How Spencer Strider Can Be Elite Again with Great IVB

There is no question that getting Spencer Strider back to an elite level could go a long way for the Atlanta Braves in 2026. But why is that induced vertical break so important for him? Answer that question on today's episode of Locked on Braves. You are Locked [music] on Braves, your daily Atlanta Braves podcast, part of the Locked On Network. Your team every day. Hey, welcome back to Lockdown On Braves, part of Lockdown Sports Atlanta, where we cover your favorite Atlanta sports teams each and every day. Also part of the lockdown podcast network, the number one sports podcast network. I'm your host, Jacob Mastriani, been covering the Atlanta Braves in both written and podcast form for over 10 years now. And again, this is Locked on Braves, your daily connection to all things Atlanta Braves. On today's episode, I'm going to answer some of the mailbag questions I didn't get to on Friday afternoon's episode. If you didn't watch that one already or listen to it, please go back and do so. But there's a couple of questions we didn't get to. One in particular on Spencer Strider that I wanted to give a little bit more time to as it needs some more explanation. We're going to dive deep into why that induced vertical break, what it is, and why it is so important for Spencer Strider. This episode is brought to you by MLB the show26. Visit mlbtheshow.com/lockon. Use code locked on to unlock a pack for use in Diamond Dynasty. You can pre-order MLB the show right now and it'll be available on March 17th on PlayStation 5, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch. Rated E for everyone. So, a couple of questions that I didn't get to on the full mailbag episode that we did on Friday afternoon. And this one coming from PJ's Braves, who says, "We've heard a lot about IBB for pitchers this spring training, especially Strider. What is IBB? And why is it important for any pitcher, but especially one like Strider?" So, this is a great question here from PJs, but it does uh it does make you put on your thinking cap a little bit. Okay, so we're going to go deep into it and bear with me as I do read a little bit verbatim on induced vertical break. Induced vertical break, IVB for short, is the amount of movement a pitcher generates from how he spins the baseball, creating rise or drop on the pitch. Induced vertical break is reported as either a positive or a negative number. Positive induced vertical break indicates that a pitch has induced rising movement. In other words, it drops less than a than a pitch has in or sorry, it drops less than a pitch would if thrown at the same velocity but without spin. So you just throw a flat fast ball, no movement. This induced vertical break would have an arising effect to it. Negative IBV indicates that a pitch has induced a drop. In other words, it drops more than a pitch would if thrown at the same velocity or but without spin. Fast balls are going to have positive IBB. Curve balls are going to have negative IBB. We really only hear induced vertical break talked about with fast balls, specifically forcam fast balls. And the reason is that is because it does it does play so much into how a fast ball can play up. That's what you hear a lot of times. You hear about a fast ball playing up. A lot of times that has to do with the invered vertical break. Now the average induced vertical break on a fourseam fast ball is 15 to 16 in. So, when you're looking at those induced vertical break numbers, you typically want to see something around 16, but definitely above 16 is the mark that you're looking for when it comes to induced vertical break. So, let's look at some examples really quickly from the past couple seasons. We'll also look at some examples from Spencer Strider and why it's so important for him to have that induced vertical break. Last year, Nick Paveta had the second highest IVB on any force seamer in all of baseball at 19.7 in. Only one player last year, and it was a reliever, had an induced vertical break over 20 in, but Nick Paveta, the starter with the highest induced vertical break at 19.7 in. That led to a positive run value of 21 on his four seam fast ball last year. That is an elite number. batters hit just 183 against his four seamer and whiffed 25% of the time which is a really high whiff rate for a fourseam fastball. And here's the catch with this. Nick Pavetta averages 93.8 miles per hour on his four seam fast ball. So there's a perfect example of a guy who doesn't have elite level velocity, at least not elite velocity in in today's terms, but because of the induced vertical break on his fast ball, he generates a lot of swing and miss with it, and hitters can't square it up. And I'm going to talk more about that in a second, but let's look at SP Spencer Strider real quick. In 2023, Strider's IVB averaged 18.4 in. that ranked as the 16th best in all of baseball that season. And the run value on his four seamer that year was was eight plus eight, which was 28th best overall. So elite level IPB and I wouldn't say elite level run value on the four seamer, but definitely really really good. In 2022, he actually had he had more induced vertical break on his fast ball, but the value was uh wasn't as high or he threw harder that year as well. And he spent time as a reliever. So 2022 is not really the best year to look at. But last year for Spencer Strider 2025 his IVB was down to 16.4 and like I said earlier MLB averages you know around 15 16 inches. So seeing him at 164 uh that rate 78th in Major League Baseball and he had a run value of -6 120th overall last year with that four seamer. But again it's not just that the induced vertical break was down on his fastball. The velocity is down as well. and and both of those, you know, play a part in it. Certainly, you know, the higher velocity and the higher induced vertical break is just going to be that much better and can lead lead to some elite outcomes. Here's here's the overall idea of induced vertical break, why it's so important overall for pitchers, why it's certainly important important for a guy like Spencer Strider. The idea behind induced vertical break is that the the baseball perceive perceivingly going up almost to the hitter and the hitter is going to be swinging under. They're going to be expecting that baseball to be coming down and instead it's going to in theory be coming up or staying more on plane. That is the the effect that the induced vertical break can have. And that's why you're going to see a lot of hitters, especially for Spencer Strider, getting under the baseball. He said it under after a start the other day when I think it was after his first start when he got those fly balls. You know, he said you're getting fly balls, that's good. That's what he wants to see. He wants to see those hitters getting under that fast ball and popping it up or hitting some easy flyyous. He's has a 30% fly ball rate for his career. The MLB average fly ball rate for pitchers is 24%. So that's why you've seen him have all those high fly balls and why you've seen him kind of get hurt by the home run at times too because that can come back to bite you. But there's also it's not just about having the high induced vertical break. It's also having pitches to throw off of it and where you throw that for seam fast. It's also very important to be able to throw that that high IVB fast ball at the top of the zone because like I said, hitters are going to be expecting that to come down. So if you can throw it and keep it at the top of the zone and keep the ball above their hands, that's where you're going to get those whiffs at the top of the zone. That's where you're going to get those those weak popups. So again, it all plays together. Induced vertical break is certainly a big part of it, and it can give you an edge even if you don't have elite velocity, but you still have to locate it. You can have great induced vertical break, but if you're throwing it down the middle at 94, which is what Strider was doing a lot last year, it's not really going to matter. And he was throwing at 94 last year without elite induced vertical break. So again, it's one part of the equation. It's not the end all be all, but if you have that good induced vertical break and you can locate it, then you can definitely get some swings and misses on that fast ball like we've seen from Strider in the past, but we haven't quite seen last year and and honestly haven't really seen in spring training either, even with the bump in that IBB. And you have to have something to throw off of it as well. So again, it's not just that, it's other things too in conjunction with that. And plus, if you get the elite velocity back with it, that's going to be a big part, too. That's just going to the velocity, in my opinion, is more about helping you avoid mistakes. You can you have a better chance of getting away or or getting away with, you know, 97 down the middle than you do 94 95. You have a better chance of getting a a swing and miss or a foul tip on a, you know, a ball that's 97 98 99 than you do 94 95 96. That's where the velocity comes into play more for me. The induced vertical break is certainly a big deal, but it still has to be located correctly. If you have 18 inches of induced vertical break, but you're throwing the pitch at the bottom of the zone, it's not going to be as effective as it is throwing it up in the zone. So, hopefully I've kind of helped explain that a little bit more. PJ, thanks so much for the question. If you still have some other questions around that, let me know. But that is the that is the idea around IBB, why it is so important for pitchers, but especially for Spencer Strider, who's been a two- pitch pitcher, and being able to work in both quadrants, throwing that high IBB fastball at the top of the zone at elite velocities and being able to snap off that slider in that same tunnel with that fast can be so effective. And if you can get that back, then obviously you feel really great. But again, my biggest takeaway from this, it still comes back to location. You can have that great IBB, but you have to be able to locate it in the right spot in order for it to have ultimate effectiveness. So, that's something to watch for as well with Spencer Strider. All we got several other questions to get to on today's episode of Locked on Braves. We'll jump back into the rest of these questions here next. Workplace chaos, deadlines stacking up, inbox overflowing, and the one position you have to feel still sitting open. 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If you want a little bit more content from myself and Lindsay Crosby, you can be part of our all access tier and our everyday club where you get ad free audio versions of the podcast. You'll get all access episodes of me and Lindsay text access with us as well. Or if you just want to get our base tier, you'll get ad free audios uh audio versions of the show as well. And you get access to our membersonly discord where me and Lindsay will be in there chatting about the games each and every day throughout the season. Head to lockdown.supcast.com to join today. That's lockdown.supcast.com supercast.com to join today. All right, getting into the rest of the questions that I didn't get to answer on our Friday afternoon mailbag episode. Uh the next one comes from Jeremy Vincent who said, "Would you rather have in their prime for who would you rather have in their prime for one season, Matt Olsen or Freddy Freeman?" I'm taking Freddy Freeman. You know, give me the 300 average, the 30 homers, 100 RBI's, and the Gold Glove fielder. You know, Matt's capable of doing all of those things except set for maybe the 300 average, and that to me gives Freddy the edge. Would you rather have Mauricio Dubon and Hassan Kim or Dansby? That's an easy Dansby for me. You're talking about a guy that's been pretty consistent at least over the last four or five years. Um, he's been a a leader for his entire life and a Gold Glove defender. So, give me Dansby. Aussie or Marcus Giles? I honestly forgot how good Marcus Giles was. Now, his, you know, longevity wasn't necessarily there, but he had some that 20 2003 season for Marcus Giles was elite. So, give me Marcus Giles. Michael Harris or Maris Gryom. Give me Michael Harris. I don't think we've seen the prime yet for Michael Harris. I hope. We talked about lot about that one on the previous mailbag episode if you haven't listened to that one yet. But give me Michael Harris. And then the estimated prime between Drake Bowwin or Brian McCannis is not a fair question because Drake Bowwin only has one year in the big leagues. And I think Brian McCann is a borderline Hall of Famer, but give me Brian McCann right now. And then the final one, and this one is the toughest one. Chris Sail or John Smoltz. Some of you are going to hate me, and a lot of you are probably going to disagree, but give me Chris Sail over John Smoltz. People forget before all the injuries that Chris Cell had an eight-year run of just pure dominance being one of the greatest strike strikeout pitchers the game has ever seen. I don't know how he didn't win a Sai Young over that span, but then he's somehow irrelevant for four years. Comes back at the age of 35, wins that elusive Sai Young, and still looks like one of the greatest strikeout pitchers of all time. So, I get this one's controversial and it is really close, but give me Chris Sale. Also closed out a World Series. He has that same fire and energy. This is this is a really good comparison here between Chris Sale and John Smoltz. I'd love to know what you think on that one. Who would you rather take in their prime, Chris Sail or John Smoltz? Next one here from Dan Wagner who said, "Should we trade for Kantio of Cleveland? He's about to conquer hitters. Then why is Cleveland trading him?" Um, I mean, yeah, I'd love to go out to get any any great guy uh for the Atlanta Braves. Big dog fan 73 says, "What's your thoughts on the Braves going into next year with a healthy Schwelly Waldrip, Richie Schaver with Sales, Strider, and Lopez still under contract? Which ones do we keep and who do we trade? Assuming everyone is healthy and we and we know that won't happen. So, yeah, we know that won't happen. So, don't worry about it on March 6, 2026. Plus, we don't even know what the 2027 season is going to look like. But let's say hypothetically the Braves still have all of those guys and they're all healthy. To me, J.R. Richie probably gets the same treatment that Hursten Waldrip was going to get this year that even though maybe he's better than some guys in front of him because he has options, he's probably going to start the year in AAA. And then I think at that point you look at moving a Lopez to the bullpen. Um, you didn't mention Grant Holmes, but he's still going to be in the mix too, assuming that he's healthy. I think you look at probably moving a Lopez to the bullpen depending on how this this season plays out. And I go with a a rotation of Cell Strider, Schwelenbach, Waldrip, and then that fifth start starter battle in camp of AJ Smith Shaver and Ronaldo Lopez. You could even say it's a it's a battle because depending on how this season, you know, wraps up, how Waldrip looks like coming back, how AJ Smith Shaver looks like coming back. I think Sale Strider Schwelbach would be your definite in the rotation. And then it would just be a battle between Waldrip, AJ Mchalver, Ronaldo Lopez, and Grant Holmes. And then, like I said, Richie will probably get that prospect treatment that you send him back down to Triple A because he has the options available to him. Uh, SSD says, "If you could give any pitcher in this staff an RA Dicky knuckle ball, who would it be?" I'm giving it to Grant Holmes. One, maybe it preserves that UCL a little bit. Doesn't he also just kind of look like a knuckle baller to you? Like I I feel like Greg Holmes would be the the perfect guy to give that knuckle ball to. Just kind of seems like he fits the mold, whatever that mold is. Um and then another question here from Emperor Luke who says, "In a situation where where we're both healthy, who would you rather call up, Diddier or Richie?" I I think I'd rather call up J.R. Richie. Um Dier definitely has the biggest upside. Richie just seems more polished and ready. And that's nothing against Ddier, but we did see him get rushed up and he was rushed up and he wasn't prepared and he was 20 years old and I get that. But J.R. Richie just looks ready. And while I think I know that Dier has the the higher upside and has top of the rotation potential, I think I'd still just rather call up J.R. Richie right now. You know, DDA comes back, he's shoving at Triple A. you know, he's showing that elite command that he showed in the miners. Maybe I changed my tune a little bit, but at this moment right now, you're asking me, Emperor, I got to go with J.R. Richie. And then final question here from JWF9. Will Chipper ever be our hitting coach or manager? He's one of the all-time greats for the Braves. Yes, I think Chipper will eventually be the hitting coach of the Atlanta Braves once all of his kids are grown and out of the house. problem with that. I think his youngest is still just seven years old, so it might be a while. But I do think eventually Chipper Jones will be a hitting coach. I don't think he'll ever be a manager, but I think I think we will see Chipper Jones as the hitting coach of the Atlanta Braves. Full-time hitting coach. No special assistance, no chipping in. I think he will be the actual hitting coach for the Atlanta Braves at some point, but that point might come in 10 years. Um, so yes, I do think he will be. Thanks so much for all the questions submitted both on the full mailback episode that we did on Friday afternoon and for this follow-up mailback episode as well. Again, appreciate all your support here on the podcast. If you're on YouTube and you haven't already, please hit that subscribe button, hit that thumbs up button, leave us a comment down below. Make sure that you uh leave a fivestar review on Apple, Spotify, wherever you get your podcast. Make sure that you rate, review, and subscribe to the Lockdown Braves podcast. And we will talk to you next time.

Spencer Strider's path back to elite form could redefine the Atlanta Braves’ 2026 season. Can a boost in induced vertical break (IVB) on his four-seam fastball make the difference? Jake Mastroianni unpacks the science behind IVB, revealing how this key metric transforms a pitcher’s arsenal—illustrated by Nick Pivetta’s success and Strider’s own changing performance. Discover why location, velocity, and pairing with secondary pitches like Strider’s slider are crucial, and what the advanced data tells us about getting hitters to swing under the fastball. Additional mailbag rapid-fires pit stars like Matt Olson versus Freddie Freeman, Chris Sale against John Smoltz, and debate which pitching prospects could see MLB action first. Plus, what would it take for Chipper Jones to become the Braves’ full-time hitting coach? Tune in for analytics-driven Braves insights, intriguing hypotheticals, and answers to burning Atlanta baseball questions shaping the team’s future. Follow & Subscribe on all Podcast platforms… 🎧 https://lockedonpodcasts.com/podcasts/locked-on-braves/ Locked On MLB League-Wide: Every Team, Prospects & More 🎧 https://lockedonpodcasts.com/leagues/mlb/ #Braves #AtlantaBraves #mlb Everydayer Club If you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! PlayStation This episode of is brought to you by MLB The Show 26. Visit https://mlbthe.show/lockedon and use code “LOCKEDON” to unlock a pack for use in Diamond Dynasty. Pre-Order now, Available March 17th on PlayStation 5, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch. RATED E FOR EVERYONE. Turbo Tax For a limited time, you can have your taxes done by a local TurboTax expert for just $150 — all in, if a TurboTax expert didn’t file for you last year. Just file by February 28. Take taxes off your plate and get back to your life. Visit https://TurboTax.com/local to book your appointment today. Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast Gametime Today's episode is brought to you by Gametime. Download the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase. Terms and conditions apply. FanDuel FanDuel is giving you a way to turn that energy into even bigger potential wins with a College Basketball Parlay Profit Boost. Visit https://FANDUEL.COM to get started — Play Your Game. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)