SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Patrick Bailey caught the Cy Young Award runner-up most of last season, and was called up to the big leagues early enough that he was in the batter's box when the Giants faced pitchers like Clayton Kershaw, Shohei Ohtani, Corbin Burnes and Tyler Glasnow.
But the nastiest repertoire Bailey saw came in eight plate appearances against Blake Snell, who had a historic run over his final 23 starts. Snell absolutely dominated his future teammates, allowing just 10 hits and striking out 26 in 18 scoreless innings.
The Giants gave Snell quite a boost in his successful bid for a second Cy Young. They'll now try to ride that left arm back to the MLB playoffs, and Bailey already is thinking about what he might be able to do with a four-pitch mix that could be the nastiest in baseball.
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"It's a big-time fastball, and then I think he had three pitches last year with a 50-percent whiff or above," Bailey said, laughing. "That's pretty good; that's hard to beat. The year he had last year kind of speaks for itself."
Snell finished with a 2.25 ERA, and it was down to 1.20 over those final 23 starts. He sits near the bottom of the league in walk rate, but the rest of his Baseball Savant page features more splashes of red than Levi's Stadium.
Snell also finished in the 100th or 99th percentile in pitching run value, breaking ball run value, and off-speed run value. He was in the 98th percentile in whiff percentage, with his curveball, slider and changeup all sitting around 50 percent. Opposing batters hit just .079 against his curveball, .123 against his slider and .185 against the changeup.
By those impossible standards, the fastball technically was the weakest link. But Snell averaged 95.5 mph with his four-seamer and can run it up to 98 when he needs to, and the pitch also was above average by advanced metrics. Snell threw four-seamers nearly 50 percent of the time, getting ahead in counts and then burying hitters with his breaking balls or changeup.
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It's the changeup that Snell said is his favorite, and that was a key to his dominant second half. Snell and Bailey briefly chatted about their future plans during Tuesday night's game, with the new co-ace telling Bailey that throwing the changeup more in hitters' counts was a game-changer.
"I think the changeup kind of sets everything up," Snell said during an interview for the "Giants Talk" podcast, which will be released Thursday. "That's what makes everything look even better, because now they've got to respect 82 on the other side going away from them, and then I can backdoor a curve, I can strike a curve, I can under-the-zone a curve. The changeup sets everything up.
"I think the changeup is my favorite pitch. If it's around 82 to 85, it just makes me a completely different pitcher."
Snell threw his changeup just five percent of the time in 2022 but bumped that to 18.4 percent last season, and he regularly was above 20-percent usage in the second half, when he was borderline unhittable. Bailey is used to leaning changeup-heavy with his game plans already thanks to Logan Webb, and he's ready to run it back with Snell. But he said it's actually another pitch that might be his current favorite.
"Probably the curve. You just don't see that powerful of a curveball," Bailey said. "It's always just below the zone. You know it's coming with two strikes and you still can't not swing at it."
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