The Cutter Keeps Coming Along, as Bryan Hudson Tries to Keep Hitters Guessing

Everyone who's watched baseball for years knew this stretch was coming for Bryan Hudson. He pitched so impressively during spring training that he won a roster spot relatively easily, and over the first two months of the season, he was one of the best relievers in baseball. He did it all without elite velocity or an unusually dominant secondary offering, though, so eventually, hitters were going to force him to make some changes. They were going to figure him out.

That's not to say that Hudson's early success wasn't legitimate. He doesn't throw overwhelmingly hard, but his elite extension and unique release point gave him so much extra deception that hitters experience an at-bat against him much the way they would someone who throws 95-97 miles per hour. His sweeper quickly became a separator, too. As I wrote near the end of May, though, Hudson's cutter is also a key ingredient in his mixture. It's not a good pitch in and of itself, but it makes the two pitches that do lead his repertoire work much better.

Now, that's becoming more important than ever. From Opening Day through May 31, Hudson was one kind of dominant pitcher. Since the start of June, he's had to become a very different one. Hitters learned to work through the deceptive elements of his delivery and arsenal, and if he'd made no material adjustments of his own, he would have experienced regression, the way a bug experiences a windshield. Even as things stand, a lot of peripheral and process-oriented numbers have broken in the wrong direction in the second half of the season to date.

Bryan Hudson, Performance Metrics, 2024

Hitters are expanding the zone less often against Hudson. They're making contact more often when they do swing. They're striking out less, and walking more. They're hitting for more power, too, although marginally so. The indicators we use to predict how a pitcher will do all imply that Hudson is less effective since the calendar flipped to June. In terms of actual runs and baserunners allowed, though, there's been relatively little change. He's still a dominant relief weapon, albeit a less confidence-inspiring one who's had his workload conspicuously lightened.

He's less able to strike out and dominate opponents, because his two essential weapons have each gotten a bit worse as the season has progressed. Hudson's fastball has a little bit less carry over the last two months, and his command of the sweeper is a bit looser. There are red flags here.

There's the cutter, though, in the center of the plot--the calm amid the storm. Hudson has increased the usage of that cutter fairly dramatically, especially this month. Through the end of June, it made up barely 20 percent of his pitches. Since Jul. 1, it's 35.3 percent.

"I think we’re just trying to switch up some looks," Hudson said Sunday, in the visitors' clubhouse at Target Field. "First half, threw a lot of fastballs and sliders, kind of combo’ing that. I mixed in some good cutters here and there, but I think mixing things up and keeping them on their toes also helps."

By no means has the pitch transmogrified, becoming an out-getter he can count on to front his arsenal. It's still a complementary piece, but while hitters are trying to sit on his fastball and sweeper and while he's struggling to throw the best versions of each of those pitches, he's become dependent on that contingency plan.

This is a challenging moment for many pitchers, because right as they've found success in the majors, they're forced to change some big, important things, and to leave their comfort zone behind. For Hudson, it helps that he really started throwing the cutter last summer, so he's not as far out on a limb as he would have felt if he had to undertake this tweak several months ago.

"It used to be that way," he said. "Now that I’ve been throwing it for around a year, I’m pretty comfortable with it. I’m pretty confident I can throw it where I want it. It’s just about what that hitter’s looking for, what their approach is against lefties—especially big, long, sidearm lefties—and we’re obviously trying to not feed into that. So a lot of it depends on the hitter."

That's a very common theme when you talk to Brewers pitchers. Their gameplans are tailored to insights drawn from data, on the approaches hitters take against pitchers of a given handedness, with similar arsenals and arm slots. The samples under study in such cases are small, but the organization believes in the signal inside whatever noise that creates, because it's extremely difficult for hitters to change the way they approach similar-looking pitchers with similar stuff from day to day or week to week. Hudson, like Bryse Wilson, Trevor Megill, and Colin Rea (to name just a few), is availing himself of information the team is confident will be broadly actionable.

Neither the pitcher nor the team are trying to change the cutter, itself. They're also not pivoting toward an approach in which it's the defining pitch of his repertoire. It's much more about keeping opponents off-balance, and about continuing to execute that pitch, even as he tries to rediscover his feel for the others.

"It’s 100 percent the same. I think I’m just getting into a better position with my mechanics to be more consistent with it."

He might be getting lucky along the way, but this constant and proactive evolution has preserved his effectiveness, so that improved consistency seems to be nearly as valuable as an extra inch or two of carry on a four-seam fastball.