Anatomy of an At-Bat: Jared Koenig Halted Athletics by Beating JJ Bleday

The Brewers headed into the seventh inning with a 5-3 lead over Oakland. After a single and stolen base by Zack Gelof, lefty Jared Koenig was tasked with getting the final out of the inning. His sixth pitch to Daz Cameron, a sinker in the heart of the strike zone, was battered into right field for an RBI double. Brent Rooker, who had already hit a double and a homer, was intentionally walked, so JJ Bleday entered the batter’s box. 

Koenig has been great against lefties all year, posting a 0.83 ERA and 0.88 WHIP over 84 batters faced. Not only did walking Rooker reduce the threat of an admittedly hot bat, it gave Koenig an important handedness advantage.

On the other hand, Bleday has been hitting lefties well this year, posting a .537 slugging percentage and an .821 OPS over 89 plate appearances. Despite his power against left-handed pitching, his strikeout (21.3%) and walk rates (6.7%) still left him vulnerable.

The matchup started with some drama before the first pitch was thrown as Bleday was charged with a pitch-clock violation after taking too long to enter the box. Athletics manager Mark Kotsay came out to argue that Bleday had simply been waiting for Rooker to make it to first base but his words fell on deaf ears, giving Koenig an 0-1 head start.

In fresh 0-0 counts, Koenig throws a sinker more than half the time. In 0-1 counts, he prefers to mix in his cutter and changeup more, likely to slow down the hitter after seeing a mid-90s sinker. In this case, he threw a sinker that ended up down and in on Bleday, causing him to whiff his way to an 0-2 count.

With three balls to work with, Koenig likely wanted to expand the zone and avoid giving Bleday anything too juicy to hit. So he deployed a cutter that ended up in the right-handed batter box to bring the count to 1-2. He tried it again, instead placing the cutter beautifully on the outside edge of the zone but Bleday managed to foul it off to stay alive.

Now at 1-2 with Bleday starting to time up his cutter, Koenig needed to stir the pot once again. 1-2 counts are when he throws his curveball most often and it typically follows a string of higher velocity pitches. With proper tunneling and the hitter’s timing sped up, Koenig’s curveballs have a whiff rate of 48.7% and a put-away percentage of 22.8%. Unfortunately in this case, Bleday took his curveball beneath the zone to bring the count to 2-2.

With Bleday starting to work his way back in the count, it was time to get back to the bread and butter. With the last pitch down and in, Koenig’s fifth pitch was a sinker to the outer portion of the zone. It even had some extra juice, clocking in a 2.3 mph faster than the first sinker he threw in the at-bat, but Bleday fouled it off once again. 

The one part of the zone Koenig hadn’t yet attacked was the upper portion. As with most hitters in today’s game, Bleday struggles to be productive against high pitches but more importantly, he’s been terrible against pitches up and away. A quick peek at his wOBA heat map illustrates this as clear as day.

With the game on the line and protecting a narrow lead, Koenig’s best bet would be the cutter. The location of that pitch has been up and away from lefties all year and while it’s actually been most effective against righties, it seemed like the right weapon in this case.

And so against a 90.2 mph cutter just past the outside corner, Bleday failed to check his swing and punched out, allowing Milwaukee to preserve their 5-4 lead heading into the eighth inning.

The events of this matchup seemed ultimately inconsequential as the Brewers would tack on four more insurance runs and finish the game with a 9-5 score, but this helped stop a potential downward slide for the team.

Of the 27 outs earned by Milwaukee, this one had the highest win probability added at 9.5%. It was an outstanding performance by Koenig in a high-pressure situation and was a good example of what makes this pitching staff so great.