Affectionately nicknamed the "Klubot," Cleveland Indians ace Corey Kluber is a machine on the mound, so mechanically sound and precise. In fact, he's so quietly consistent that many don't realize that, by at least one measure, he has been the second-best pitcher in the majors over the past three years. (Clayton Kershaw is No. 1, of course.)
How is Kluber so effective? Let's take a closer look at his unique repertoire to find out, and for good measure, let's see if we can develop a game plan against him. The Cubs will need a little luck -- a few pitches on the corners called balls, a few loopers falling in -- to have success against him, but it can be done.
The breaking ball
So is it a curveball or a slider? Depends on who you ask; one system will label it a curveball, while another will call it a slider. So I asked Kluber himself last year -- and he provided no clarity. The big right-hander shrugged and said it was his "breaking ball." So we're left to classify it ourselves.
If you call the pitch a curveball, then Kluber had the best curveball in baseball this year in terms of swings and misses. He got whiffs on 27.7 percent of his "breaking balls," and the next-best true curveball from a starter was Jon Lester's, with 21.3 percent. (The late Jose Fernandez threw a hybrid curve-slider pitch that got similar results, including a 23.7 percent whiff rate, but most systems labeled it a slider.)
Yet it also would make sense to label Kluber's breaking pitch a slider, given its characteristics. For one, only six curves have less drop than Kluber's breaking ball; it just doesn't have that downward break we're used to seeing from most big league curves. But he also gets a lot of swings on the pitch, and curves have the lowest swing rate in baseball, perhaps because of their signature look and downward action. Kluber coaxes swings on 54 percent of his breaking balls, almost 50 percent more than the league average. Yet it's only 17 percent more than the league average for sliders.
Whatever it is, Kluber's breaking ball has the most horizontal movement of any slider in baseball. Yes, more than Sergio Romo's Frisbee-like slider, and more than the sliders thrown by Yu Darvish and Adam Ottavino.
Traditionally, horizontal movement is better to induce ground balls and vertical movement is better for whiffs -- this makes sense when you think about the relative size of the bat in those dimensions -- but at the extremes, horizontal movement is effective for whiffs, too. The pitchers in the top 10 percent in horizontal movement on the slider average 18 percent whiffs on their sliders, compared to 14 percent for all sliders.
And that's why the pitch is so successful. Batters rarely see a "breaking pitch" like this. It doesn't have the drop of a big curveball, so they're coaxed to swing at it more than other big curveballs. Then its extreme movement makes them miss.
The cutter
Here we go again ... Is it a slider or a cutter? Again it varies.
Sites like PITCHf/x consider it a slider, and it does have a similar whiff rate (Kluber's 16 percent rate is just above average). Yet it's only 3 mph slower, on average, than his fastball, which would be the fourth-smallest difference in baseball. It also has almost three inches less drop than the average slider.
Kluber considers it a cutter, and if we classify it that way, it's the third-best cutter thrown by a starter this year, behind only the ones thrown by Darvish and James Paxton.
It's a strong pitch, and the cutter gives Kluber another weapon against left-handed hitters; he has been more effective against them with this pitch than against righties. He uses it like a cutter against lefties, almost exclusively busting them in on the hands, as his 2016 heat map shows.
By being both hard for a slider but with a bit more movement than a traditional cutter, Kluber's cutter has an interesting comp. The cutter most like his in terms of movement and velocity is the one thrown by Mark Melancon, who has built a career on that pitch.
Kluber's cutter also pulls the same trick as his breaking ball. He coaxes 20 percent more swings on the pitch than the league average on sliders and cutters combined, and with that good whiff rate, every additional swing is a good thing.
The command
The asset that ties these unique pitches together is the Klubot's outstanding command. He has put together a top-15 walk rate over the past three years, though command is about more than avoiding walks.
Command is getting first-pitch strikes, which Kluber does at a top-15 rate. In fact, getting a first-pitch strike is one of the best ways to avoid a walk.
Command is also about getting swings on pitches outside the strike zone, which only Kershaw has done better over the past three years. Kluber's breaking ball looks like it might end up in the zone until it zooms another three inches past the bat and makes the batter look silly.
And finally, command can also refer to getting swinging strikes, which only five starting pitchers have been better at over the past three years.
So what's his weakness?
Yes, he does have one; all pitchers do, even if it's slight. In terms of movement, Kluber's four-seam fastball is straight, and his sinker/two-seamer is average. By velocity, his fastballs are average. He still manages to get 56 percent grounders on his sinker, which is above average, and 14 percent whiffs on the four-seamer, which is plus, because he has mixed up his usage of the pitches.
He actually has thrown more four-seamers this year, and it has been effective as a surprise pitch. Kluber has started to vary his pitch mix more in certain counts, going to the breaking ball more often to steal strikes on first pitches, and when he's behind in the count.
But it's all about those fastballs. They provide the best hope for a hitter.
Lefties in particular need to hunt that sinker in the zone. That's the pitch they hit for homers and line drives more than any other pitch Kluber throws. It's not a particularly effective pitch for Kluber against lefties, as it gets only 41 percent ground balls against them -- and yet he still throws the pitch 38 percent of the time against them.
The objective is much easier said than done, of course, especially since it's not a good idea to be aggressive and swing a lot at Kluber's pitches. But the point is this: The only way to take the Klubot down is to hunt that fastball!