Mike Foltynewicz was drafted by the Houston Astros in the first round of the 2010 MLB draft. He made his major league debut with the Astros on August 2, 2014. In January 2015, Foltynewicz was traded to the Atlanta Braves. I watched him on the mound in the 2015 spring training. He was the starting pitcher, unfortunately, he couldn’t even complete one inning.
Mike Foltynewicz was an All-Star in the 2018 season. However, he only threw 3.1 innings in his first start this season, giving up 6 runs, and was outright to the Braves’ alternate training site after clearing waivers.
Foltynewicz mostly relies on sinker, 4-seamer and slider. He mainly throws 4-seamers, however, only 26.3% of pitches were 4-seamers last season.
Foltynewicz is a flame-thrower. His 4-seamer and sinker were over 95 mph from 2014 to 2018. However, average velocity dropped to 94.8 mph last season, in his first start of this season, his 4-seamer was only 90.9 mph and his sinker dropped to 89.9 mph. Since 4-seamer and sinker are Foltynewicz’s primary weapons, seeing drops in velocity is an alert.
Hard hit rate against Foltynewicz’s 4-seamer went up gradually from 2015 to 2019, reaching 48.2%. Meanwhile, the hard hit rate against his sinker remains at least 36.8% in the last 5 seasons.
Foltynewicz’s 4-seam fastball usually can create some swings & misses from 2014 to 2018, swing & miss % against his 4-seamer remains around 20%, however, swing & miss % against his 4-seamer dropped to 15.8% last season. Foltynewicz was an All-Star in 2018, in that season, swing & miss % against his slider was 36.8%, highest in the last 5 seasons.
Looking closely at the xwOBA chart, we can see that in 2018, the year when Foltynewicz was an All-Star, xwOBA against all types of his pitches were below .400. Hitters had big problems against Foltynewicz’s slider and it was really hard to make high-quality contacts. Nevertheless, xwOBA against his 4-seamer went up to .406 in the last season.
Mike Foltynewicz began the season on the IL last season. In the first half, he had a 6.37 ERA in 11 starts and was sent to AAA Gwinnett Stripers. He was recalled in August and pitched well in the second half. In September, Foltynewicz pitched very well with a 1.50 ERA and his WHIP was only 0.70.
He threw more sliders in the second half last season and the result looked pretty good. In September, xwOBA against Foltynewicz’s slider was only .169 and it also created 40.3% swing and miss. It’s not easy to pitch in the big league. A drop in fastball velocity is not an unusual problem for MLB pitchers, there are several pitchers who overcame this problem. Some pitchers get the fastball speed back, some pitchers change their pitch mixes to fool hitters. It’s hard to tell if Foltynewicz can get his fastball velocity back. However, as he did pitch well after being recalled from Gwinnett Stripers last season, he is probably able to find the right way to make adjustments in the alternate site and come back stronger as he did last season. With Mike Soroka out for the season, the Braves would really need another All-Star Mike on the mound.
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