This is part 2 of my lists of the most effective pitches thrown in Japan in the 2024 regular season. “Best” is subjective, but these pitches were the most effective in terms of their influence on game situations, by leading to better or worse counts or having worse results when put in play.
In Part 1, I explained the way the evaluations were created, and included the top 10 pitches overall, the top fastballs, and the top sliders.
Part 2 starts with Japan’s favorite secondary pitch, the splitter. For the most part, I have stuck with the SpoNavi website’s name for each type of pitch, except when Delta Graphs, which is more rigorous, is obviously talking about the same pitch as something else. The changeup of Hiroshima’s Allen Kuri is listed as a splitter by DG and so I’ll list that here.
Top 10 Splitters
| Player | Team | Avg. Val | Miss Pct. | Avg. Velo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tomoyuki Sugano | G | -.032 | 36.9 | 138.5 |
| Carter Stewart Jr. | H | -.028 | 42.6 | 135.4 |
| HIroto Takahashi | D | -.026 | 34.5 | 143.0 |
| Iori Yamasaki | G | -.023 | 37.9 | 137.2 |
| Allen Kuri | C | -.021 | 34.7 | 126.8 |
| Kona Takahashi | L | -.019 | 29.8 | 141.5 |
| Shoma Kanemura | F | -.018 | 29.7 | 140.3 |
| Tomohisa Ozeki | H | -.017 | 24.5 | 131.5 |
| Roki Sasaki | M | -.017 | 54.5 | 142.1 |
| Kazuya Ojima | M | -.014 | 27.3 | 135.1 |
Next up are the top curveballs of 2024, a list that definitely has a hawkish lean to it…
Top 10 Curves – minimum 100 pitches
| Player | Team | Avg. Val | Miss Pct. |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tomoyuki Sugano | G | -.027 | 22.1 |
| Shoki Murakami | T | -.023 | 5.0 |
| Shumpeita Yamashita | Bu | -.019 | 23.0 |
| Livan Moinelo | H | -.018 | 27.0 |
| Shuta Ishikawa | H | -.017 | 28.2 |
| C.C. Mercedes | M | -.014 | 31.4 |
| Carter Stewart Jr. | H | -.014 | 21.4 |
| Yuito Mori | BS | -.013 | 31.4 |
| Natsuki Takeuchi | L | -.012 | 26.4 |
| Chihiro Sumida | L | -.011 | 28.4 |
Now to the cutters, where the No. 1 pitcher, rookie Teruki Yoshino, just scraped over the minimum, but it perhaps explains why he started Game 5 of the CL playoffs’ final stage…
Top 10 cut fastballs – minimum 150 pitches
| Player | Team | Avg. Val | Miss Pct. | Avg. Velo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Teruki Yoshino | BS | -.043 | 22.2 | 137.5 |
| Kohei Azuma | BS | -.038 | 19.8 | 138.5 |
| Shoma Kanemura | F | -.029 | 21.7 | 138.1 |
| Kohei Arihara | H | -.028 | 13.2 | 142.5 |
| Sachiya Yamasaki | F | -.025 | 12.0 | 129.0 |
| Jeremy Beasley | T | -.024 | 20.4 | 140.6 |
| Ryusei Kawano | F | -.024 | 37.8 | 137.2 |
| Naofumi Kizawa | S | -.021 | 48.3 | 139.6 |
| Hayato Yuge | E | -.020 | 19.8 | 130.4 |
| Iori Yamasaki | G | -.019 | 27.9 | 134.4 |
| Yutaro Watanabe | L | -.019 | 16.9 | 137.8 |
Top 10 2-seam fastballs – minimum 100 pitches
| Player | Team | Avg. Val | Miss Pct. | Avg. Velo |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Takuma Kirishiki | T | -.040 | 11.6 | 147.2 |
| Haruto Takahashi | T | -.032 | 19.4 | 139,4 |
| Allen Kuri | C | -.032 | 21.0 | 130.3 |
| Kohei Arihara | H | -.030 | 8.3 | 145.5 |
| Keisuke Izumi | G | -.028 | 25.0 | 138.0 |
| Patrick Murphy | F | -.028 | 15.7 | 154.0 |
| Luis Perdomo | Bu | -.028 | 14.3 | 147.9 |
| Albert Abreu | L | -.027 | 20.3 | 155.6 |
| Kotaro Otake | T | -.024 | 6.1 | 132.1 |
| Daiki Tajima | Bu | -.024 | 15.9 | 138.1 |
| Andres Machado | Bu | -.024 | 22.2 | 154.6 |
Delta Graphs categorizes Allen Kuri’s shoot as a two-seamer, but the shoot was much less effective than the two-seamer (+.006 as opposed to -.032).
