Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
June 11, 2008
Wang Being Wang

Chien-Ming Wang returned to form last night as he struck out just two but induced four double plays in 7 1/3 innings as the Yankees downed the Athletics 3-1. Wang's double plays are off this season. Through his first three years in the majors, he induced a double play in 4% of the at bats against him. Even with the four last night he's only at 3% for 2008. The double plays allow Wang to allow a high number of balls in play, effectively reducing his OBA allowed.

Wang's been working on his sinker.

Wang sustained a mild calf injury in the first start of that stretch, but the Yankees believed his problems were not physical. Wang had simply been dropping his arm angle, the theory goes, because his arm speed was too slow. That caused his sinker to sweep across the strike zone, not sharply downward.

The pitching coach Dave Eiland said Wang watched video and noticed that he was lifting his left leg too slowly in his delivery. That caused his arm to lag and his pitches to flatten. It was not a consistent problem Tuesday.

"There were a couple of pitches where he didn't get to that slot -- his arm was slowing down -- and he self-corrected himself in the middle of the inning," Eiland said. "That's huge, when a guy can do that."


Posted by David Pinto at 10:06 AM | Pitchers | TrackBack (0)
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