Stat Chat: Beyond The Bat Tracking-Verse: The Rocking Chair And The Mishits

Logan Webb is having a rough go at it this year, even if you don’t count the disaster start on Opening Night (that streamed on Netflix to no one’s delight), his ERA would be 4.40 in 43 IP (in reality, it’s a 5.06 ERA in 48 IP). McCovey Chronicles did a great breakdown of how Logan Webb’s best days may be behind him due to the sheer workload he’s taken on in his 20s (somehow he hasn’t turned 30 yet!). Another explanation I’ve seen floated around was the introduction of the automated ball strike (ABS) challenge system, which has contributed to an increase in walks and especially affected pitchers who were previously “stealing” strikes outside of the zone like Webb has.

What’s made Logan Webb’s results even more perplexing is that there hasn’t been much of a decline in his pitch arsenal. The velocity on his pitches are about the same, the pitch model grades haven’t changed much (111 Pitching+ in 2025, 109 Pitching+ in 2026), so it’s hard to see much of a difference there. If you think “well, he’s a groundball guy who relies on balls in play, which means he’s susceptible to random fluctuations in BABIP”, his BABIP is actually LOWER in 2026 than last season (.346 in 2025, .333 in 2026). One thing I did notice was a change in the bat tracking metrics of hitters facing his pitches.

I previously wrote about using bat tracking metrics to evaluate pitchers, and this is great opportunity to see if hitters are doing something differently against Logan Webb’s pitches, most notably his bread-and-butter sinker:

Above is Logan Webb’s bat tracking metrics since 2024 against his five main pitches. It’s sorted by type and year, so you can see the change year-over-year for each of his pitches. The thing that stands out most to me is the increase in bat speed in 2026 against his sinker (row 4). The Squared-Up per contact rate is actually down this year for that pitch, but you can see how consistent bat speed is against his other pitches, opposed to how bat speed next to his sinker in 2026 goes into the red. That shows hitters are getting their better swings on their sinker than they have in the past, and the faster swing speed is also why his sinker is getting hit harder than it has in his entire career.

The analysis of Logan Webb comes to a concept I touched on in the original article last season: Bat tracking stats can give us better details on how a pitcher is doing on controlling contact quality. To better understand this, let’s put on our Joe Morgan/John Smoltz hat for a moment, and think about the stuff these grumpy baseball lifers would talk about when discussing a pitcher who “controls contact”. They would describe how a pitcher would “have a hitter on the rocking chair,” meaning the hitters are always off balance, and can’t drive the ball even when they make contact. Then, in the next inning, a hitter would mishit the ball and roll it to the shortstop, and John Smoltz would talk about how the pitcher “created” the mishit. These were simply old-timey platitudes back then, but with the introduction of bat tracking, can we actually measure how much a pitcher is creating mishits, or putting hitters on the rocking chair?

To do this, I pulled all swing data for competitive swings since 2024, and calculated the established baselines for how fast a hitter normally swings at a certain type of pitch (average swing speed), and how often a hitter squares up that pitch when they do make contact (squared-up/contact rate). For a player’s specific pitch where hitters are swinging slower than they typically do, I gave that a higher score for “Rocking Chair Factor”. For a player’s pitch where hitters were squaring up less than expected for that pitch type, I gave the pitch a higher score for “Mishit Factor”. Taking those scores, I can plot all the starters in 2026 based on “Rocking Chair Score” and “Mishit Factor” score:

The above chart can be accessed online here. I think immediately it passes some sniff tests; Shohei, Paul Skenes, and Nolan McLean on the right top (good pitchers), Lance McCullers, Simeon Woods Richardson, and Tomoyuki Sugano on the left bottom (bad pitchers), and whatever Zack Littell is doing down there, you don’t want to be close to him because he’s been one of the worst starters this year. Seth Lugo and Bryce Elder being on the right side of the Rocking Chair Score is good, since they are pitchers who “induce” lazy fly balls that result from hitters not swinging as hard. Couple of interesting things that stand out to me are Will Warren being towards the left bottom corner in the bad zone, but more importantly, the man who started it all, Logan Webb, actually grading decently well overall by this method!

Was it just that his previous scores were so high that it felt like a regression? I still see that the sinker is not scoring well, which I’ll take as a consolation prize. Either way, this will not be the last time we go through [Rod Serling voice] The Bat Tracking-Verse.