Hot corner time. The Toronto Blue Jays are having a banger year. They've been great, They have been surprisingly great. The offense has taken a significant turn. We've seen the names on paper for several years and this year it's all coming together for them, Trevor. One of the big reasons for that is the drastic turn in their contact rate.
So let's look at the strikeout numbers for the Blue Jays, because they stand out a ton Blue Jays today with this tweet, the Jays are averaging six point five eight strikeouts per game, the next best team six point nine to oh they said, that's frankly ridiculous. Dave Popkins actually might be a hitting wizard talking about their hitting coach. That might not seem like a large number, but that is a very massive difference six point five eight to six point nine to zero when you have this many
baseball games. Right, we're over one hundred games into the season. I think one ten, maybe even a little bit more than that one fifteen. So anyway, your thoughts on how the Blue Jays are turn things around? Six five eight, And just to give everyone a little more context, the Kansas City Royals are next and they are often contact Kings in that category six point nine ohks per game.
Then the padres at seven point oh two, and then there's another big drop off to Saint Louis and Houston both at seven point seven to seven strikeouts per game. What are you seeing with Toronto and how annoying is it for pitchers to face them right now?
Well, it seems like this is a very conscious effort to not strike out as much, especially because they had last year no power and that was a major issue. That's why they went on and senttender like they wanted to bolster that power side. You just didn't know, you know, Boba Sheet has been on or off, you know, up to this point in his career in terms of on the power side. And you can't just only rely on
Vladdie for all of your power. So if you can't rely on power driving a lot of your production, you got to do all the little things and you got to make sure that at least we're not giving away at bats and at least we are putting the ball in play and letting athleticism take over because the game is also we all the rule changes have shifted towards really putting pressure on teams defense defensively needing to be able to make plays that they're maybe not positioned as
well for so leaning into that makes a lot of sense your team. If you're a team that doesn't strike out a lot, like the number two team, for example, Kansas City on this list at six point nine, Like they don't have a lot of power either, right, and they they don't score a lot at the moment, but they don't just get dominated and just struck out by these really good pitchers that we see everywhere. Strikeouts are the way here in baseball. Everyone wants to get strikeout.
So if you can just frustrate strikeout pitchers top to bottom, if a guy goes into an outing thinking this is gonna suck, and I even if I throw zeros, they're gonna make me work for it, and this isn't gonna I'm not gonna have any of these nine pitch you know, immaculate innings. Probably I'm gonna have to be making my good pitches and be okay, and I'm not getting swim and misses and not letting you know, outing or batters get to ten pitch out at bats, but they're doing that,
and they're doing it regularly. They're doing it one through nine, and I think that has put them in a really good position to wear great pitching down and be a little bit of daunting, even if they're still not just hitting the cover off the ball over the fence all the time. That combined with you know, guys like George Springer having the year he's having and an increase of the power at the same time, has really translated them
leading that that division. Like there's no ifs, ends or buts about it.
So I'm going to take this to the next step because for Blue Jays fans, they're looking forward playoffs. If this team keeps this up, they're going to be playing some October baseball. They haven't gone as far as they wanted to go, even when they had, you know, some better times a few years ago, and then even going back ten years, right, like, how does this team get past the American League, which in my mind is still down like it was last year compared to the National League.
It's my opinion again, I've gotten knocked forward recently, but last year that opinion worked out pretty well for me. I thought there were about five or six teams that could beat the Yankees. So this year for the Blue Jays, how do they get to the World Series? Do you think that this style will play well in October? There's been a lot written about this, Trevor over the last five to ten years.
I love contact.
I want contact to win in October, but you still need some serious slug because the pitching gets tightened up. It's the best pitching and you're facing even less on a staff. Right, you're going to face basically the top three starters in the top four relievers ish on each team.
So how does that look in October?
Well, I think that this approach, the non strikeout approach, works better than the other thing than if you're strikeout heavy, but you're have big boppers. I think those guys get abused by great pitchers. Running to a tear scooble or something in the first round is not going to be fun for anybody. But if you can go up there and get the two extra pitches per per inning, and so he only can throw five or you know, five and a third as opposed to eight, right, you're gonna
get the best guys. So if you're able to put the ball, bat on the ball more often, you're putting yourself in a better position. Now you need the big swings, you need the guys to come up clutch, you need to get the big hit right. But if you can
grind that out. It's highly charged atmosphere. You're using a lot of energy as a pitcher, and if you can fight against that and the guy can't depend on his ability to get a strikeout the way he did during the regular season, you're putting himself in a good position to grind guys down. As someone who pitched extensively to the twenty fifteen Kansas City Royals who did not have a lot of slug and nobody struck out. And it was so frustrating because that was my one thing that
I did well. Like we saw it in the playoffs, they just wore teams down. They were not a fun team to pitch against. And they kept running into nasty guy after a nasty guy and just fought and fought and fought, and their pitching was good enough, their bullpen was good enough to keep him close and ended up coming up the top. And that's how you do it.
You have to approach it in that way and then have a couple of guys, the Vladdies, the George springers the Boba Sheets like, have a couple of big games here and there, and that be the difference. That is probably what it's going to look like if to make a long run.
Yeah, guys have holes in their swing. Power hitters often have more holes in their swing, right.
Absolutely, Yeah, Well, I mean the harder you swing the like, the more right you have to be on how it's moving and where it is. Like you can't if you drag your bat through the zone. If you're able to slow and various swing speeds like Wan Soto does that very well. That's why he's so good at making contact. It's just more frustrating than vice versa, and making adjustments in your swing is the way that you are going
to hit against these guys. Very few guys are just going forcing fastball and a slide of them moves the same way every time, even relievers. Now you reallys have four pitches, so you have to be able to work AB's and get these guys tired and less confident in their ability to get you to swing amiss. That's a big deal, especially for bullpens that are pretty much all built around the swing, and it's.
Hard to string together rally, so That's why for me it's super fun to watch Luisa rise in the playoffs. A Stephen Kwan in the playoffs to counter things right, even against you know, the number one starters right at schoobl Like, it's still really hard for Terrek Schooble to strike out Stephen Kuan, And if Kuwan can make a little contact and get on base, suddenly things change. He's
not just bulldozing the entire lineup. On the other end of that, I mean, Aaron Judge is a complete all round player, but man, they found a hole.
They exploited it. Then he started losing confidence.
Looking at Aaron Judge last year in the playoffs, that's the best player, top two player him and Otani in our sport. And Aaron Judge was was terrible really for most of the postseason. Kind of found it a little bit towards the end, then had the big drop. But it can happen to anyone. AJ I'm on my phone right now in Arena Club and I'm looking at the Emerald Slab packs and I see in the grail a Bobby wit Junior twenty twenty Bowman Chrome Prospect Auto Gold Refractor card.
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Here we go.
We've got Guardians Starter Gavin Williams joining us right now, coming off a big week, a huge outing, carrying a no hitter into the ninth against the Mets. Gavin great to have you on, Scottie Brown here and Trevor May. How's the week going for you?
Oh? The week's going good.
I mean it started off by getting a one one card for me for myself from a fan, a Mets fan actually just traded a jersey had got them some tickets to the game.
So it's been a good week for me. Wait tell me, wait, so what did you get? What did you what was the deal?
So you got a one to one chrome saw something it's like an orange or some some kind of barrier to it. And then somehow got up with our public public relations people and then they asked me if I wanted to trade anything for I was like, for sure, I'll definitely.
Take a one on one of myself. So it was pretty easy.
Just had to sign a jersey, wrote a little letter to him on there, and that's about it.
So are you like a are you a big card I'm assuming you're a big card guy. That's uh, that's something that I honestly, no one ever approached me about that. So you you big card collectors? Just like one of your big things.
I wouldn't say card I've been collecting more base us on baseballs and stuff like that. First, I got a good collection going so far. Baseball's I mean, I got Miguel Cabrera, I got Tito, got Mike Treill, Bobby with I got, I got some big names in there. So I'm gonna I'm I'm gonna keep going on with that.
So do you are you a send the clubhouse guy over or do you like to personally ask for the for the autograph.
I've done a little bit of both. Usually it's just the clubhouse guy going over. I feel like that's the easiest way to do it.
Safest, definitely the safest. It's a little weird asking sometimes it's a little weird asking guys you're sharing the field with, or you gotta strike out later to sign a baseball for you. I totally get it. I totally get it.
Yeah, for sure.
I mean, I got some buddies that I'll ask, But that's about it. Definitely got to send the clubhouse guy over though.
Definitely.
All right, Gavin, let's let's get into the good stuff here. Take me through the experience against the Mets from you know, what was going on before that start? How you're feeling going into that matchup.
All the way through your.
Ninth inning emotions, Soto finally breaks up the no no, and Steven Vote was like, I'm letting this guy eat one hundred and twenty six pitches.
We rarely see that.
I'm sure you've talked about it a lot already in interviews, but our crowd definitely can tend to want to see pitchers eat and they want to hear about the old school experience that Steven Vote.
Brought for you.
So how did that all go down and how cool was it for him to let you do that?
Yeah?
I mean at that point when I went up out for the ninth if it took me one hundred and fifty pitches to try and get a no hit or done, then I mean that's what I would have done. I mean, the villa was still there as everyone sees, but I mean it was just a surreal moment. Doesn't really happen that often. Being able to get in that position and stay in that position throughout the whole game and a good lineup, it was phenomenal.
What do you think the kind of X factor was arsenal wise? What was working the best for.
You that day.
What what what pitch or maybe combination of pitches. I guess I never got close to throwing no hitters, so I'm assuming there's probably more than one. But what felt what were you most confident in throwing? What was working the best?
Honestly, the cutter and the sinker. I felt like, I mean, the cutter wasn't there as much as I've had in the past, but I threw it and get them off the get them off balance, and then throw them the sinker the lefties and rieties, which that was the first time I threw both the lefties and raeties.
Just just get them off, get them off the heater.
I knew in the pass it through like I guess fiftys in games, so being able to get get the guys off the heaters big. I knew it through the sweeper or slide or whatever you want to call it. I feel like I didn't even have that really throughout the game.
When you mentioned the cutter. Uh, and this is something that well, a friend of mine and then the guy who follows your career pretty close that you know Sarahs loves your cutter and your change is your cutter, So I would be remiss if I didn't ask you, and I'm glad you brought it up. So your cutter usage is the highest it has ever been. You learned that pitch last year? Correct?
Yeah, well it was supposed to be a slider last year, but I was hurt so I couldn't really get on top of the ball that much. So I brought it back this year after I think it was the playing the Orioles gave up five. I only had three pitches like in the first five or six starts, so I needed to add a couple more just to be able to get the hitters off the heater, not do it as much.
And it seems to have been working out as you mentioned. So in terms of the cutter, how what has it unlocked for you? And what about the pitch has got you thinking? Wow? This is this is what I wanted to be as opposed to, you know, the slider that maybe you're trying to throw before. What what what made you land on? Cutter is the way to go.
I think it's my biggest strike pitch.
I feel like I can throw it in any count, in front of the count, behind the count, doesn't really matter. Lefties, righties, I can throw it at any point and know I can either get a strikeout.
Or roll over or pop up.
Kevin, I want to ask you about the development machine, pitching wise, that Cleveland has built. So can you take me through your draft experience, which you can definitely sprinkle in. I think you were drafted three times. How you end up with Cleveland, What they showed you, what they taught you to do, and how you've gotten to this point right, what's refined? What did you learn from them?
Yeah?
I think going out in Arizona, just learning about all the different kind of technology, like the edge, the track man. I know, I didn't use any of that in college, and I didn't really care about it when I got drafted. And then the more I get to throwing and getting off the mountains, seeing how I can use all of that and see how I can read fine all my pitches.
It's helped out a lot with Cleveland.
I mean it starts with all the tech guys and then all the the pitching coaches. I mean they're all smart, They're unbelievably good and talented at everything they do, showing you what to work on and what you need to do to fix everything. So it's it's been a big transition from the bottom up for me.
So you've, according to our numbers, you've thrown over one hundred pitches eight times this season, which is if I'm assuming, I don't know the numbers on everyone else, but that seems high. It doesn't seem like this happens as much. And one twenty six obviously is a very high number. But how important is it is? Is the one hundred pitch mark very important for you to get to? Or you know that you're doing well when you're like going
that long? And what was going through your mind when you were like, I think I'm at like one fifty. Did you realize you were at like one fifteen one twenty, especially after the photo broken up. Were you excited to face more hitters after that? Oh?
Yeah, I think in the seventh inning.
Came in into the dugout after that inning and Voter Voter yelled out, keep going, Gavin.
I looked up, but I was that ninety seven pitches. I was like, this dude wants me to keep going.
And then I finally looked at the scoreboard and saw what was going going on, and I think I got to like the one to fifteen mark or one eleventh mark, I was like, dang, this is I'm cooking right now.
Hopefully I got some more in the tank.
And then obviously Soda left it up just a little over the plate for him, and it took a good swing, but it was nice getting a refresher after he hit that, and Carl coming out and give me a little break trying to get two more outs after that.
Were you surprised they let you go after that, because of course many organizations are freaking out soon after the century mark and they're like, okay, but once the no no is gone and then Soda hits the homer, obviously you guys are in command still of that game. Where you surprised that they let you go after that, I.
Was a little surprised, but I do have two extra days this week.
We had an off day yesterday and then off day Monday, So it.
Surprised me a little bit, but not too much.
And I also knew there was nobody warming up in the pen at that point, so I was either gonna have to finish it or they were gonna have to waste some more time for me.
Hey, one more on this with pitch counts. I know you've talked about it a lot this week. Do you think that it's something that needs to be revisited in our sport? It really goes down to the minor league level, where there's some starters that are baby so much for a long period of time. Right, it's like, oh, we're only going to let you go three innings or you know, we're only gonna let you go fifty pitches, and then
a few months in maybe we'll extend things. Not every org's doing this, but many of them are, right, they're super careful, and let's be real. I mean, the sport definitely has an arm injury epidemic going on. So I'm not gonna act like I know what I'm doing. It just doesn't sound like anyone knows what they're doing. So do you think that there needs to be less of a struck Sure, I mean, you're six six, two fifty, maybe you can handle a little bit more than your average starter.
I think it just depends on the organization.
I know, there's like a there's a lot of innings that cover in the minor leagues, and then I mean sometimes it's a guy's first year, so they're just trying to do workload stuff. But I think it depends on the guy and like how many innings they have in the past, really worry about the pitch count and if they need to go less or more. I think I think there's a bunch of science behind behind the pitch count.
Really, I was listening to some radio this morning and your manager, Steven Vote Vote he was on there and asked about the decision to leave you in as long as he did, and he the comments he made were effectively what you just said. I know this guy, I know what type of work he does, and I know he's going to take care of his body in between these two starts. He's built to do this thing. And it's specifically I feel this confidence I try him because I feel like he can handle it because of what
you do between your starts. So do you do you does that resonate for you in a way like is that something that you are actually out here trying to foster? And be like, yes, that's exactly what I want you to feel when I get out there and pitch, that I can't take care of myself and be ready to go even if I throw more pitches one week, one start over another.
Yeah, one hundred percent I know Corey Kleeber.
He's working with us now, and I've talked to him plenty of times about what I need to do between starts and what he did.
So now now I see the mastarge therapist three times a week.
I get one the day after I start, and then bullpen day, and then the day before I start. I see the massage therapist and she's a big she's big into my routine and I could could. I can't thank her enough for what she does day in and day out for me and just all the other pitchers.
Man, there's nothing better than than the post start, actually post any relief appearance to massage the best. I've also been told that you in high school through back to back no hitters. Is that? Is that right?
Yeah? That is correct?
So I have a question.
Back to weeks, back to back weeks.
Okay, I have a question because I don't mean to toot my own horner, but I'm I did three, So I guess the question is why didn't you pull off that third one?
Because I got taken out early pitchcount or not really pitchcount. It was a five in game, so I can't really count a five inning game.
Ah, So you hadn't given up hits in that one either. Ah, so it all makes sense. That explains why you want to go one hundred and twenty six pitches and ountings.
It makes I need to get my third one so I can catch up with you.
Maybe someday you'll get to do this.
Yeah, yeah, it's it's beautiful.
Wait, just to clarify real real quick. So you did the two and then the third one was a shorter game, so you did the five Benning No, no, but it's not enough for a game.
Yeah, it's not enough for a game. Can't count. Yeah, okay, okay, but it's like kind of more in high school at least.
Okay, kind of like good asterisk though, because there's nothing else you could have done. I mean, you did not give up any hits for the five, So that actually like kind of brings Trevor down a notch. He was he was coming in here. I got that in a row, and Gavin's like, I kind of did.
I mean, he's got he's got the full game under his belt. I don't so true.
True, Well, uh, you you've got something cooking in the in the majors here.
Man.
It was awesome to watch We appreciate you joining us. It was really fun game, cool to see even you know, the crowd out there in New York, which can be hostile, give you a nice standing oh at the at the back end of that. So, Gavin, thanks for joining us. Man, keep doing your thing. Yeah, I appreciate yo. Thanks for having me.
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