Tanner Scott’s first season with the Los Angeles Dodgers has not gone the way he or the team expected when the two sides agreed to a four-year, $72 million contract.
Scott’s struggles continued on Sunday when he threw a fastball over the middle of the plate, which Arizona Diamondbacks’ Corbin Carroll hit out of the park to tie the game in the eighth inning. It was Scott’s third appearance since returning from the 15-day injured list and his eighth blown save of the season.
Being stung by the home run ball has been a major theme for Scott this season, with the nine he’s allowed this season and his 1.66 homers per nine innings both representing career highs.
“It’s super frustrating. You never want to see the ball leave the park, especially in that situation,” Scott said after the Dodgers managed a walk-off win. “It’s super frustrating. Just got to go out there and fix it.”
Dodgers manager Dave Roberts attributes the home run issue to missing over the heart of the plate too often.
“I just think if you look at the spray chart, everything is middle-middle,” Roberts said. “He’s not walking guys, but you get good hitters, right-handed or left-handed, if they can lock in on a certain area, they’re going to have more success.
“The stuff is really good, but I do think when you’re consistently throwing in the same zone, that’s the predictability part of it.”
The percentage of Scott’s pitches that can be classified as a meatball is actually down slightly from 7.7% to 7.5%. But batters are swinging at those pitches 87.5% of the time, which is a 6.4% increase from last season.
In general, Scott has thrown more pitches in the strike zone this season. Hitters have swung at a slightly higher percentage of those pitches and are making contact at a rate nearly six percent higher.
While Scott’s command has been an improvement this season compared to his career as a whole, it has actually been detrimental because hitters are using that consistency against him.
“The irony is I think he’s more of a command guy than I think he’s ever been,” Roberts said. “So where you look at past years, the spray chart is kind of all over the hitting zone.
“Now it’s very consistent, so that’s where guys are looking to hunt.”
Scott can’t pinpoint why his fastballs have missed over the middle so much this season, but it is something he is going to have to figure out since it is a pitch that has a lot of trust in.
“I don’t know. I mean, that one, probably should’ve went with a slider. But I trust the fastball, and just missed it down the middle,” he said.
Is Tanner Scott’s delivery still off?
Earlier this season, Scott attributed his mistakes over the plate to his delivery being off. The left-hander wasn’t sure if that is what happened on Sunday.
Roberts saw no issue with the delivery and believes the adjustment should be adding more variance in location when attacking the zone or be willing to go outside the zone more often.
“Right now, I think his delivery is clean and the stuff is good,” he said.
“I think it’s just more of trying to attack different parts of the hitting zone or keep guys chasing as opposed to looking at one specific zone.”
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