With Henry Owens, Walks Just May Be A Part Of The Package
By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston
BOSTON (CBS) -- The Red Sox are riding high, sitting in first place and feeling better about themselves than they have perhaps since October of 2013. They're six games over .500, and they just completed a series win over the best team in the American League.
All is good.
Yet, for an hour or so on Thursday night, the Red Sox' hopes were quite tenuous, as left-hander Henry Owens simply could not find the strike zone. And it's an issue that might not be a one-off.
Owens allowed a game-tying run to score in the bottom of the first, after a wild pitch and a walk.
Given a 2-1 lead in the second, Owens walked leadoff man Brett Lawrie, but was able to get out of the inning unscathed.
In the third, things got interesting. With Boston leading 4-1, Owens walked Adam Eaton and Jimmy Rollins to start the inning. He got Jose Abreu to strike out looking, but he then walked Todd Frazier to load the bases with one out. Owens was again able to pitch out of it, getting a diving catch out of Hanley Ramirez on a popup in foul ground for out No. 2, and getting Lawrie to flail at a changeup in the dirt for the final out of the inning.
It was a high-wire act for Owens, and it preserved the three-run lead. But Owens took the mound for the fourth and quickly gave up a leadoff home run to Avisail Garcia. And without recording an out in the fourth inning, Owens' night was done.
"His [issue], obviously, was command and the walks," manager John Farrell said. "But five days ago he was able to harness things and command a baseball a little bit better. Tonight was not the case."
The start to which Farrell was referencing came last Friday night at Fenway Park against the Yankees. In that start, Owens threw 92 pitches. Just 49 of them -- or 53.3 percent -- were strikes. On Thursday, Owens threw 64 pitches. Just 33 of them -- or 51.6 percent -- were strikes.
The difference is that the Yankees, frankly, stink. They rank 13th out of 15 teams in the AL in on-base percentage at .303. The White Sox are better, though not by leaps and bounds, as they rank seventh in the AL at .315. Chicago has taken 99 walks, while the Yankees have taken 83.
This is not to say the difference in quality of opponent was significantly different. It is merely to point out that even a slight improvement in quality of opponent can make the difference between a passable start and a borderline disastrous one.
Owens now has issued 13 walks in 12.1 innings this season. It's obviously a small sample size, but he's walked 22 percent of the batters he's faced in the majors and 14.3 percent of batters faced in Triple-A this year. Last year in the big leagues, he walked 24 batters in 64 innings (8.8 percent walk percentage), which wasn't terrible. But in Triple-A last season, his walk percentage was at 11.2, indicating that on the whole, he walked a few too many batters in 2015. For comparative purposes, Eduardo Rodriguez (roughly the same age) had a walk percentage of 3.7 at Triple-A and 7.1 percent in the majors last year.
And it's an issue that extends through his entire pro career, really. His walk percentage has been in double digits or very close to double digits at every level along the way.
Yet for Farrell, the issue on Thursday seemed to be a temporary loss of gusto.
"I don't think it's a matter of aggressiveness. I think it's just a matter of him having the knowledge or the wherewithal to know he's going to be able to throw the ball over the plate. So that, obviously, states it's erratic," Farrell said. "But he does seem to find a way to get the changeup in the mix and get some soft contact. But still, the base on balls, it was a night of them tonight."
With respect to the manager who's tasked with pumping up a young player who likely needs a confidence boost, that's just not the case.
For Owens, it's not a matter of confidence. It's just a matter of pitch selection. And when you take a closer look, you're left to conclude that walks are simply going to be a part of his game.
What else could you possibly expect from a 6-foot-6 left-hander who only averages 88 mph on his fastball and only throws that fastball 47.9 percent of the time? If you can't throw a big league fastball, your secondary pitches can't be relied upon to carry you through 30 starts per year. Not at this level.
Owens has thrown his changeup a staggering 36 percent of the time this season, while using the curveball 10.3 percent of the time and the slider 5.8 percent, per Fangraphs. Combined with last year, he's thrown his fastball just 57.5 percent of the time, averaging 89 mph on the radar gun, while throwing the changeup for 26 percent of his pitches, the curveball for 11.3 percent of his pitches, and the slider for 5.2 percent of his pitches.
While the sample size is small, a troubling number for Owens this year indicates that opposing teams may be wisening up when it comes to facing him. This year, batters have swung at pitches outside the strike zone just 20.7 percent of the time. That's down considerably from last year, when it was at 32.3 percent.
Overall, opponents have gone from swinging at 48.8 percent of Owens' pitches last year to just 34 percent this year.
It makes sense, giving the pitcher's reliance on breaking pitches. With a pitch that moves as much as Owens' curveball, it's simply difficult to consistently throw it for a strike without hanging it over the fat of the plate. Likewise, the same applies to a changeup that often dives into the dirt.
That leaves big league hitters knowing they can sit back and wait to see that 88 mph fastball, and if they don't get it, they know they'll likely take their free base if Owens is unwilling to throw it. (Or in the case of Garcia on Thursday, they can tag a 75 mph changeup that splits the plate.) As of right now, with Owens' fastball registering at negative-12.8 on the runs above average scale over the past two seasons, he's smart to not throw it. But having a plus changeup (7.9 runs above average) won't be enough to hack it at the major league level. He needs a fastball.
It's without question the most critical issue facing the still-young 23-year-old pitcher who just two years ago was a top-40 prospect in baseball, as ranked by Baseball America. It's also why when Eduardo Rodriguez returns to the rotation, Owens should be atop the list of pitchers to send down to Triple-A. There, he'll need to work on improving his fastball any way he can, enough for him to build confidence in the pitch so that he can use it. If he can't, then nothing but a whole lot of starts resembling Thursday's lie on the horizon.
You can email Michael Hurley or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.