McAdam: What's behind Chris Sale's elevated walk rate and how he can fix it

More than ever, in an era when analytics and data rule baseball, the battle between pitcher and hitter is constantly evolving.

When more and more pitchers began throwing harder and harder, hitters compensated by adjusting their launch angles, hoping for more power.

When hitters began swinging with slight uppercuts, pitchers began throwing more to the top of the strike zone, making it tougher for hitters to get underneath pitches with their swings.

Next, to combat falling behind and having to hit in pitchers' counts, hitters started to become more aggressive at the plate, swinging far earlier in at-bats than ever before. In response, pitchers have started to be wary of being around the plate too much early in the count.

And that's where Chris Sale may have gotten himself into trouble.

Sale issued three walks in just 4.1 innings Sunday in the Red Sox' 7-1 thrashing at the hands of the Atlanta Braves. He's walked nine over the last three games, and his walks/per nine innings rate is at 2.4, the highest it's been since 2012. In each of the last three seasons, Sale had average 1.8 walks per-nine-innings, so this year's mark represents an increase of one-third.

Those walks helped do Sale in against the Braves. All three of the hitters who walked against him came around to score.

"That's obviously something that's been bothering me,'' said Sale. "That's never really been a part of my game, up until recently, so it's something I want to look at and work on. That's what really kills you. At the end of the day, those are the daggers. Two-run home runs, solo shots, that's fine. But when you're giving them free passes and making those solo shots (into) three-run home runs, that's what kills you. It takes the energy out.''

The Sox are convinced that there's nothing mechanical at fault here, even if they determined that Sale's arm angle was a bit lower Sunday than it had been.

Instead, the walks may be the unintended consequence of dealing with more aggressive hitters.

"I think at times, we've been a little extra-cautious against hitters,'' Dana LeVangie told BSJ, "because there's a lot more first-pitch swinging going on. It's not that we're trying to pitch away from contact, but there's been damage early and we're just trying to avoid it. He doesn't pitch away from contact, but maybe he's just a little more cautious early in the count, and then, before you know it, he ends up losing the guy.

"He's just a little more cautious, especially early in the count, because so many guys are attacking early.''

Indeed, while hitters going into Sunday's start had hit just .222 when swinging at Sale's first pitch, they were batting .385 with a .923 slugging percentage on 1-and-0 pitches and, even when he was ahead 0-and-1, they were hitting  a robust .526 with an .842 slugging percentage.

The result? Sale has, consciously or not, gotten gun-shy early in the count and is missing outside the strike zone. The effect: longer at-bats, inflated pitch counts and, most ominously, as the numbers illustrate, more free passes. He's walked nine in his last three starts.

"It's something we'll watch closely,'' vowed LeVangie, "whatever it might be. Everything that happened today, we'll dig deeper into tomorrow and try to get back to where it needs to be.''

This could be a case of Sale and the Red Sox over-thinking matters. While it's fine to recognize trends and react accordingly, Sale's stuff is elite enough that he should win the vast majority of one-on-one battles.

By taking away from his aggressiveness early in the count, Sale is inviting hitters to work walks and find ways to get on base -- hitters that would have little chance of hitting the ball hard against him, or, in some cases, of even putting the ball in play -- and build bigger innings against him.

Better to have Sale attack them with his elite fastball and wipeout slider and take his chances.