Corbin Burnes, Pitch by Pitch Part Two: The Secondary Pitches and How They Mix

The Change-Up
A pitch that Corbin Burnes has steadily been using more often year on year, to the point that it’s currently his second most common pitch this season, has taken on a life of its own. As mentioned in part one, he used the change-up only to left-handers in 2022, fading down and away in the zone or sequencing with his cutter to create weak contact and forcing batters to stretch away. The standout for Burnes on this pitch is the speed at which he throws it, last season recording almost average major league movement on the pitch across both planes, but at 90.3mph. 

His change-up had 26.4 inches of vertical drop and 14.4 inches of horizontal movement and was thrown harder than Wade Miley’s fastball, recording a whiff rate of 46.7%. The pitch had an expected WOBA of just .288 (the MLB average is usually about .320), and this has continued to progress in the current season, with hitters recording just one hit across the 46 pitches he’s thrown so far.

He’s historically used it to devastating effect against left-handers and has thrown a couple to right-handers this season; he may plan to use this more often in the coming season.

The Slider
The slider is a pitch Burnes used to devastating effect against right-handers last season; a slower, more exaggerated movement than his cutter made picking either of these pitches particularly difficult. Like the curveball, Burnes has historically kept this pitch out of the hitting zone at 65-70% for his last two seasons. Yet even when he keeps it in the strike zone, the batting average against this pitch has been incredibly low on a month-to-month basis, only exceeding .200 a handful of months. 

He primarily used it like his curve to right-handers, as a finishing pitch, getting the hitters to chase down and away, using it 36% of the time when he gets ahead to right-handers, compared to just 12% of the time when the hitter gets ahead. Opponents overall hit .160 on pitches ending in the slider, with a 49.7% whiff rate. As you can see below, one of the best things about his slider is how well he locates it, keeping it down in, or below, the zone almost 75% of the time.

He averaged 85% more horizontal break than the average slider, as well as slightly more vertical drop, and likes to use this to his advantage with the cutter, locating the cutter down and away in zone, then using the slider to follow the same path and dart further off the plate.

The Sinker
Burnes has often looked for another fastball he could use to keep the pressure of his cutter, whether that be the occasional four-seamer, which has gotten hit regularly, or the sinker, which moves the opposite way and was hit slightly less frequently. Ideally, this post by the pitching ninja demonstrates exactly what Burnes was hoping for in his arsenal:

However, it was comfortably the most hittable pitch he used last season (albeit his underlying metrics were more sound) to the tune of a battering average of .250 and a slugging percentage of .525. As such, he’s begun using this a lot more sparingly this season. However, when he has, it’s been crushed, in part because he doesn’t generate much movement either vertically or horizontally, comfortably below league average in both categories, as well as struggling a lot more with a location in the middle of the zone and spraying it when trying to encourage a chase. The issue is it had a potentially beneficial effect in emphasizing both his cutter and his slider’s performance, and we’ll see throughout 2023 if these pitches have become less effective. 

Pitch Usage
The Brewers ace had relied heavily on his cutter over the last few years, particularly when behind a hitter, and then used his off-speed stuff under lower leverage counts or to finish off a hitter. It’s interesting to see how methodical he’s been in his approach to this.

The mere fact he threw only cutters in 3-0 counts for an entire season shows how much faith he has in that pitch, as well as its prominence in 3-1 and 2-0 counts, but also how often he uses the off-speed variations early in the count with a lot more variety and usage. How the sinker and slider were used only for right-handers speaks to this approach, and it’s worked well for our Cy Young winner. However, he did start to get hit much harder in the three-ball counts than throughout 2021.

He does have specific sequences he likes to use, from the back door cutter paired with a fading change-up to left-handed hitters, the cutter/slider combination down and away to right-handers, and the curveball is thrown in against both to have a three-pitch arsenal with which to attack each side of the plate.

What do you think, Brewer Fanatics? Is anything that stands out to you? We’ll be back soon for part three, and an analysis of where he took a step back in 2022 and how he can learn going into this season.