Why do people swing against Zach Britton?

[Can_of_corn]

Royals had the perfect lineup to go against Zach. Patient, speedy hitters that put the ball in play. Most of Zach's blown saves seem to be a result of infield hits.

The 2014 Royals were last in MLB in walks.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/MLB/2014.shtml

[LookitsPuck]

I think the thing with the Royals is that they were a perfect storm. Contact hitters that were fast. Put in an ump that didn't have much of an idea of Britton's break (let alone the strikezone) and there you go.

[weams]

I think the thing with the Royals is that they were a perfect storm. Contact hitters that were fast. Put in an ump that didn't have much of an idea of Britton's break (let alone the strikezone) and there you go.

What about the field trip?

[LookitsPuck]

What about the field trip?

A lot of factors. Regardless, other thing we're discounting here is that Britton has a ton more experience in the closer role.

[Orioles4Life21]

The 2014 Royals were last in MLB in walks.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/MLB/2014.shtml

I stand corrected. Remove the patient part then. [emoji12]

[Can_of_corn]

I stand corrected. Remove the patient part then. [emoji12]

Just replace it with very good advance scouting.

[Orioles4Life21]

Ugh now you guys got me thinking about that crappy series. 2014 should've been our year.

[Aristotelian]

The Abreu AB was sick...Zach did not throw a single strike but except for the one in the dirt they were all close enough to induce a swing. White Sox announcers just said "that is unihittable" after every single one.

[BarclaySouthway]

Zach is generally not going to bring the ball up until he's behind in the count. If the ball's not up, it's pretty much unhittable. Hitters should definitely be taking on 0-0, 0-1, and 1-1.

Let's hope they don't figure this out.

[schittenden]

[emoji1155][emoji226][emoji250]

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[NashLumber]

Ugh now you guys got me thinking about that crappy series. 2014 should've been our year.

Game One was nuts. Bloop hits (one scoring 3 for KC). Extra inning HRs off of Matusz and O'Day and Britton throwing something like 12 straight balls.

[scOtt]

It was no sleep in three days and 5000 miles in planes.

[video=youtube;07Y0cy-nvAg]

[TouchemAll]

When I see replays, britton's ball looks like a strike for a long time and then has insane movement at the end.

When that's coming at 96-98 mph and you don't have much time to react it's easier said than done like frobby said.

This is not junk coming it at 88-90. This is no joke high 90s that looks like a strike all the way and has insane movement. He's just really tough

THIS ^^^^^^^ :thumbsup1:

[callahan09]

Here is Zach's swing and miss pitch chart from this season. Got it from a Daren Willman tweet.

A quick count of that pitch chart looks like it's about a 2:1 ratio of balls to strikes that people are swinging and missing on.

[crawjo]

I think taking would be a good strategy, but I also think that Britton knows when to put one in the strike zone. If batters started taking he would start throwing more strikes. And when he started throwing more strikes, batters would stop taking. And when batters stop taking, he'd be right back to keeping the ball down.