardy music plays* His release looks a bit lower and appears he’s coming around the ball more. To the Brooks Baseball Batcave!

It is true! His horizontal release points have been extending out further creating more cross-body cut, especially with the slider, and that’s helping him get more frisbee action. And you can see over the last few seasons his vertical release points have dropped as well. He’s become more of a sidearm pitcher. This has helped him separate from the noise and become more unique and unexpected.

Remember how he said he learned from a Pitching Ninja video? This is the post he saw:

Kyle Crick, Filthy 81mph Slider (release/spin). ?

h/t @RossInsana pic.twitter.com/wDV0evOCaN

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) July 29, 2018

As you see in the video, this is the same grip and release that McHugh is employing today. That’s what is generating the wild horizontal break along with the dropped arm slot. And he’s dominating with it too. Just a week ago, he set a franchise record for 30 IP consecutively without allowing an earned run. He’s having his “best” season, albeit one from the pen. The numbers don’t lie though. A quick glance at his Statcast page gives you all the confirmation you need…

Even though he’s lost a little zip on his fastball, this is proof you don’t need overwhelming velocity to be a dominant pitcher. The deceptive arm angle and high spin rate is getting the job done. And the final piece of the puzzle… and possibly the most important… location, location, location. Just like real estate (right Yantz? *wave* hi).

Moreso than before, Collin McHugh is making a directed effort to keep the slider low and the cutter high. That brings us back to the concept of pitch tunneling, pitches follow the same path from the release point before diverging as they reach the plate. This makes adjustments more difficult and pitch recognition near impossible. That’s why his swinging strike rate has spiked and why his CSW% and K/9 is his best mark ever.

So what’s the actionable advice on this? Simply put, if you need to trim down your ERA/WHIP in the final stretch of the season you could do a lot worse than rostering McHugh on your team. He likely won’t get many saves (if at all); but, he can help you shave some points off your ratios, bolster your Ks, and maybe even get a few wins along the way. That’s a W in my book.

If you want more Coolwhip to top off your baseball experience, fantasy or otherwise, you can follow me on Twitter: @CoolwhipRB.