The Reynaldo Lopez mechanics saga is, well, a saga.
First, we had his diminished velocity in Spring Training due to “mechanics” rather than injury or something else that persisted, as he was throwing in the high 90s in this 2026 debut. That debut went well without Lopez pitching all that well, but he looked and pitched much better in starts three and four, until essentially a career-worst outing in Washington upended the nascent trend of effectiveness and threw everything into question.
Since then,
Lopez has been on a rotation hiatus, but really, a pitching hiatus. He was warming up in the bullpen in Sunday’s win over the Phillies, but didn’t make it into the game. The explanation? It involves “mechanics” again.
So, because I have no idea and am hoping someone else will do the work for me: what mechanical issues are we talking about, exactly? Mechanics have now been attributed to Lopez’ wide variance in fastball velocity from pitch to pitch and game to game, but also his overall effectiveness. I can’t tell whether it’s meant to be a vague catchall for everything under the sun, i.e., he’s not effective and we’re not sure why but he doesn’t want to go to on the Injured List, or whether there really is something that he’s unable to fix in a side session. Anyone have any ideas?
