Being Patient With Jonathan Cannon

Like most rookie pitchers, Jonathan Cannon is far from a finished product. He’s taken some bumps since being called up by the White Sox this season, but he’s shown some promising traits in his outings. When projecting what a pitcher can do in the future, the process and who he is as a pitcher matter far more than the actual results. That may not be exactly what fans want to hear, as it’s harder to see the bright future when a pitcher is getting shelled. All things considered, for a guy who was picked 101st overall less than two years ago, Cannon is way ahead of schedule. Only two (Adam Mazur and Drew Thorpe) other starters from his draft class have made their debut, and he’s off to a better start than both of them.

This is not to rag on those two, they both have bright futures as well. I’m just trying to put Cannon’s 4.56 ERA into context. Making it this far this quickly takes serious talent, and surviving at this level is more of a bonus than an expectation at this point in his career. Let’s break down the excellent stuff that’s been carrying Cannon to this point, and what he needs to do to take the next steps.

The Sinker

Cannon’s bread-and-butter pitch is his heavy sinker, he lives and dies by it and likely always will. Standing at 6’6”, Cannon comes with a built-in advantage for creating a sinker with a steep path to the plate. While his 5.7’ release height is actually a bit lower than average, his stature allows him to create that release with a low three-quarters arm slot. This leads to him spinning his fastball at a lower axis which creates the horizontal movement and lack of rise. It has 2.6” of iVB, and 14.4” of iHB, an excellent shape for its release point. His average velocity of 93.3 mph and max of 96.0 is perfectly fine, if unspectacular.

This pitch shows the potential to be a foundational fastball, but in what is going to become a recurring theme, his execution of the pitch needs work. He likes to land it on the glove side, which is fine, but it’s all he likes to do with it. His 51.7% gLoc% is in the 99th percentile of pitchers. He seems to have no interest in running it inside on right-handed hitters which is frankly a waste. It’s probably why the batted ball profile it has isn’t as good as you’d expect from a sinker with this shape. He also tends to let it creep up from the bottom of the zone and toward the middle, which he desperately needs to cut back on. That is not where you want any pitch to live.

There’s a good sinker here, but he needs to branch out with his usage of it and cut down on the mistake pitches. I appreciate that he can pepper the zone with it, it’s a pitch he should be challenging with, but it can be more than that.

The Sweeper

Cannon’s sweeper is a good if somewhat uninteresting breaking ball. He throws it 82.2 mph, with 2.6” of iVB, and 14.4” iHB. Interestingly, this is the same as his sinker, though in the opposite direction horizontally of course. Their spins don’t create a perfect mirror, but there’s at least some deception going on with this pitch. It feels strange to call a low-80s breaking ball with more than a foot of sweep uninteresting, but that’s just the way the league is now. The sweeper revolution has happened, this is just something hitters have to contend with and adjust to now.

So what makes Cannon’s different? How is he getting good results on a kind of average pitch? Unlike his other pitches, his command of the sweeper is excellent. It’s a small sample, sure, but he’s shown an aptitude for landing this pitch directly next to the zone on the glove side, the best place for it to be. This allows it both to play off of all of those glove-side sinkers he throws, but also for it to draw chases even when not set up by a complementary pitch.

The results this pitch has seen are absurd. Hitters have just not been able to put good wood on it if they’re even making contact at all. It won’t be a 4.3 RV/100 pitch forever, but it’s earned it to this point.

The Cutter

Cannon’s cutter would be fine if he used it better. That’s probably about as nice as I can be about it. At 89.4 mph with 6.2” of iVB and 0.5” of iHB, it can serve as a good bridge pitch for his sinker and sweeper, and could potentially tie up left-handed hitters when thrown inside to them. His execution of this pitch is potentially the worst in his arsenal, and that’s a major problem as this pitch is not built to get weak contact in the zone.

Far too frequently this pitch is either down the middle or too far to the glove side to get chases from either handedness. Until he refines his command of it, it’s likely going to be a double-edged sword. It’s worth throwing because it enhances his two main pitches, but on its own, it’s a negative. Ultimately that adds up to something neutral or better, but he needs to work on this one.

The Changeup

The most interesting pitch in Cannon’s arsenal is also the one that’s caused him the most trouble on a rate basis. His changeup has the look of a devastator. At 85.8 mph with -1.5” of iVB and 12.9” of iHB it dives off its path to the plate. It’s a gorgeous pitch. It should be able to get whiffs and chases without issue.

I can’t really take a sample this small seriously about anything other than its shape and potentially his ability to locate it. It’s been hit hard, but that’s how it is for most changeups. When he’s locating it well he can place it right around the zone on the lower half. The cluster of pitches he’s put there is promising. It’s really hard to comment on a sample of 49 pitches, especially when they haven’t gone well, but the movement on this pitch gives me hope that it could be an equalizer for him against left-handed hitters.

The 4-Seam

Now we get to talk about a pitch with an even smaller sample, down to just 45 pitches.  Cannon’s second fastball is a better pitch than its shape would imply. He throws it harder than his sinker, at 95.0 mph with a max of 96.8. With just 13.7” of iVB and 9.4” iHB, this doesn’t have good rise or a particularly flat VAA. What it does have, however, is substantial vertical separation from his sinker and changeup. 

Imagine you’re a hitter for a moment. When you’re facing a sinker baller and a pitch comes out of his hand with the same spin direction as that sinker, you’re expecting it to dive to the bottom of the zone. When that pitch suddenly has 11.3” more rise than you were expecting it to, you will be swinging under it, almost invariably. This pitch fits into his arsenal beautifully. It’s the difference between him and other east-west pitchers. He’s not as restricted vertically, he can throw something with enough rise to separate itself from the rest of his options.

Now it’s not a perfect pitch, it’s better against lefties, and he also needs to work on locating it above the zone rather than just at the top of it. Its non-optimal shape also means that it will likely get hit hard if he throws it too much. With that said, this pitch playing in tandem with his sinker and changeup is a combination to dream about.

The Outlook

I wish there was some big revelation I could give about Cannon that would lead to his immediate success, but that’s not the situation he finds himself in. A lot of it is going to come down to his ability to command his arsenal and use it to its strengths.

His 5.0% BB rate is a mirage, it comes from throwing hittable sinkers in the zone. His command is not as good as that walk rate might suggest. It’s good that he makes hitters work for their bases, but I’d like him to make it a bit tougher on them. He needs to vary his sinker location more. Throwing it inside to right-handed hitters will lead to weak contact and whiffs. It’s a thing that comes with time and practice. He’s just two years removed from pitching in college, I’m sure he’ll grow into it eventually.

I think he could stand to throw his 4-seam more, against all hitters. There’s a good chance it would open up his other pitches to more success while also potentially giving him another pitch he can get strikeouts with. He shouldn’t make it his primary fastball or anything, but I think leaning further into the kitchen sink approach he takes with lefties would be good for him. His arsenal plays very well off of itself, everything complements at least one if not multiple other pitches. The process there is good, even if the results haven’t been.

Without trying to sound like a broken record, I’m going to mention something that I also brought up in an article about MacKenzie Gore last season that you can find here. In a similar case, I think Cannon’s busy wind-up may be holding him back and hurting his command. It’s more free-flowing and less theatrical than Gore’s was, but I can’t help but notice how much movement there is in it. It just seems like a lot is going on that could be difficult to keep in sync. This is purely speculation, but I wonder if Cannon’s command might improve if he simplified and pitched out of the stretch only, or at least cut down on some of the movement in his windup.

There are going to be growing pains here. Cannon’s flaws are the kind that his stuff can only cover so much of. They’re also the kind that tend to improve with experience. Give him time. This is a talented pitcher with a deep repertoire at his disposal. Once he learns to use everything in it to its full capability, there will be no stopping him.