Bryce Elder has made four starts and given up a grand total of one (1) run so far across four starts and 23.1 innings of work. That’s it — that’s the stat. As of now, there are only three pitchers who are ahead of Elder on the leaderboard and one of them is Shohei Ohtani. I bet you never thought you’d see those two guys in the same stratosphere, now did you?
Yet, here we are: It’s real and so far it’s been spectacular for Bryce Elder, who has stormed out of the gates to what is certainly one of the best
stretches of his career so far. He’s scaled similar peaks over the course of his career but he’s certainly experienced his fair share of valleys as well. 2023 comes to mind when it comes to the peak for Elder, which is when he pitched his way into the All-Star Game during that season. The valleys have been covered in excruciating detail as well.
So while this is certainly a pleasant surprise, we’ve also been here with Elder before. The big question is what’s so different about the peak he’s currently on now and the peaks that he’s experienced in the past. I asked Elder about how he feels now compared to 2023 and it’s clear that he’s got a bit more confidence in his arsenal as a pitcher.
“I feel a little bit more complete,” answered Elder. “I think that year I just had however many starts where I was just executing pitches when I needed to — getting to a certain count and making the pitch. I feel a little bit more complete [now], I have more weapons and I’m going to try and keep it going.”
Indeed, Elder has been working a cutter into his arsenal and while it’s not the pitch that he’s been using to put away batters, he’s used it as a solid complimentary pitch aside from his usual arsenal. He’s also gone back to relying more on his slider instead of primarily sticking with the sinker and that’s gone a long way towards helping as well. Heading into Wednesday’s action, Bryce Elder had thrown the slider 93 times (according to StatCast) and opposing batters had only hit .083 against it with an xBA of .091.
His sinker had been getting knocked around a bit (to the tune of a .412 BA and a .338 xBA) but he’s used it to great effect as a Put Away pitch at 45.5 percent and a whiff rate of 27 percent. He’s getting a 28 percent whiff rate and a 32.1 Put Away percentage on the slider and his four-seamer has also gotten more effective with a whiff rate of 23.1 and a Put Away percentage of 25 percent. It’s nearly night and day compared to the numbers that he was getting on those pitches when he was spending 2024 and 2025 trying to get back to where he was in 2023.
Walt Weiss was asked by the media about Elder’s stuff so far and it’s clear that he’s noticed that the entire arsenal is working well for him right now. Elder stated earlier that he felt more “complete” and Weiss seemed to echo that thought in his remarks.
“It’s all his pitches, really,” stated Weiss. “His secondary stuff is better. His slider is a really underrated pitch and when you go back to his first year when he made the All-Star team, you’d see a lot of hitters swing and bounce sliders, they just didn’t see his slider. I think he’s got that slider back again. He’s getting a lot of swing-and-miss on it. He’s getting some takes on it. They just don’t see it very well. He’s got the cutter to add to the arsenal.”
“He had it once upon a time but he brought it back and it’s a good pitch for him,” continued Weiss. “He compliments the changeup really well and the changeup’s gotten better. All of his stuff has ticked up…He’s got three different fastballs: The two-seam, the four-seam and the cutter. It makes it difficult on a hitter when you’ve got three different fastballs and the other stuff is working too, so he’s throwing the ball really well.”
One thing that’s left to ponder now is just how long this is going to last for Bryce Elder. If you’re a believer in the Greg Maddux effect and the other changes that he’s made then there’s no reason to think that this couldn’t be the start of a major bounce-back season for Elder. Again, he’s experienced this type of form int he past where he was getting results and getting guys out at a very high rate. The difference now is that he appears to be a bit more confident in his stuff and his command — the days of waiting for a hanging slider from Elder to get hit to the moon by an opposing pitcher appear to be done for now, at least.
Again, there’s going to come a time when Elder will return to a valley and go through a rough patch. It happens to all pitchers and it’s just a part of baseball. The hope going forward is that we’ll no longer see Elder fall into a category of being an enigma — someone who’s go the capability to be a reliable pitcher but can’t quite seem to harness it on a regular basis. If we start seeing a less enigmatic version of Bryce Elder going forward, that should hopefully turn into a more reliable version of Elder as well.
Either way, it’s certainly been a pleasant surprise to see Elder start off his season on such a strong note. The starting rotation was a big question mark coming into this season and while we’re still in the early portion of this particular campaign, we’re getting closer to some of those question marks turning into periods. It’d certainly be huge if the ultimate question mark known as Bryce Elder ended up becoming a steady presence in the rotation rather than a source of frustration. We’ll see what happens!
