How Can The Brewers Reinvigorate Aaron Civale’s Fastballs?

In 2021, the Rays needed to move Willy Adames to make room for Wander Franco. David Stearns and Matt Arnold acquired Adames in exchange for Drew Rasmussen and JP Feyereisen. It's a trade the Brewers won by a landslide, in hindsight, even without accounting for its ghastly off-field intrusions. Shane Baz is returning from an injury, and the Rays needed to make room. Hence the trade for Aaron Civale. The Brewers may have the tools to bring Civale back to the sub-4.00 ERA pitcher from his last two seasons with the Guardians, as opposed to the one on the wrong side of 5.00 in his split season's worth of time with Tampa.

It’s All About The Fastballs
Civale possesses a four-seam fastball, a sinker and a cutter, which he varies in usage depending on the platoon facing him. Against right-handed batters, he uses the sinker more often, and he saw improved results in 2023 behind this pitch having added a tick in velocity while maintaining similar vertical movement. However, since acquiring him, the Rays have moved Civale over toward the first-base side of the rubber, and it just hasn't worked. 

The clusters on the left are from 2024 and the time period in 2023 after the Rays acquired him; it's a noticeable shift from where he was while pitching for Cleveland. While the Rays always have a good reason for trying something unexpected, all this one has done is negate some of the deception he had on his fastball in 2023, by making his release point more visible to the righties on whom he predominantly unleashes it.

The sinker has also been entering the strike zone at less sharp a horizontal angle, which makes it easier to square up for the hitter given where he likes to locate it.

By reducing the horizontal angle at which it comes into the strike zone, Civale's sinker can't afford to come inside on hitters as often, and it's allowed them to lean out over the middle-away parts of the strike zone and pull significantly more often. If the Brewers move Civale back toward the middle of the mound, he should be able to come inside again more effectively and open up space for his breaking pitches to excel. The way things are now, he's seen the line drive rate jump from 21.7% with the Guardians to 29.3% with the Rays, and it seems like a remarkably simple fix to simply move Civale back over the center of the mound and unlock those 2023 results once more.

Somehow, Civale has also struggled against left-handers even more with this move across the mound. With an .857 OPS against lefties this season (compared with a .728 OPS against righties), it could be argued the sinker isn't the problem here. Civale favors his cutter to left-handers, but has found the move across the mound changing how his pitches cross home plate.

The locations he’s hitting with the cutter are almost identical from last year to this, but the results couldn't be further apart because of how often hitters are finding the sweet spot for launch angle. The cutter was never an elite pitch for him, but jumping those sweet-spot rates from 29.7% to 38% is like comparing the ability to elevate a ball well from below league average to Luis Arráez’s elite levels. Sweet-spot rate is heavily correlated with both slugging and batting average, so it’s no surprise to see how this has resulted in significantly more line drives, fewer ground balls and more damage.

So why is this, if he’s locating the cutter in the same areas? It’s that move across the rubber again. It should be beneficial against left-handers and hide the ball slightly better, but it’s affecting the look of the pitch as it crosses home plate again. He’s added half a tick in velocity but the only really significant changes are the release point and the angle at which it crosses home plate, which is less steep. It’s an angle that may be successful when used to bore the pitch inside on them, but because Civale lives more on the outer half of the zone, it actually makes pulling the ball easier, because the hitter feels like the ball is coming into his wheelhouse. Left-handed hitters are pulling the cutter 50% of the time, which shouldn't be the case when he’s locating so regularly on the outer half. Perhaps he can come inside slightly more often to keep them off that pitch, but once again, if he can move back across the rubber and keep the horizontal approach angle where it was before the trade to Tampa, then that up-and-away location should allow his cutter to play up.

It seems like a fairly simple switch and that, for once, the Tampa Bay development staff have failed to get the most out of a pitcher. Moving right-handed pitchers across to the third-base side of the rubber is something the Brewers love to do, anyway. It's part of the story of Bryse Wilson's breakthrough for them. If Civale can get back to that more effective profile by doing so, then the Brewers should have at least another reliable innings eater and out-getter in their rotation, and one who’s capable of some very hot streaks. They needed starting pitching depth for the second half, and it seems they’ve found some.