Lamigo Monkey's Pitcher Deliveries

The Lamigo Monkeys had the worst ERA in the CPBL in 2013, so perhaps fittingly, they are the final team in my look at CPBL pitchers.


#72 Mike Loree

50th round pick by the Giants out of Villanova made it to A-ball. After struggling in independent ball in 2010, he was great in 2011, earning four outings with the Pirates AA affiliate. He returned to independent ball in 2012 and didn't have a great year. He threw over 200 innings with the Monkeys, and was effective, with a 3.6 ERA. At 6'6", he gets very good extension, takes advantage of it in a pretty simple delivery without many moving parts.

86-89, gets down to 84, gets on top of ball well, doesn't seem to be a sinker most of the time, but keeps it low.

71-74 down to 69 curve with pretty impressive depth, but the movement is pretty slow, so I wonder if some of that is mitigated.

81-82 down to 79-80 impressive downward tilt, good pitch to lefties.  Seems to be a forkball to me.

79 change, not a lot of movement, not near as good as the forkball.

#73 Rommie Lewis LHP

In the CPBL he pitched 18.1 innings without an earned run, but threw 23.2 innings with the Toronto Blue Jays in his Major League career with an ERA over 7. He really slings the ball back, which gives him pretty good movement glove side with the fastball. The deception and size has to be tough on lefties, not as tough on righties.
89-92 sometimes had command issues arm side.
76-79 left pitch up, not a lot of movement.

#32 Wang Yi LHP

He has a pretty normal delivery, sort of lanky with some arms and legs going forward.
86-89 can get it glove side, would say he has good horizontal movement
78-80 change arm side gets more of a glove side pitch that looks like a slider occasionally at 79-81.


Kuo Wen-Kai RHP

The 25 year old comes with a bit of a high sidearm motion, but really struggled in a short 2013 stint.
84-87
85-86 with 2 seam movement
68-71, down to 66 curve that looks sort of like a knucklecurve
70-74 change? Will throw it with platoon advantage
76-78 slider

Huang Chong-Chen

The 26 year old misses almost no bats, but is a good groundball pitcher.
81-83 up to 85, can sink it
75
78-79 some sort of splitter or slider

Hsieh Chang-Rong

The 26 year old rookie posted just over 40 innings in 50 appearances, and had as many strikeouts as walks.
82-85
77 change
72 slider

Chen Cheng-Da

The submariner has a 71-73 MPH fastball and 67 change

Cheng Cheng-Hao

The 26 year old had a rough season, and like a lot of pitchers on the team, he is more of a groundball pitcher than a strikeout pitcher.

84-87
80-81 glove side
74-76 slider

Treng Chou-Hau

The 32 year old will soon turn 33, and had a nice season, soaking up over 130 innings despite not a lot of strikeouts, relying mainly on grounders.

84-87 can sink it
78-82 split throws to both lefties and righties. High usage
82-83 slider
71-73 curve

#81 Wu Pei-Hui

The 27 year old rookie threw 37 okay innings, with decent strikeout and walk rates.

86-88 down to 84-85
78-82 slider
74-75 change
69-71 curve

Huang Chin-Chih

Pitching in the CPBL since 2003, the 35 year old has never eclipsed 100 innings, but has always been pretty solid. 2013 was no different, with an ERA under 4 despite rarely striking out anyone.

82-86
76-81 some kind of slider
77 some kind of split

Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions Pitcher Scouting Reports

Continuing the look at CPBL pitchers, the following is a look at the pitchers from the Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions. At 58-53, the Lions are the second best team in the league in 2013, boasting a league best ERA. All velocity numbers are converted from KM/H to MPH.

Lin Yueh-ping

The 31 year old has nearly 600 CPBL innings of experience, pitching mainly out of the bullpen. His 2013 was very good, with a 2.56 ERA, despite barely striking out more hitters than he walked. He is a pretty extreme groundball pitcher.
88-92
80-84 splitter

Kao Chien-san

Soon to turn 40, the reliever has shown no signs of slowing down, posting a 2.25 ERA for 2013 with a plus groundball rate. 
87-88
83-85 slider that looks like a cutter

Boof Bonser

Once rated the 29th best prospect in baseball, Bonser made 111 appearances in MLB games, but struggled throughout his career, pitching under replacement level, and not appearing in the Majors since 2010. He threw just 12.1 innings in the CPBL as a late season pickup. 
89-96
87-88 slider never seemed to be able to get it down
78 curve

Wang Ching-ming

Another pitcher with an ERA under 3, he can at least boast about having twice as many strikeouts as walks. He has pitched out of the bullpen and the rotation and is a flyball pitcher.
83-87, up to 87-89 occasionally is able to get on top of it despite his lack of height
80-82 change
78-82 slider/cutter
69-71 curve not high usage early but began using it more the second time through the order. The pitch has good depth, didn't hang it.

Fu Yu-kang

The 25 year old has emerged as one of the most dominant pitchers in the CPBL, with a 1.31 ERA in 130.1 innings over the last two seasons. He is an extreme flyball pitcher, but has one of the better strikeout rates in the CPBL, with a low walk rate to go with it. 
85-90
74-75 curve
80-81 slider

Lee Wei-hua

The 28 year old doesn't have a lot of CPBL experience, but is a flyball pitcher with about a 1:1 K/BB.
84 fastball
77-79 change
74 breaking ball

Luis Vizcaino

The 39 year old pitched in 543 games in the Majors from 1999-2009, but had spent most of the time since then out of baseball. After a stint in the Mexican League, Vizcaino appeared in 11 games for the Lions.
92-95
82-84 slider with good depth

Nelson Figueroa

With almost 500 MLB innings under his belt, and a stint in Taiwan in 2007, Figueroa came back to the Lions and posted an ERA under three in 95.1 innings.
85-89
78-81 slider
74-75 curve, just a little slower and a little less sharp than the slider. Doesn't use it as much but it seems that he uses it similarly. Sometimes he is around 76-77 and you can't tell what pitch it is.

Tsai Wan-lin

The 26 year old struggled in a small sample size this year, but has shown the ability to get strikeouts with about an even groundball rate in the past.
88-92 armside and downward movement created by his arm action
82-83 slider

Liao Wen-yang

81-87 sinker, got up to 87-91 on a more straight fastball, but it is rare. The sinker is his feature pitch.
68 curve

Lo Ching-lung

86-93
75-80 curve/slider, two different pitches but it was difficult to tell at times which was which, especially by velocity.


Chiu Tsu-kai

84-87 up to 89
76-77 heavy sweep slider down to 72-73

Pan Wei-lun

84-90 some 2-seam or sink
76-79 change
79-82 breaking ball

EDA Rhinos Pitcher Scouting Reports

Continuing the look at CPBL pitchers, this post has the rest of the pitchers on Juan Morillo's team, the EDA Rhinos. All velocities are converted to MPH.

Lin Chen-Hua

The RHP has a sidearm release point even though he is a starter. He has been a full time starter in the CPBL for two years now, and the 24 year old has been pretty successful from an ERA standpoint, even though he is a low strikeout pitcher that doesn't get many groundballs.

82-86, a little bit of glove side slide to break into lefties. Can also use it as a 2-seam type fastball, but it appeared that he wants to work inside regardless of platoon. Later in his outing, he started moving the ball away from hitters.

75-76 down to 74 breaking ball, appears to be a slider, didn't always have the great slide. It sometimes broke arm side like a change, and I think there are two different pitches based on platoon.

Tsai Ming-Jin

The 29 year old moved back to the bullpen after a failed attempt to move to the rotation in 2012. He has had high ERAs throughout his career, and he doesn't get a lot of strikeouts, though he does get some groundballs.
87-90 moves aggressively arm side, can get it down.
77-78
67-68 curve

Lin Chi-wei

RHP
85-89
76-78 slider
73-76 curve

Lin Ying-Jie

The 32 year old has seen his innings decrease over the past two seasons, but has remained effective. His groundball rate has decreased this year.
80-82 can get glove side movement
76-78 soft slider like movement
73-78 splitter/changeup, grip almost looked like a palm ball
68-69 2-plane break curve

Chen Huan-yang

The 27 year old has failed to really establish himself in the CPBL, but he has decent K/BB rates, and about a 1/1 GB/FB rate.

84-87
75-78 change breaks arm side.
74-79 slider does a good job of getting glove side and down

Nick Green

The 28 year old threw 38 innings in the CPBL, and didn't have a high strikeout rate, but only walked 7 and had a good groundball rate. Green pitched in the Angels and Brewers system before three years in the Atlantic League (independent ball). 

86-87 down to 84-85, up to 89-90 will use it high and it is hittable there, even at this level

71-73 curve very occasionally mix it in.

76-77 breaking ball that breaks straight down.

Lai Hong Cheng

The 25 year old LHP appears to have pitched both out of the bullpen and as a starter. He has developed into a good groundball pitcher, but his K/BB rate has been poor.
87-90
82-83

Shen Yu-Jie

The 32 year old veteran was once one of the best pitchers in the CPBL, but has struggled over the last three years. In his prime, he did everything you want to see a pitcher do, getting grounders, striking out hitters, and not walking many. 
84-85
70-76 sweepy breaking ball

Zhang Geng Hao

The RHP has moved to the bullpen full time now and has posted an ERA over 5 for the 2nd straight year.
86-87
76-82
69-70 curve

Matt Torra

A first round pick in 2005, Torra has never reached the Majors, but has 578.1 AAA innings, not walking hardly anyone, but struggling to miss bats. In 12 starts in the CPBL, he dominated, walking just 5 hitters in 78 innings, but still not striking many hitters out.

86-90, some 2-seam movement or sink.

79-80 changeup can throw it for a strike arm side, not a lot of real movement, just kind of softly drops.

84 slider, mostly a down pitch, doesn't really slide horizontal.

Lin Yen-Fang

 He is a bigger guy that most of the Rhinos.
84-87 with some vertical movement downward.
79-80 change with similar movement, just takes velocity up, sometimes keeps it up.
Seems to have a horizontal late breaking slider at 81-82

Yang Chien-fu

He is pretty small without any real room for projection.
86-90 can sink it
76-78 downward slider
67 curve

Juan Morillo in the CPBL

Juan Morillo is the hardest thrower in the Chinese Professional Baseball League, and one of the hardest in the Far East as a whole. In case you don't believe me, here is him hitting 99.4 MPH, which is a CPBL record.

Morillo is a former MLB pitcher, appearing in 9 games over four seasons with two different organizations. Especially since not every outing was even a Pitch F/X outing, we do not enough Pitch F/X data to analyze (not to mention that he has not been in the Majors since 2009, so the data would be dated, not containing any possible changes he has made since that time). However, it appears that Morillo didn't get much movement on his fastball (though the sample size was really small and I distrust a lot of Pitch F/X movement data since it varies so much from park to park). So it may be important to look at whether or not his fastball is "straight" when evaluating Morillo

After his brief MLB career and a somewhat odd minor league career, Morillo, who will turn 30 in the offseason, signed with the Rakuten Eagles for the 2010 season, but he didn't pitch in 2011. He was released in April by Rakuten of that year by his own request and was dealing with some elbow problems. He threw just 6.2 Ichi-gun innings for Rakuten, and 17.2 innings for the Ni-Gun team. In both, he struck out a lot of batters, but had a few walks as well. His fastball averaged under 95 MPH (never really got close to 98 MPH on a "cold" gun)  and he threw almost all sliders (with some "cutters" that were the same velocity) as secondary pitches.

Here is what his slider looks like:

If he could control that pitch, then it would be very effective to both lefties and righties. It works as a really good vertical depth pitch, but just from that one pitch alone, you can see why it would be hard to command.

In 2013, Morillo sruggled in the Mexican League in a small sample size to start the year before going to Taiwan. He has only thrown 18 innings for the Rhinos, and his ERA is a 4.50, walking more guys than he is striking out. The only real positive you can say about his statistical line in the CPBL is that he has over twice as many groundouts as flyouts.

I watched one of his outings with the Rhinos and what I saw pretty much matched the data above. He was 94-99 MPH without great command. However, I thought the pitch had good life, and he threw it both high and low. Despite giving up more than a hit an inning, I don't think the fastball, at least in a vacuum, is easy to hit because it is straight. I thought one of the problems he has mechanically is that it looks like he just slings the ball around. His release point, for the most part, is a mess. He uses a delivery that has a lot of moving parts to it, as he goes up, pauses, and then tilts before coming forward. His arm angle is a little non traditional, as it is more of a 3/4 motion that becomes an over the top motion because he falls hard to his left. This "falling" seems like it would be very difficult to repeat on a consistent basis.

He also went that outing without throwing any breaking balls, which is perhaps why it was a successful outing. His fastball isn't an easy pitch to hit for CPBL hitters. It can be an easy pitch to take because it isn't close to the zone.

At age 30 next year, it is hard to believe that he will even figure out how to command his mechanics and throw strikes, but perhaps one could have said the same about Radhames Liz. He found enough command to start effectively in the KBO without losing any of his fastball. Would it make sense for a MLB team to sign him to a no risk minor league deal, try to tinker with his mechanics, and release him when/if he didn't throw strikes? Perhaps. However, I think it would make more sense for the EDA Rhinos to keep him and try to develop him as their closer. He is the hardest throwing pitcher in league history, and even with his flaws, that has real, tangible value. He has a skillset that no one else in the CPBL came even really come close to, and who knows, perhaps he pitches himself back onto MLB radars.

Brother Elephants Pitcher Scouting Reports

In a previous post, I looked at three CPBL pitchers who could be possibly be considered MLB prospects. However, since the league contains only four teams, I thought it would be a good idea to look at the pitchers on each team similar to how I have been looking at the deliveries in the NPB. Since complete games in the CPBL are kept on YouTube, I watched each pitcher, wrote some short notes on their pitches, and GIF'd their deliveries, just as an introduction for people not knowing anything about the CPBL but wanting to start to get to know the players. I am not doing the teams in any particular order, and the first team is the Brother Elephants. The Brothers are last in the league in overall 2013 record, but have the best pitching staff just by runs allowed (they have scored the fewest amount of runs). Hiroki Sanada and Ta-Yuan Kuan were in the post linked to above, so they won't be in this post.

I tried my best with the names, but unlike the NPB and KBO, there aren't always easy to find English translations. If you know of a better translation of a name, leave it in the comments and I will link to it or change the name (ironically, the biggest reason I wanted to do some CPBL posts is because there are basically no English resources available, which also makes doing so without being bilingual difficult). All velocity numbers are translated from KM/H to MPH.

Lin En-Yu
He was recently replaced on the active roster by Li Juguan, but he was on the roster when I started working on this, and he has more innings, so I included him. He has pretty good size, and brings his hands over his head facing the hitter before his leg kick, which isn't part of his stride. After all this, he comes forward pretty standard.
82-86 fastball
72-76 soft slider
64 curve

Yu-Ching Lin
The 24 year old has backed up a strong 2012 campaign with a slightly better 2013 campaign. His numbers are virtually the same other than walks, an area where he has improved. Just under 6 feet tall, he uses a hip turn to bring his body away from the hitter with a high leg kick, followed by a bizarre arm action.
84-88, velocity picked up to the higher stages in the second inning. Could get some downward movement on it.

76 slider mostly downward break, 73 more of a curve.

76-78 splitter like pitch that breaks arm side

A lot of deception in his overall games, a lot of bad chases out of the zone by CPBL hitters.

Miguel Mejia
The 25 year old pitched in both the Marlins and Tigers systems, almost exclusively out of the bullpen. Nothing was spectacular about his numbers, and he racked up just 131 innings in 3 years. At about 6-2 or 6-3, he uses a pause in the middle of his leg kick, and it seems to upset his own delivery timing, along with the hitter's. There is a tilt backwards in his delivery before slinging his arm forward.

92-94 early, down to 87-91 after the first couple of batters.
73 slider, good two way movement, not close to the strike zone.
78-80 splitter, up to 84

Brad Thomas
LHP, easily the tallest pitcher on the team, standing at about 6'4. According to Pitch F/X, when Thomas was in the Majors, his fastball was about 91 MPH and he threw a sinker, curve and a changeup, but here is what I saw watching him in the CPBL:

91-92, really likes to come in on right-handed hitters.

79-80 unimpressive slider he can throw for a strike

Luo Guohua
The 26 year old is enjoying his best season, posting a 3.82 ERA as a reliever.
He has a really standard delivery, standing just over 6 feet tall.

82-84 sometimes moves arm side.

75-77 breaking ball he struggled to get down, though on the occasions that he can, he gets good two way movement.

72 more of a curvey breaking ball 

Sung-Wei Tseng
RHP SP is about 5-10. This year has been the 28 year old's biggest year by far when it comes to innings pitched, and while his ERA and groundball rates held well, his strikeout to walk rate leaves something to be desired (50 to 41 in over 130 innings).
83-86, up to 87-89. 2-seamer can come in on RHB, and can throw it low with good movement.

72-74 curve/slider

Mid 70s changeup/slider he left up a lot.

Po-Hsuan Keng
At about 6 feet tall, the 28 year old has been a 1 inning reliever throughout his career (actually averaging less than an inning an outing). He is not much of a strikeout pitcher, relying on groundouts instead. He has pretty good size, good weight, broad shoulders, but slings the ball sidearm. It is more of a high sidearm, not a low sidearm.
84-86, gets some sink or 2-seam run, down to 83-84, up to 88
78 change
73 slider breaks glove side, something to go away from right-handed hitters.

 Wu Ming-Hsu
Also about 6 feet tall, the CPBL rookie threw 23.1 innings this year, so the jury seems to still be out on the 25 year old. He slings the ball hard, with a little bit wobbly landing point. Fastball command seems to be some kind of issue
89-92, gets up to 93-94, down to 86-88 with a little more command and ability to get it low.
81-82 slider, gets it glove side, not a lot of movement either way, a strike pitch
72 curve
79 split

Hung-Wen Chen
First year in the CPBL has been successful, with a 3.07 ERA and 3.6 K/BB ratio. The 27 year old pitched in the Cubs' minor league system from 2007-2011, enjoying some success, getting all the way to AAA, but not missing a lot of bats. He also spent part of 2011 in the Mexican League, where he dominated as mostly a closer in 34.2 innings. A pretty big looking guy, but actually stands under 6 feet. He has a leg sweep more than a kick, though he does come up some. Comes forward after he has set the leg back down.

87-91 up to 92-93 at end of outing can get some downward movement on it. He seemed to use it both arm side and glove side and would pitch inside to righties.

74-79 got up to 80 soft slider (though it doesn't look like a slider grip, the movement didn't look like a splitter, maybe a separate splitter), didn't seem to get it down well, a strike pitch.

Statistically Interesting CPBL Pitchers

In a previous post, I looked at three Chinese Professional Baseball League hitters that were interesting statistically from an international point of view, basing "interesting" off hitters that outperformed Manny Ramirez in some capacity. Skeptical of what the league has to offer when it comes to power, I wanted to see if some of the best statistical pitchers in the league were interesting from an international perspective.

Just like in the NPB and the KBO, there have been many foreign pitchers come and pitch in the CPBL, but at least for now, I won't use any kind of statistical translation because those aren't always helpful (though it appears that the official site makes it easy to navigate from year to year, so it may be worth taking a look in a post in the future). Instead, I'll just use the best foreign pitchers in 2013 as benchmarks to find three native players that are statistically interesting.

Andrew Sisco 2.7 ERA lead all qualified starters in the CPBL, and in the big leagues was an above replacement but below average pitcher. Brian Burres (0 rWAR, -3.3 WAA) had a 3.49 ERA , JD Durbin (-.6 WAR, -1.3 WAA) had a 2.89 ERA, and career minor leaguer/independent player Zach Hammes had a 2.72 ERA. Brad Thomas is a closer that had a 1.44 ERA (but 1.26 WHIP), was below replacement level in the Majors.

There were three pitchers in the CPBL (with more than 30 IP or so) with an ERA under 2.7 (Sisco's mark) and WHIP under 1.26 (Thomas' mark). For the purposes of this post, it made sense to focus on those three pitchers (in the future I hope to have some more CPBL scouting reports and pay more attention to the league, a league that seems to be attracting higher profile names, but with almost no English exposure).

Fu Yu Gang is a 25 year old right-handed pitcher that has been an extremely effective reliever. He has actually been a little worse this year with a 1.63 ERA after his 1.20 ERA in 2012, coming with a strikeout an inning. The slight drop in strikeouts and the increase in walks is concerning, as he certainly shouldn't be declining at his age. As perhaps the GIF below shows, he doesn't have imposing height, and he is a little on the heavy side.

He comes up before coming forward, separating his hands after he comes set, kicking his leg up and slightly outward before coming forward. His arm motion seems to be a bit over the top, and while the top of his body peels to the left, his legs take him pretty straight forward, giving him a decent landing point. I could see how it would upset a hitter's timing, and since everything eventually comes over, I don't see a huge red flag, other than it is just a lot going on.

He reportedly gets up to 93 MPH (I saw 87-89 MPH when I watched him) with a slider, curve, and change. The curve has tremendous slow loop at 74 MPH, looks like he can throw it for a strike. The slider (78-82 MPH) has good two way movement, though it doesn't have real sweeping action, almost cutting downward.

Hiroki Sanada

A former NPB pitcher with both the Yomiuri Giants and Yokohama Baystars, Sanada appeared in 11 different seasons and had a career kwERA of 4.67, almost exclusively in relief. He was never a high strikeout pitcher, but in his last full season in the NPB, 2011, he struck out just 8.4 % of batters. He appeared in just one Ichi-Gun game in 2012. He would not have been a guy that would have been considered a MLB prospect while in Japan statistically (though it does appear he got some kind of tryout), so either the standards listed above are too lenient, he translated to the CPBL better than expected, or something in his game has changed. There is no real way to test the first one, and I don't have enough info or data to speak intelligently about the third one, so instead, let's take a look at what he does and doesn't do well.

He is just below 6 feet, which I don't think would be a big concern in international scouting because he is a career reliever. His delivery is pretty straight forward other than his hesitation to actually start coming forward. There seems to be less moving parts in his delivery than the delivery of Fu Yu Gang.

According to NPB Tracker data, Sanada's would bring an average of about 91-92 MPH on his best days, and average 88-89 MPH overall. In his final NPB outing, his fastball was way down, averaging around 86 MPH with his slowest fastball tracked ever (84.5 MPH). The data and his Taiwanese scouting report basically agree on what pitches he throws; fastball, 2-seam fastball, slider, curveball, change, and forkball. However, the scouting report claims he has reached 93 MPH with his fastball in the CPBL, meaning it may be back up to where it was a few years ago. From the video I watched of his season in the CPBL, his fastball was 86-89 MPH, with some 91s. He isn't afraid to throw it inside to right-handed batters and then throw away with the slider. The pitch was 80-81 MPH, seems to be mostly designed to just keep away and throw for strike, not a pitch that will get a lot of swings and misses, which explains his low strikeout rates. He used it about a quarter of the time in the NPB, very heavy usage in video I watched, occasionally hanging it.

The change/forkball was inconsistent, sometimes having good command or drop, sometimes having neither (and about 82-83 MPH), so it seemed like he would go back back to the slider against LHP. I did see him break out what looked like a curve at 74 MPH.

Ta-Yuan Kuan

He was not impressive in 2012 with a 4.72 ERA, but the reliever has been one of the best pitches in the CPBL so far this year. Has actually become a flyball pitcher this year after being a groundball pitcher in the two previous seasons, but he's increased his strikeout rate and decreased his walk rate.

A small guy, at under 5 feet 10 and listed at a 150 pounds. He tilts back in his delivery slightly, getting his front shoulder up further in the air before coming forward. It is very slight, but it seems like this may, if he can repeat it, help him get on top of the ball a little bit better than his size would suggest.

Seems to have a full array of pitches: A fastball that gets up to 91 MPH (against New Zealand in the WBC and other short outings I watched, I saw 88 MPH, but he wasn't pitching off his fastball much, going with a lot of off-speed and breaking balls), cutter, fork, change, curve, and slider.

I saw more of a split than a change or a fork. The pitch is usually in the high 70s and had impressive, though perhaps a little slow, drop. He also seemed to have a 2-seamer that he would throw at 84-85 MPH. It seemed like he could sink his fastball. His slider is about 79-80 MPH with some good glove side movement, though it doesn't really sweep the way you would expect, more of just a downward slider. He uses the pitch very heavily against right-handed batters. I think I like Kuan's collection of pitches better than the two pitchers that preceded him in this post. None of them have the lights out stuff that international scouts are going to be looking for in "older" (by which I mean players that aren't 16-18 year olds) pitchers, so from an MLB perspective, they may not get a lot of recognition.