Stuff vs Movement?

[Daxil]

I know. Let's just call it an amateur question. What's the difference between Stuff and Movement on the scouting reports? I think stuff means spin on the ball "the control a player has over a ball, especially to give it spin, english, curve, or speed" so how is movement different? Does this mean placement of pitches in the strike zone? Or how it moves from release to mit? I'm confused!

[Bumstead]

From what I can tell, Stuff leads to Strikeouts and Movement leads to ground balls. So a pitcher with a high Stuff rating tends to be a strikeout pitcher and a pitcher with a high Movement rating tends to produce a lot of ground balls.

That's my experience.

Bum

[Qwerty75]

In a nutshell:

The higher Stuff is, the more Ks the pitcher gets.
The higher Movement is, the fewer HRs he gives up.

Ground balls are governed by ground ball percentage.

[DiMaggio5CF]

Originally Posted by Qwerty75

In a nutshell:

The higher Stuff is, the more Ks the pitcher gets.
The higher Movement is, the fewer HRs he gives up.

Ground balls are governed by ground ball percentage.

This is how I understood it to be.

My understanding of it is that it went back to when DIPS was first put into the game, which means that a pitcher can only control strikeouts, walks, and homeruns.

So higher ratings in stuff means more Ks, control means less walks, and movement means less HR allowed.

The pre-determined GB% is the only thing I know of that makes a pitcher induce more or less groundballs.

[Daxil]

So Movement is a made up OOTP category for ability to avoid HRs? I thought as much as i never hear baseball analysts reference movement. Instead they seem to label everything stuff.

[kq76]

Stuff is like how fast your fastball is, how much your curveball breaks, etc. It's a measurement of how good your individual pitches are.

Movement is how much your pitches move on their way to the plate like high to low, left to right, etc. So in theory, yes, there is some overlap between movement and stuff at least when it comes to breaking pitches.

Control is where your pitches end up being, either in the strike zone or not. Command is precise control, like picking the corners of the strike zone.

[robc]

Originally Posted by Daxil

So Movement is a made up OOTP category for ability to avoid HRs? I thought as much as i never hear baseball analysts reference movement. Instead they seem to label everything stuff.

When it comes down to it, each rating is there to have some effect on gameplay. So movement just represents whether that pitcher gives up a lot of home runs. It could have just as easily been named 'Avoid HR', like batters have the 'Avoid Strikeout' rating.

[CD1083]

anybody know if GB% adjusts over time?
Ex. a power pitcher adjusts his style to prolong his career?

[RchW]

Originally Posted by Chase Davis

anybody know if GB% adjusts over time?
Ex. a power pitcher adjusts his style to prolong his career?

Check it out on Baseball Reference. One warning, they present it as GB/FB ratio which is different than GB%.

[CD1083]

Originally Posted by RchW

Check it out on Baseball Reference. One warning, they present it as GB/FB ratio which is different than GB%.

I mean in game

edit: thank you though

[Qwerty75]

I know the GB% varies from year to year, but I'm not sure if it gravitates around a pre-set figure or if the changes can trend in a certain direction over a number of years. Others may have insight on this.

[Hobbes63]

Originally Posted by Daxil

So Movement is a made up OOTP category for ability to avoid HRs? I thought as much as i never hear baseball analysts reference movement. Instead they seem to label everything stuff.

No, I don't think it is made up at all. You hear analysts and others talk about movement all the time. Big league hitters can hit something if they know where it is going. Particularly on fastballs, they will comment on how much, or how little, movement the ball has. Low movement the ball just travels in a straight line to its destination. If the hitter is waiting for that pitch...he's going to hit it..hard. Conversely, with lots of movement, even if he's waiting for that pitch, he still doesn't know where it is going to be, so both contact percentage and contact quality should drop.

FWIW, I've found movement to be FAR more important than stuff with my pitchers. If you have medium stuff with high movement...still not going to give up much. If you have great stuff with low movement...they're going to shell you...they'll guess right on a pitch, and since no movement, they'll likely make good contact.

Others thoughts on this? As an example, currently deciding between Chris Sale and Carl Hubbell. Sale has great stuff, with fair movement (65). Hubbell has fair stuff with pretty good movement (75), as well as great control. I've had pitchers like Sale with lower movement, and they get shelled. Conversely, I have pitchers more like Hubbell (Niekro, etc), and they do pretty good. But Sale might have sufficient 'stuff' to outweigh the lack of great movement.

Probably one of those things I'll just have to jump in and find out about. So, spend more money to experiment on Sale? or less money to see how Hubbell does? ;-)