Huascar Brazobán Has Been Dominant Since Raising His Arm Angle
New York Mets reliever Huascar Brazobán threw four dominant hitless innings in the World Baseball Classic, striking out seven batters and walking only one. This included striking out Will Smith, Roman Anthony, and Brice Turang of Team USA.
Additionally, he has thrown three scoreless innings so far in spring training, allowing just a hit and a walk. So is this just a nice seven-inning stretch, or should Mets fans be excited?
Photo by Ed Delany of Metsmerized
One thing of note is that Brazobán is throwing from a higher arm slot than in 2025, helping him generate more vertical movement on his pitches. Across these seven innings, he has been more consistent in his release points, which has improved the tunneling of his sinker and changeup. Both pitches have generated over a 50% increase in whiff rate since raising his arm angle.
Control was also an issue with Brazobán in 2025. He had a below-average zone rate at 48.5% and walked 10.3% of batters. So far this spring, Brazobán has increased his zone rate to league average at 50.5% and has only walked two batters across the spri g.
His metrics have been stellar across the board:
- 0% barrel rate (100th percentile)
- 11.1% hard-hit rate (100th percentile)
- 53.8% strikeout rate (100th percentile)
- 79.8 mph average exit velocity (98th percentile)
- 70% ground ball rate (98th percentile)
- 34.8% whiff rate (95th percentile)
- 75% zone contact rate (91st percentile)
- 35.3% chase rate (86th percentile)
Even at his best in April and May 2025, Brazobán was never generating this level of swing and miss or contact rates this low. It is still a small sample size, but the early returns are strong. Brazobán is not alone either. Multiple Mets, including Clay Holmes and Kodai Senga have attacked the zone more this spring with improved pitch metrics. This seems to be an organization-wide strategy that lines up with the philosophy Justin Willard has discussed over the years.
Per Anthony DiComo of MLB.com, Carlos Mendoza has confirmed that barring an injury, Huascar Brazobán will be part of the Mets’ Opening Day bullpen. Brazobán has one option left, so it is possible he could see time in the majors and the minors this season, but if he can continue pitching as he has this spring, he can be a weapon in both the regular season and ideally in October.
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