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Pitchers Can’t Throw Two-Strike Fastballs by Javy Báez

It’s absolutely insane that Javy Báez is batting .343 with four homers in 0-2 counts this season. One reason Javy is doing so well in those situations is that pitchers haven’t been able to make the slugger whiff against two-strike fastballs.

We can illustrate Javy’s performance in 0-2 counts over the past few seasons by plotting the probability that he whiffs against two-strike fastballs.

At the bottom right of figure above is El Mago’s 2019 fastball whiff probability with two strikes. Notice how pitchers have a less than 10% chance of getting a swing and miss.