Texas Rangers Starting Pitcher Has One of the Most Lethal Pitches in Entire Sport

The Texas Rangers have had somewhat of a mixed bag when it comes to their start this season, with their offense being somewhat stagnant at points while their pitching has led them to a 13-9 record through the first few series.

This places them atop the American League West at the moment, and has allowed them to build momentum at home with a 10-3 record in Arlington to begin the 2025 campaign.

The pitching from this staff has been absolutely outstanding, and they have managed to do so without Cody Bradford, Jon Gray, Josh Sborz, and, for a short time, Jack Leiter, all of whom have landed on the injured list at various points this season or ahead of Opening Day.

The Rangers currently sit No. 4 in the league in ERA (3.23), No. 1 in walks allowed (only 53), No. 1 in WHIP (1.05) and No. 4 in batting average allowed (.212).

Others in the room have stepped up immensely, including Nathan Eovaldi, who has been having one of the best seasons of his career so far.

Through five starts, he has pitched 30.2 innings with one complete game shutout, posting a 2.64 ERA, 0.750 WHIP, 31 strikeouts to two walks (15.5 SO/BB) and a 147 ERA+.

One of the most impressive parts of his game has been the four-seam fastball, however, with 11.9 inches of induced vertical break and 14.1 inches of induced horizontal break, according to Baseball Savant.

At this point in the season, it is one of the best pitches to induce a swing-and-miss.

Eovaldi has utilized this pitch quite a bit, so the sample size is not the bare minimum.

29.6% of his pitches have been his four-seamer this year, the highest rate of any pitch for him.

According to the Baseball Savant leaderboards, Eovaldi ranks No. 8 league-wide in overall Swing% (minimum of 100 batters faced), currently sitting at 52.4%. This lands him right among some of the league's best, including Chris Sale, Justin Verlander, Tarik Skubal, Paul Skenes and Logan Gilbert.

This is predominantly due to his four-seam fastball, which has been dominant all season long and his go-to pitch in many occasions.

What is intriguing is that he has seen a slight change in his arm angle compared to previous years, pitching at a 31-degree angle as opposed to 33 degrees last season.

In years prior, it's been as high as 37 degrees.

This switch seems to have helped him quite a bit, as he is producing at an exceptional level so far this season.

Overall it is intriguing to see how Eovaldi has changed his mechanics slightly, but also how his skillset still shines through which has made his fastball as good as ever.

Getting a larger sample size will provide the opportunity to see if this is just a hot streak or if the technical changes have truly improved his game for the long-term.

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