2022 World Series: Lance McCullers is different, but Astros starter remains great

Though Tuesday’s Game 3 will be the first time Lance McCullers Jr. has ever pitched at Citizens Bank Park, the postseason stage is one he’s quite comfortable performing on.

Still just 29 years old, McCullers ranks 11th among active pitchers with 68.1 career postseason innings . At the same time, it’s hard not to think about how much higher he’d stand on that list if not for multiple ill-timed injuries along the way. He pitched through an elbow injury in the 2018 postseason before ultimately succumbing to Tommy John surgery after Houston was eliminated. That kept him on the shelf for all of 2019, which meant he couldn’t pitch during Houston’s run to the World Series — when they surely could have used him in the seven games against the Nationals. 

Two years later, a forearm injury in the 2021 ALDS against the White Sox knocked McCullers out for the rest of what turned out to be another deep October run for the Houston Astros. When McCullers takes the ball for Game 3, it will be the 12th start and 19th appearance of his playoff career, but his first Fall Classic outing since starting Game 7 of the 2017 World Series.

Now in his eighth season as an Astro, McCullers is the longest-tenured pitcher on the World Series roster and the second-longest-tenured player overall behind only José Altuve, who debuted in 2011. He made his postseason debut 10 days after his 22nd birthday in Game 4 the 2015 ALDS against Kansas City, throwing six strong innings but getting a no-decision as the Royals stormed back to win the game, the series and a few weeks later, the whole damn thing. 

In the seven years since that memorable first playoff start, McCullers has evolved markedly as a pitcher. Gone is the young fireballer alternating almost exclusively between high-octane four-seamers and his ridiculous trademark knuckle-curve. The McCullers we see today is the product of constant crafting of a repertoire that is now unlike almost any other starting pitcher in baseball. The injuries along the way have surely played a part, but it’s been remarkable watching the same McCullers find postseason success in 2022 and realize how different it looks from that October debut against the Royals in 2015. 

Of the 110 pitches McCullers threw against Kansas City, 51 (46.4%) of them were four-seam fastballs, 54 (49.1%) of them were knuckle-curves and five (4.5%) were change-ups. His fastball maxed out at 97.8 mph. Fast-forward to this October, and you’d hardly believe you were watching the same pitcher. Of McCullers’ 100 pitches thrown against the Yankees in the ALCS, 36 were sliders, 36 were sinkers, just 14 were his signature knuckle-curve, 13 were change-ups and one was a cutter. 

He threw zero four-seam fastballs. In fact, McCullers hasn’t thrown a fastball that Statcast has registered as a four-seamer since 2020, when he only threw four of them. 

Since returning from Tommy John surgery, McCullers has completely shifted away from the four-seamer in favor of the sinker, or two-seam fastball, and has overhauled his repertoire as a whole to better fit an arsenal that isn’t quite as high-powered velocity-wise as it used to be. 

McCullers’ sinker maxed out at 96.2 mph in the ALCS, which was also the hardest pitch he’s thrown in 2022 and only time he crested 96 mph all season. This pales in comparison to rookie McCullers, who unleashed 299 pitches in excess of 96 mph in 2015, including 9 in his playoff debut alone. In 2016, he maxed out at 99 mph. Since then, he hasn’t thrown a single pitch above 98 mph. 

Make no mistake, no matter what kinds of fastballs he’s been throwing or how hard he’s thrown them, McCullers has always been known more for his secondary offerings — most notably, the curveball he’s terrorized hitters with since high school. His 24 straight curveballs to close out the 2017 ALCS powered one of the more unique pitching performances in postseason history:

But as McCullers’ velocity has dropped — even more since returning from a forearm strain that kept him out for the first four months of the 2022 season — he’s leaned further and further into his array of off-speed stuff. Among starting pitchers with at least 40 innings (McCullers only made eight regular-season starts upon coming off the IL in August), McCullers threw the fourth-lowest percentage of fastballs (four-seamers + sinkers) at 24.5%. 

McCullers’ heavy reliance on his non-heaters this season stands out, particularly in relation to the other starters who throw a relatively low percentage of fastballs. Two of the three pitchers who threw a lower percentage of fastballs — Brewers ace Corbin Burnes and rookie Reds right-hander Graham Ashcraft — rely heavily on high-90’s cutters that aren’t classified as traditional fastballs. The other is soft-tossing Rays lefty Ryan Yarbrough, whose fastest pitch in 2022 was 90.4 mph. McCullers, meanwhile, resides in a unique velocity band relative to those three. He may not have the freaky-fast cutters of Burnes or Ashcraft, but it’s not that McCullers is a total junkballer like Yarbrough, either. His sinker averages about 93 mph average, and might not be what it used to be, but it ain’t exactly batting practice. Plus, by using it sparingly, its average velocity can appear much more intimidating to opposing hitters when deployed in relation to his tremendous off-speed pitches. 93 mph can look like 103 mph if you just saw a bunch of sliders and change-ups in a row. 

It’s possible McCullers is still building velocity back up from the forearm injury. Maybe we’ll see a couple more 96’s or even a 97 in Game 3. What matters most is that he’s figured out what version of himself can consistently get outs in 2022, no matter how hard he’s throwing. Most importantly, he’s healthy and able to contribute to Houston’s latest run at a championship. 

A huge reason why the Astros are in their fourth World Series in six years has been their incredible ability to get the most out of their pitchers no matter where they were drafted, how big their signing bonus was, what their repertoire looks like or how hard they throw. Though they are often credited as one of the primary trendsetters of throwing more four-seamers up in the zone with the breakouts of guys like Gerrit Cole, Houston has also consistently demonstrated that the priority is figuring out what works best for each pitcher and maximizing their skillsets more than any one-size-fits-all organizational philosophy. McCullers’ evolution over the years exemplifies that approach brilliantly. 

Jordan Shusterman is half of @CespedesBBQ and a baseball writer for FOX Sports. Follow him on Twitter @j_shusterman_.