Tyler Anderson and his improved changeup

Tyler Anderson continued his incredible run on Friday by not allowing any, again. He put six more zeroes on the board against the Mets, running his consecutive scoreless streak to 26 innings.

Anderson lowered his ERA on the season to 2.59, and in his last five starts has 31 strikeouts against only one walk.

A new grip to his changeup has not only added more movement but also changed the spin axis and lowered the velocity of the pitch, as Jake Mailhot capably chronicled at FanGraphs. That’s increased the effectiveness of Anderson’s entire repertoire as well.

Anderson this year is throwing the changeup more often than his fastball for the first time in his career, as noted by Brian Mendéndez at Baseball Prospectus, who also noted Anderson is using the changeup more with two strikes as well.

“For Anderson, it hasn’t been as simple as ‘throw your best pitch more,’” Menéndez wrote. “Rather, he made his best pitch better and then threw it more.”

On Friday, Anderson got 10 swinging strikes among his 24 changeups against the Mets. In at-bats that ended on the pitch, New York was 0-for-6 with three strikeouts.

Links

• On Glen Burke getting posthumously honored on Friday at Dodger Stadium, 44 years after being shunned by the organization, Jim Alexander at the Orange County Register wrote, “Maybe this particular Pride Night, and this recognition that has been so long in coming, is the organization’s atonement.”
• With Edwin Ríos out for several weeks with a right hamstring strain, the Dodgers lost the player who was second on the team in home runs. From Jack Harris at the Los Angeles Times, manager Dave Roberts said, “I’m just really bummed out for [Eddie] ... He was off to such a nice start, so now to miss a handful of weeks, interrupt his season, I feel bad for him.”
• Among the notes from Bill Plunkett at the OC Register is that Blake Treinen played catch Friday, the first time he’s done so since getting sidelined with shoulder discomfort in April.
• Denise Goolsby, a Palm Springs resident, threw out the ceremonial first pitch on Thursday at Dodger Stadium. “My main goal was just not to end up on the blooper reel on SportsCenter,” she told the Desert Sun.