I’ve gotten a bunch of emails about the pronounced hip turn shown by Felix Hernandez during the All Star Game, so I thought I’d make a post of it.

As I mentioned in the last post, I thought this was brand spankin’ new.  I thought that he had always had a slight turn, but was so amped up for his All Star Game appearance that he just overdid everything in his motion.

As it turns out this is not the case.  It’s new, but not as of last evening.  As you can see, Felix was doing something similar in his last start before the All Star break.

Why this motion jumped out to me (and apparently a lot of other people) as something completely different in the All Star Game but not in his previous starts is a little strange, but I think I know why.

I went through the MLB.com archives of just about every Felix highlight reel they had.  At the World Baseball Classic and in his first start of the season there was just a hint of rotation– the way a lot of us probably picture him.  By May there was a little more, but still nothing dramatic.  By June he had definitely altered his windup, but there still wasn’t anything that was jumping out to all of us watching casually.

Felix was rotating farther and farther back as the season went on, but he did it so gradually that a lot of people, myself included, failed to give it much notice.  There isn’t much difference between Felix’s All Star Game motion and that of his last couple of outings, but I guess he rotated back just enough last night to catch our attention.

As to where he got this from, a lot of people are pointing to Erik Bedard, who rotates similarly.

(stolen from here)

In fact, I was asking someone about this earlier (before I realized it was more than a one time thing) and they told me that they heard through the baseball “grapevine” that Erik Bedard had indeed turned Felix onto this mechanical tweak.  I have no way to verify that– and using the word “grapevine” while citing a source is about as flimsy as it gets– but it makes some sense.

Whether Bedard suggested Felix try this, Felix mimicked Bedard unsolicited or whatever else– the reason Felix started doing this doesn’t really matter.

Now that we’ve solved the riddle of when this happened and have an idea of where it might have come from, let’s move on to what this means for Felix.

Since this motion started becoming noticeable in late May, Felix has been unhittable.  The last time he gave up more than 3 earned runs in a game was May 19th.  Since then he’s thrown 68 IP, allowing an opponent’s line of .195/.257/.260 en route to a 1.19 ERA.

In the three outings leading up to May 19th Felix’s 4-seam velocity averages came out at 92.94, 92.43 and 92.03 MPH according to pitch f/x.  Since May 19th his averages have been 94.92, 94.55, 94.36, 93.81, 94.05, 94.60, 94.24, 94.98 and 94.80.

There could be some added deception here as well.

We’ve got a small uptick in fastball velocity and a boost in performance starting at about the time the hip rotation became apparent.  I understand that this isn’t exactly a scientific study– with him gradually twisting more and more there is no obvious “new Felix” start point– but as far as I can tell May 24th looks like the date Felix started embracing his inner Nomo as well as the point when he started tearing up the league.

I’m not going to say that Felix has become this shiny new pitcher since starting to coil back farther.  The dates seem to line up, but I’ll let you draw your own conclusions for now.

What else could this mean for Felix?  Let’s take a quick look at how this could impact his health.

Since Bedard shares a similar mechanism and has also had a couple of hip flareups while with the Mariners, it would make sense to start with the hip.

In simplest terms, some analysts are concerned that motions like this can cause significant cartilage, labrum and bone damage that could lead to degenerative hip conditions.

This doesn’t completely apply to Felix, however.  Pitchers with similar motions who develop hip problems have been repeating that rotation for years, allowing the tissue to grind down over time.  In theory, Felix pushes any of these problems back by several years because he just started doing this motion within the last month or so.  If he had been doing it since he was 14 it might be more of an issue.  It’s probably not a healthy thing to do, but the chances of it hurting his major league career appear slim, at least for the foreseeable future.

Timing issues, such as the ones we see with the Inverted W, can also be caused by this kind of motion.  You may remember from past write-ups that, according to some biomechanics experts, it is considered ideal with regards to shoulder health for the forearm to be vertical as the foot plants and the hips begin to rotate, i.e. before the acceleration phase.  This keeps the arm from being violently accelerated around the body in a whip-like motion.

Does Felix have this problem?

To be honest, I thought I was going to be heartbroken after finding some ominous “flaw.”  As it turns out, Felix is in pretty good shape as far as timing goes.  If he comes up with a shoulder injury, chances are it isn’t because of this new coiling mechanism he’s developed.

If this new delivery doesn’t negatively affect his health– and I don’t think it will– then we should be able to sit back and watch Felix continue to turn into an ace with his new windup in tow.

Welcome, tweaked Felix!