There wasn’t a great velocity panic with Homer Bailey, even though his two slowest average fastballs came in his last two starts of September. Call me crazy, but maybe that’s because one of those games was a no-hitter, so it probably isn’t a canary in the coal mine for Bailey’s success. But when a fastball is a little shorter at the end of the season, it’s not crazy to keep an eye on it.
Homer Bailey dealing, Reds still up 1-0
It’s not an issue today. Bailey is sitting at 94, and what’s more, the Giants are swinging right through the fastball. Both Pablo Sandoval and Buster Posey, normally excellent fastball hitters, swung through fastballs in the middle of the zone for their strikeouts. Bailey has been pretty lousy at Great American Ballpark this season, but it’s hard to allow runs when the ball isn’t put in play.
On the other side, Ryan Vogelsong settled down after throwing a week’s worth of pitches in the first inning. Ryan Hanigan led off the inning with a seven-pitch at-bat, and ripped a foul down the line, but Hunter Pence made a nice sliding catch for the first out:
Considering the 30 pitches Vogelsong had to throw in the first inning it was a bigger play than it might have seemed.
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