Jack Leiter’s Delivery Tweaks Show Signs of Progress
Image credit: Pitcher Jack Leiter of the Frisco RoughRiders pitches (Photo by John E. Moore III/Getty Images)
So far Rangers righthander Jack Leiter’s pro career has not gone as expected.
Considered the top college arm in the 2021 draft, the Rangers sent Leiter to Double-A to begin his pro career at the start of the 2022 season. As the second pick in the draft after a storied career at Vanderbilt, Leiter appeared to be on track to be a fast mover to the majors.
Almost two seasons later, the first wave of college pitchers from that 2021 draft class has arrived. Gavin Williams, Andrew Abbott, Tanner Bibee and Bryce Miller are all now productive big league starters.
Leiter is still in Double-A. He has a 5.42 ERA in 39 starts and 164.1 innings. He’s walked 5.4 per nine innings.
But in two starts since a stint on the developmental list, Leiter has reworked his delivery. Leiter has a more relaxed tempo and better success. Leiter has allowed two earned runs on six hits in 6.1 innings over those two starts. He’s struck out 11 and walked one while allowing one home run.
Those are two of his best back-to-back outings as a pro.
How Has Jack Leiter’s Delivery Changed?
With a very energetic and high-tempo delivery, Leiter has struggled to stay in sync as a pro. When he loses the strike zone, he falls behind, and while his 94-99 mph fastball gets swings and misses at the top of the zone, he can be homer prone when he misses his spots.
In 2022, Leiter threw strikes with only 59.1% of his pitches, well below the Double-A average of 62%. He had a 59.9% strike percentage when he was placed on the developmental list.
It’s clear that Leiter and the Rangers have been busy. Leiter has junked the windup that saw him bring his hands over his head. He has slowed down the tempo of his delivery as well, and moved from the first base side of the rubber to more of the middle/slightly toward the third base side of the rubber.
Here’s where he set up early this season.
And here’s where he sets up on the rubber now.
He also starts before the delivery from a more closed-off position.
Leiter’s pre-shutdown setup was more open.
Here’s how he stands now as he gets ready to begin his delivery.
Leiter has also simplified some of his early parts of his delivery. Leiter has long used a windup where he brings his hands over his head. Now he just breaks his hands with a delivery that isn’t much different than his delivery from the stretch.
This is what Leiter’s mid-windup delivery looked like before he and the Rangers re-worked it.
Now it’s much simpler. Here he is at a similar spot in his new delivery with no runners on base.
A Slower Tempo
While those are changes, it’s the tempo of Leiter’s delivery that is even more noticeable. All too often, Leiter’s delivery as a pro has seemed to be almost frantic. He had an exceptionally fast tempo, but at times it seemed like his attempt to rush through his delivery made it hard for his arm to stay in sync and on-time.
Leiter has a 67.3% strike percentage in his last two starts. He’d never posted a strike percentage that high in any of his previous 38 pro appearances. Leiter has walked 1.4 batters per nine innings in his return down from 5.9 per nine before his shutdown. His 15.7 strikeouts per nine is also a dramatic improvement on the already impressive 11.7 per nine he was piling up before.
Leiter heads to the end of the season on a step forward in his development rather than a step back. He’d allowed five earned runs on five hits and two walks in .1 innings in his only start in July, and he’d allowed eight runs on seven hits, three walks and two hit batters in 4.2 innings in his final start in June.
Now he has strung together back-to-back solid starts. It doesn’t put him back on the fast track, but with likely two more starts remaining before the Double-A season ends, Leiter does have a chance to build some positive momentum into 2024.
