Last week, Mark Buerhle made some rather controversial comments about Gavin Floyd being a question mark down the stretch of the season for the White Sox. The reason is because of how the veteran thinks Floyd will deal with the pressure. In addition to the mental hurdles that Floyd faces, The Hardball Times believes that Floyd is on "borrowed time," after breaking down his five pitches in their Anatomy of a Player piece.

Their explanation of his pitches leave the reader to draw a similar conclusion as well. Floyd throws a four-seam fastball, two-seam fastball (which can also be classified as a sinker), 1-7 curveball, changeup and slider.

- Floyd doesn't throw the four-seamer all that hard (92 MPH), which means that it's difficult to throw it past people's bats.  Specifically, it can't be used as an out pitch (more on this later). 

- His two-seamer is technically a sinker, and at 86 MPH, is an extremely hard one. Floyd has nine inches of movement on the pitch, so it does have that significant drop that often throws off right-handed hitters. But, unlike prolific sinkerballers (Brandon Webb, Derek Lowe, etc.), Floyd doesn't have enough sink on the pitch to consistently force groundballs. And the other troubling thing with this pitch is that he can rarely throw it against lefties, because it tails away from them (over the plate or out of the strike zone).

- Floyd's out pitch, as White Sox fans can attest to, has been his curveball throughout the season. And this is his best, and most unique pitch. At 86 MPH, Floyd throws the curveball harder than most everyone in the league (Ben Sheets being one of the exceptions). And while it's a very effective pitch, The Hardball Times is worried that hitters will start to pick up on it because it starts on a different level than the oft-used fastball. 

- The last two pitches in Floyd's arsenal are works in process. The slider has similar movement to a typical cutter, but is only 86 MPH, and actually breaks in to right handed pitchers (which, if you've seen Mariano Rivera/Brad Lidge pitch, you know is a bad thing). Taking into account the speed and the movement, it's safe to say that this is a terrible pitch.  The changeup, similarly, is also rather ineffective. It is only a nine MPH drop from his fastballs, which many pitchers get away with, but Floyd does not throw it with two strikes.  Meaning that hitters can sit on the curve and fastball when down in the count. He also struggles to get it over the plate.

Like I said last week when writing about the Buerhle comments - be sure to keep all of these things in mind for the rest of the season. And also remember that Gavin Floyd is young, meaning that he still has time to improve the last three pitches (curveball, changeup and slider).

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