Strength in numbers: Leahy having success with six-pitch mix

ST. LOUIS -- Kyle Leahy’s superpower as a reliever is that he has six solid pitches that he has confidence throwing at any point in the count, and that’s just how he tried to attack Astros slugger Yordan Alvarez on a chilly Tuesday night at Busch Stadium.

Unlike most relievers who rely on one dominant pitch that they lean heavily on to get outs with even when everyone in the ballpark knows it is coming, Leahy’s strength is in numbers. That’s why, just last week, during an eighth-inning showdown against veteran slugger Tommy Pham, the 6-foot-5 Leahy unfurled five different pitch types during an eight-pitch at-bat that ended in a strikeout.

He took the same approach against Alvarez by starting him off with a mix that included a changeup, a slider, a four-seam fastball and another slider to pull the count even at 2-2. Trying to outguess Alvarez, Leahy returned to the changeup and the pitch did just as he wanted by darting off the plate to the outside. This time, however, Alvarez got his arms extended and drove the ball a Statcast-projected 419 feet to straightaway center for a solo home run in Houston’s 2-0 defeat of the Cardinals on Tuesday.

“I felt like I was making pitches all night, but I didn’t love that [changeup] and you can’t do anything about it once it happens,” said Leahy, who allowed just two baserunners over his two innings of work. “The only thing you can do right there is get back into it.”

What happened next, however, showed some of the mental strides that the 27-year-old Leahy has made to become one of the most consistent forces out of the Cardinals’ bullpen.

Minutes after surrendering the Alvarez homer, Leahy jumped ahead of Christian Walker, 0-2, before he “overcooked” a curveball that hit the slugger to put another runner on base. In the past, such moments would tend to rattle the mild-mannered Leahy and lead to an ugly inning. This time around, however, he ripped a 94.6 mph fastball to strike out Jeremy Pe?a looking and he worked himself out of the inning unscathed.

“After [hitting Walker] I did a good job of staying the course, but that could have been a time of letting things start to spiral,” Leahy recalled. “I just took a step back and said to myself, ‘You’ve just got to make one good pitch here to get going again.’”

Leahy’s growth -- both in terms of his pitch arsenal and his steely resolve -- are why he made the first Opening Day roster of his MLB career and why he has become a darling among the analytics mavens who study pitching. Thus far this season, Leahy’s 33.3 percent strikeout rate ranks in MLB’s 85th percentile and his staggering 70.6 ground-ball rate ranks in the 97th percentile. As for that Alvarez smash in the eighth inning, it was the first time all season a hitter had barreled up a ball against Leahy, per Baseball Savant.

Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol said that the former 513th pick of the 2018 MLB Draft has become one of his favorites out of the bullpen because of the pitcher’s willingness to fight even though most consider him to be almost painfully shy and unassuming.

“At times when you see someone with his personality, you can mistake it for not being competitive because he’s so mellow,” Marmol said. “But this is a guy who really cares.

“He had the at-bat the other day where [Pham] saw five different pitches and they all were plus pitches. He’s got the fastball that he can use to both sides, he’s got that hard slider, a sweeper, a changeup, sinker and the four-seamer. It’s a decent arsenal and he’s pretty calm in any situation.”

The Cardinals sent Leahy home over the winter with instructions to come back with an improved arsenal, and he took the message to heart by enhancing the shape on his pitches so that he can be equally effective against righty and lefty hitters. His mix has been spread so evenly -- he’s used his fastball 35 percent, his slider 20 percent, his changeup 14 percent, his sweeper 14 percent, his curveball 10 percent and his sinker 8 percent -- hitters can hardly guess what he might throw next.

So far, the opposition has hit a miniscule .061 off him.

“One of my strengths is leaning on any of them at any time,” Leahy said. “I feel like I can go to any pitch whenever I want. I don't have one pitch like a Devin Williams with that changeup, where everybody knows it's coming. My strength is having a bunch of different shapes.”