Breaking down Chad Green’s Major League debut

The Yankees acquired 24-year-old Chad Green from the Detroit Tigers this offseason in the Justin Wilson deal. After a dynamite start in triple-A, where he was 2-3 with a 1.22 ERA in seven starts (36 K in 37 innings), Green made his major league debut Monday night for the New York Yankees. Standing at 6’3” and weighing 210 pounds, Green threw 79 pitches across only four plus innings. The University of Louisville product also made his first plate appearances since high school and struck out twice. But although Green was not necessarily effective, he had solid moments to build on. Below was his final line on the night:

4 IP, 8 H, 6 R (4 ER), 1 BB, 5 K

Picture Credit: Ross D. Franklin-AP

Pitch Repertoire:

Four-seam Fastball

Green was seen throwing a flat fastball that was consistently pumping 95-96 MPH on the radar gun. His velocity was promising, but his spotty location of this pitch got him into a bit of trouble. It was the cause of him allowing a couple of baserunners on some base knocks here and there. He used this pitch primarily to raise the eye-level of the hitters.

Sinker

Green was also throwing a sinker which, oddly enough, had as much side to side movement as it did sinking movement. This pitch was typically thrown at about 92-94 MPH and was another pitch that ran him into trouble at times, particularly on the home run to Paul Goldschmidt in the first inning. Green had a tendency to leave this pitch up but when he was able to locate effectively, he was able to get ahead in counts getting hitters to eventually ground out.

Screenshot via MLB.TV

Slider

The Slider was Green’s go-to strikeout pitch on Monday night. This pitch had good movement in the lower-mid 80’s and if Green can continue polishing this pitch, he could become a serviceable arm in the big leagues, whether it is in the rotation or out of the bullpen. Unfortunately, he wasn’t fooling a lot of hitters on this pitch as Segura smacked it for an RBI double and it was the pitch that Jake Lamb blasted over the wall for a three-run homer.

Splitter

Chad Green recently developed a splitter while he was in the Tigers organization. However, due to the lack of confidence in this pitch, it went unused in his major league debut.

Breakdown:

Green came into the start aggressive as he struck out Jean Segura, the first big league hitter he faced. However, Green then served up a mammoth home run to Paul Goldschmidt on a sinker right over the heart of the plate. He would also give up a double to Jake Lamb and an infield single to Yasmany Tomas. Didi Gregorius bailed Green out of the inning with an excellent play finished off by a marvelous pick by Mark Teixeira.

Green would allow two more hits in the second including an RBI double to Segura. After that, Green really seemed to settle in and looked pretty comfortable for the third and fourth innings.

With his pitch count at 64 heading into the fifth, Green ran himself into more trouble after a leadoff error and walk to the ensuing hitter. After Larry Rothchild’s second visit to the mound, Green engaged in a long battle with Lamb. On a full count, Green hung a slider down the middle of the plate and Lamb made him play with a three-run blast. That at-bat summarized the night for Green. He was good enough to get swings and misses but his “rookie mistakes” skewed his results.

Article by: Chad Raines

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