Yesterday, in his response to a question about Spider Tack, Gerrit Cole alluded to “veterans” teaching him to use it or things like it. It was 2018 when Gerrit Cole moved to Houston and his fastball spin rate skyrocketed. Who were the veterans on that Houston team?
- Justin Verlander is eight years older than Cole, entered the league nine years prior to Cole, and pitched for that Astros team. His fastball spin rate has been relatively constant across the Statcast era.
- Charlie Morton was also a veteran on the team, one whose own fastball spin rate jumped when he went from Pittsburgh to Houston between 2015 and 2017. He made four starts in Philadelphia in 2016 in which his fastball spin rate was even higher, suggesting he perhaps learned about it in Philly, but also leaving open the possibility he had some strange small sample situation in Philadelphia and learned it in Houston himself. Verlander’s lack of a change casts some doubt on this, but at the same time, perhaps Verlander didn’t want to try something new, had he had success without it.
- Dallas Keuchel is only three years older than Cole, and his fastball spin rate shows no significant change during the Statcast spin rate era, which began in 2015, his fourth year throwing big-league innings for the Astros. Keuchel entered the league just one year prior to Cole, making him a poor suspect for Cole to refer to as a “veteran,” but he was well-tenured with the Astros, so perhaps Cole saw him as one, or was referring to those who taught Keuchel early in his Astros days.
- Collin McHugh was a reliever on that team and is also three years older than Cole, having also entered the league one year prior to Cole. His fastball spin rate, like Keuchel’s, shows few suspicious spikes, with some changes in his cutter and two-seam numbers but those more believably attributable to grip. This doesn’t mean McHugh was clean. It just means he probably didn’t change what he was doing at any point during the Statcast era.
- Brad Peacock was also a reliever on the team, is also three years older than Cole, and also entered the league prior to Cole, but again, not by much. No significant changes in his 4-seam spin rate.
- Héctor Rondón entered the league the same year as Cole but is three years older. His 4-seam spin rate showed no significant change at any point—perhaps he brought the stuff from the Cubs?
- Will Harris is six years older than Cole, but his fastball spin rate seems to track closely with his fastball velocity.
- Joe Smith is seven years older than Cole and entered the league six years earlier. He was with the Angels in 2015 when we first get spin rate numbers for him, having come from the Mets by way of Cleveland. His numbers don’t change much across these last six years.
- Tony Sipp is also seven years older than Cole. He entered the league four years before Cole did. No big changes for him since 2015.
- Ryan Pressly is only two years older than Cole, and his fastball spin rate tracks rather neatly with its velocity, as one would expect.
What seems most likely, then? That it was none of these guys. That someone in the Astros organization knew how to do it (doctoring baseballs in some way—we’ll see what the rumor is Morton was using, assuming Morton’s spin rate starts dropping again here, although it didn’t over the weekend) before 2015, that pitchers within the organization were doing it to varying degrees, and that Cole learned from the institution, which evidently wasn’t doing it over in Pittsburgh. (Or didn’t convince him to do it, or wasn’t doing it as effectively, etc.) This seems most likely. It’s certainly not an ironclad case. There’s a lot of speculation. But basically, if you were wondering if Justin Verlander (the only guy from this list who I think of as a Hall of Fame candidate right now) was a spin rate wizard this whole time, that seems unlikely. Which isn’t fun. I was hoping for an obvious guy, Verlander or otherwise.
