Mets' Kodai Sanga Demoted: A Look at His Struggles

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00:00this guy is just not throwing strikes right now it seems like something is totally off

00:05and the New York Mets with the approval of Kodai Senga who signed a free agent deal he did not have

00:10to accept this minor league assignment was optioned to AAA Syracuse Kodai Senga 22 starts

00:17at a 302 ERA is going to AAA vaguely what do you make of that well one I appreciate him being

00:26willing to to do that and not take you know hold the team hostage there and go work on something

00:32while they can bring up another arm and Sprott threw really well in his big league debut I don't

00:37think that was that was exciting right to to be able to bring up another prospect here and have

00:42Brandon Sprott do what he did in Great American Ballpark I thought that was extremely impressive

00:46so getting Sprott that opportunity and getting a little bit of spark into the rotation is great

00:51instead of like a oh crap what's Senga gonna look like this time around again get a breather from

00:56that but at the same time it is interesting because when I look at the data there's nothing

01:01like I would say concretely different when you look at the just kind of this strike rate you look at

01:09just some of the chase numbers in general but the one thing that does stick out to me is the chase

01:14numbers against that splitter which are down and is that because of how he's locating it it's easier

01:20takes or is that because the league is adjusting to Senga a little bit and saying that's the one pitch

01:26that if I can recognize it or if I can recognize a starting point here basically anything that

01:31starts at the belt I'm leaving and if it's a fastball he locates at the knees tip the cap

01:35but his fastball is not that good so I have a good chance to feel like I can get to it and if it's a

01:40splitter it's going to break below the zone seeing that splitter chase rate drop by seven eight percent

01:45like that's huge for a guy that doesn't throw a ton of strikes right because he's reliant on that chase

01:51to up his strike rate because his in zone rate is very low uh so that is definitely a challenge for

01:58him now and it's like okay how can I get guys out inside of the zone how can I beat hitters within

02:04the zone now I think that's going to be the focus going back to triple a the cutter is probably that

02:09bridge picks pitch to make make it happen um and that's a pitch that he had going for him a little

02:13bit more early in the year that pitch hasn't been there as much this year and maybe that's going to

02:18be the focus for him it's funny we kind of sound like a broken record as it pertains to Senga because

02:23if you were listening to this show at the end of April we talked about all the guys with a sub two

02:27ERA at that point after the first month of the season and Senga was one of them and we went in

02:34depth on Kodai Senga and we said how is this guy throwing the ball this well and we talked about the

02:41fastball fork combination and we ID'd the cutter we said the cutter being a taste breaker enough being

02:48present enough in his arsenal is making him a frontline starting pitcher because he can flash

02:5596 at you he was also sitting 96 at that point the thing that jumped out to me and watching his last

03:00start in the big leagues before this triple a option the velocity was so inconsistent on the fastball

03:06and the cutter I mean one is 92 and then the next is 97 on the four seam fastball what's happening

03:12right now with Kodai Senga and then he's spraying it a little bit at the moment but that cutter the

03:17presence of it has not entirely gone away but it's diminished from what he was doing at the

03:22beginning of the year so to your point the taste breaker is gone you effectively turn him into a

03:27two pitch pitcher and also to your point it's not an awesome four seam fastball no so you can half

03:33baked prep for that and then just identify where you want to let the ghost fork go and if you have

03:39your spot down and saying we're not going to swing at that ghost fork when we identify it

03:44okay you're probably drawing a walk or you're getting a hit on the four seam fastball

03:48but I think you nailed it like if I'm trying to prepare my team of hitters right now and I I'm just

03:54giving them these numbers here uh last 10 starts for Kodai Senga opponents are hitting against this

04:00four seamer 315 with 1051 OPS you know the splitter has a 492 OPS against in that span but

04:08it has an in zone rate of 29 percent so what are you going to let beat you I think I'm going to let

04:15the guy who throws a splitter in the zone 29 percent of the time throw it in the zone three times to beat

04:22me you say well well that's easier said than done because the whole point is it looks like a fastball

04:26and then it you know bites below great so then I'm also going to dare the guy who knows his fastball

04:32has an OPS against north of a thousand to throw that fastball at the knees and freeze me because

04:38one I don't think he has the confidence to locate it there two he ends up missing up with the fastball

04:42then it gets crushed and three he has to then either locate the fastball at the knees then also the

04:49splitter or the splitter multiple times and and right now that's just too hard to do

04:53so

04:54so

04:59you

05:01you

05:03you

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