Despite being an All-Star this season and posting a 3.02 ERA in the first half, MacKenzie Gore has lost his title as Washington Nationals ace. He has lost it to a surprising name, former 18th round pick Brad Lord. We will break down what is clicking for Lord and what Gore needs to do to get back on track.
First, we will start with the positives. That means we will talk about the rise of Brad Lord. He has gone from an 18th round pick who spent his off seasons working at Home Depot, to an ultra reliable big league arm who has thrived in the bullpen and in the rotation.
After his six inning gem yesterday, Lord lowered his ERA to 3.28, which is over a run lower than MacKenzie Gore’s 4.29 mark. In 85 innings, Lord has done it all, making 10 starts and 29 relief appearances. With an ERA of 3.69 as a starter and 2.79 as a reliever, it is time to break down how he gets it done.
Lord’s bread and butter is his fastball. It is by far his best pitch, and Lord throws either a 4-seamer or a sinker 70.3% of the time. The fastball is an absolute weapon for Lord thanks to new found velocity and some crazy movement. We wrote an article earlier this month that goes in depth on his elite fastball.
To sum it up, Lord throws from a very low slot that makes his heater tough to pick up for hitters. He is also averaging 95 MPH on his 4-seamer, which means the fastball gets on guys really quickly because that low slot makes the heater play harder than its velocity. That is how he can get an elite 25.2% whiff rate on his 4-seamer despite not throwing 100.
While Lord does not have any standout secondary pitches, they are helped by the fastball. His changeup has been looking a lot better lately, and can be really deceptive off his fastball. He got a couple strikeouts on the pitch yesterday.
While Lord has a decent slider, one thing I would love to see him add is a sweeper. When I look at Lord, I see a lot of similarities to Michael King of the Padres. Both feature a two fastball look and have a low arm slot. Like Lord, King has a good changeup.
However, what separates King is the fact he has an elite sweeper to go with his other pitches. That is what makes King better than Lord right now. He can get strikeouts in a way Lord simply cannot right now. With how similarly the two throw, it is easy to imagine Lord developing a good sweeper. That could make him a legitimate number 2 starter.
Lord is 25 and a late bloomer, so I think there could be even more to come in the next few years. However, we also have to talk about some negatives. It is time to talk about the Nationals fallen ace MacKenzie Gore. We will talk about what happened and how he can get back on track.
A month ago, things were going great for MacKenzie Gore. He was an All-Star and it looked like he had finally overcome that midseason swoon that has haunted him over the years.
At the break, he had a 3.02 ERA with 138 strikeouts in 110.1 innings. However, things have gone totally off the rails for him. His season ERA is now 4.29 and it looks like we are all the way back at square one with Gore.
So what is wrong with him right now? Well, just about everything. However, the two things that stick out to me are his command and his curveball. Both look way worse and you hope there is not an injury at play here.
In his last starts, he is throwing way too many uncompetitive balls and strikes that are right down the middle. We saw A’s hitters hunting his fastball early and often because they knew he could not keep it out of the middle of the plate. Right now it seems like the fastball is the only thing he can throw for strikes and those strikes are not good strikes.
A big reason for this is that he has totally lost his feel for his curveball. The whiff rate on the curveball has been dropping every month, and now it is at the point where it is just not a very good pitch. In July and August, the whiff rate on that curveball is about 20%, or half of what it was earlier in the season.
At its best, Gore’s curveball is a wipeout pitch and why he got so many strikeouts early in the season. Yes, he added a slider to handle lefties, but the curveball was still his best off-speed weapon. It can just make guys look silly.
Now it is just not there and Gore is pitching without his best pitch. If Gore is to get back on track, that curveball is going to have to become a weapon again. Lately, we have been seeing way too many of them bounce, which has led to a ton of wild pitches. He needs to be able to spot that pitch.
It also feels like Gore’s overall confidence is off. When Gore is off his game, he can be really off. At 26, hopefully he can figure out how to handle this as he gets older. We thought he had figured this out this year, but old habits die hard.
MacKenzie Gore still has huge upside, but this run has shown he is not the top of the rotation starter we thought he was. He still has the talent to be that guy and he shows it early in the year every season. However, he needs to find a way to hold up. He has a chance to get back on track today.
Right now, Brad Lord is the Washington Nationals ace. That is due to his rise and MacKenzie Gore melting down in the summer heat. We know Gore has the talent, but he could learn a thing or two from Brad Lord about keeping his composure.