Madison Bumgarner

Just wrote 1,500 words on Bumgarner’s new velocity, so I’ll just leave it at that.

Tyler skaggs

I think this is a classic example of a velocity boost being an example of a player simply regaining health. Skaggs has had lots of arm issues in his career and his early season velocity dip coincided with two Spring injuries(ankle and elbow) that he was dealing with. He didn’t have a normal Spring Training because of these injuries so his April should probably be ignored.

Skaggs appeared to be breaking out in the second half last season(before yet another injury screwed with his September). Skaggs has had some really rough starts this season, even as his velocity increased, but his last three starts have seen an elite 23% K-BB rate. He could be figuring things out and it just remains to be seen whether he will ever have long enough stretches of health to fully breakout.

Matthew Boyd

Boyd is another great story from the 2019 season and him appearing high on this list was pretty shocking to me considering how great he pitched in April. His velocity had actually been down since the beginning of 2018 and only in May did he finally begin sitting around 92 like he was in the first couple seasons of his career. Boyd’s fastball has been a key to the strikeout pitcher that Boyd has turned into. He’s seen an increase to his spin rate along with the recent velo spike and it’s helped him improve his swinging strike rate on the pitch.

Boyd’s breakout has been helped by increased slider usage, as well, and it’s turned him into basically a two pitch guy. His curve and changeup usage have both dropped this year down to 5% each. I worry about two-pitch pitchers and their ability to get deep into games. Surprisingly Boyd has been really good the third time through the order with a 3.13 FIP and a ridiculous 25% K-BB rate.