Big Leaguer Breakdown: Jake Peavy

It's been a few days since the last post, but it's been a busy week with a wedding and road trip to take care. With that behind me and being that it is Sunday, we find ourselves ready for our next installment of Big Leaguer Breakdown. This week, we will look at one of the Chicago White Sox's best starting pitchers. After 7 seasons with the Padres (including the footage of this video), Jake Peavy was traded, mid-season, to the White Sox while on the DL with an ankle injury. Despite the set back, he was still 9-6 with a 3.45 ERA. His career numbers are even better with a W-L of 95-68 with a 3.27.



Check out this youtube post of Peavy warming up with the Padres by elcarquis.

We can tell immediately that Peavy is not at max effort during his pre-game bullpen. Many pitchers utilize this approach with the thought that they do not want to waste any of their best stuff in the 'pen. However, we see that his mechanics are very repeatable with some key points along the way. Much of Peavy's success is attributable to a mid 90's fastball, but it is also a direct result of the deception created in his motion.

By freezing the video at the :09 mark, we have seen Peavy go over the head with his hands, settle back down and then relift them to shoulder height with the knee lift. This is quite a bit of movement, but it is very beneficial from a timing and arm action standpoint. By going over the head, as the thought process goes, a pitcher can promote both deception (the hitter would have trouble following the ball in the glove) and a fluid arm swing as the motion of the arms facilitates a looser arm on the hand break. As we watch the video, we see Peavy utilize this movement to get compact on the leg lift. From here, we watch the hand break and notice one of the key features of Jake's delivery. At the :10 mark, the hands have separated, but not directly at the target. Instead, Peavy's body rotates in toward the third base side. Thus, the throwing arm will come behind the body toward the first base side. This movement is difficult for a hitter to follow as he will see a lot of the pitchers body and the arm slot will have some rotation to it as it comes to the front and ultimately, toward the hitter.

Two more clicks through this video (still at the :10 mark) and we see exactly what we are looking for. The arms come up and through to release point. Here, we can see Peavy's low three quarters arm slot that allows him to create very effective downward movement. As I've said many times, the upper half rotation is very effective for creating movement on the ball, but it is only helpful if the delivery can be repeated. Peavy is able to do that and we see him here, with his head on target, chest square and ready to finish, executing the pitch with proper finish mechanics.

The rest of the video is much of the same. The other thing to take note of if the straight front leg that Peavy has on all of his pitches after he release the baseball. Many sinkerballers like Peavy and Derek Low feature the straight front leg because it forces them to short arm the baseball, but also promotes even more movement on the fastball. I don't teach this to my pitchers, but some guys can execute it with great effectiveness.

Keep studying these big leaguers and look for what works and what doesn't.

Until Next Time!!