Chase Burns Has One Problem Left

This weekend, Chase Burns threw six innings of two-hit ball to snap the Reds' 8-game losing streak. The breakout narrative is forming right on schedule, which is fine, but the more interesting question to me is what's fueling his success.

If you're a Reds fan, you're already aware of the basics. Chase Burns is only 23 and has an electric but limited pitch arsenal. Cincinnati took him second overall in 2024, his fastball rides like hell, and his slider now generates a 49% whiff rate and a +2.8 run value per 100 pitches. Fans have been clamoring for him to learn a third pitch for a while, especially after a couple uneven starts earlier this season. A lot of people believe it's that missing third pitch that stands between Burns and staff ace status.

If all of this sounds familiar, it's because that's how the Reds fans talked about Hunter Greene for years. But Greene became the Reds ace by mastering his four-seam fastball and slider. (Yes, he has a splitter and cutter, but he barely throws those.)

We're less than a year into the Chase Burns experiment, so there's no way to know how things will unfold. Our guy's stuck to his fastball-slider combo so far, but I wanted to see if there was anything going on beneath the hood. If he isn't working on a third pitch, is he sharpening his other pitches? If so, are they getting nastier, or is he learning how to throw them in a way that allows him to go deeper in games?

I pulled all 719 pitches across eight starts from Baseball Savant and cross-referenced against his 2025 numbers. What immediately stood out was that Burns has made three deliberate mechanical changes between seasons—he's redesigned his slider, he changed his release point, and (on the rare occasion he throws it) his changeup is behaving differently.

He's managed to land the first two successfully, but the changeup remains a work in progress. Until the changeup can be thrown for strikes against left-handed batters the third time through the order, Burns is going to have a real hard time pitching seven innings. To me, that's the gap between "best power arm the Reds have developed since Hunter Greene" and "ace."

The slider first. His horizontal break dropped from 5.05 inches to 2.76, and his induced vertical break dropped from 1.33 to 0.55. Meanwhile, his spin rate dropped 118 rpm at the same velo (90.8 mph in both seasons). He traded sweep for depth at the same velocity. This suggests that he's changed his grip and delivery, not throwing the ball harder or softer. He could be doing this for any number of reasons (deception, control, stamina, etc), but the slider is really humming right now.

In 2025 his slider moved on a wide, flat arc. This kind of sweeping slider generates chase swings when they're below the zone. Unfortunately, it can be hard to control and gets hammered when they're left hanging in the zone.

Burns's updated 2026 slider dives down and in on righties, on a slightly tighter trajectory. This allows him to control the pitch more and makes it less susceptible to barrels when thrown in the zone. And while his out-of-zone whiff rate has dropped (from 76.9% to 67.6%), the overall whiff rate has increased. Most importantly, his in-zone whiff rate has nearly doubled (14.9% to 26.7%), which means he can more safely throw his slider for strikes now. It's not just a chase pitch anymore, which gives his two-pitch arsenal a lot more mileage.

His slider is even more deceptive against right-handed hitters. In fact, half, half, of the right-handers who swing at his slider miss it. This is because his new slider's tighter trajectory makes it look more like a four-seam fastball until it drops off the table. This causes batters to swing over the top of the ball, which produces whiffs and ground balls. It's an excellent pitch combo, and I'd say his slider is the best breaking ball on the Reds' staff right now.

Burns's changes aren't limited to his slider grip, either. He's also shifted his release point approximately 4.3 inches toward the center of the rubber. This has had an effect on his entire arsenal, including the changeup he rarely throws.

And speaking of his changeup, I'm wondering if this is the storied third pitch he's working on. His change in release point has compressed the gap between where his fastball and changeup leave his hand by two inches (5.2 to 3.2). His heater and change look more alike than ever before, which makes them both better pitches.

We're looking a small sample, but his changeup's shape and velo are also better than last season. It's now 1.4 mph slower, which creates an 8.3 mph gap off the fastball, and more spin has created 3.38 inches more vertical rise to tunnel it tighter off the fastball. Combine this with the release point similarities, and the fastball-change combo could be a legit weapon.

What's holding the changeup back? Control, mostly. The change's ball rate is up to 42.6%, and the out-of-zone chase rate is down to 30.0%. Its expected weighted on-base average on contact is .435, which is bad. But, when batters do make contact with the changeup, it's not great contact (only 73.4 mph exit velocity with a 20% hard-hit rate). Yes, five balls in play is nothing, but they suggest the changeup's shape metrics are good. The command just needs to catch up.

So what should we look out for?

First, can Burns get the ball rate on his changeup down. Anyone who's zeroed a new rifle at a range can empathize with what he's trying to do here. Burns is rezeroing—throwing from a new arm slot, at a new speed, with a new spin profile. He hasn't gotten to the point where he can predict exactly where the ball is going and what a great pitch should feel like. Plus, he only throws the changeup 5% of the time in the first time through the order, 10% the second, 16% the third. That's not a lot of opportunities for in-game experience. But he's not afraid to reach for the changeup when he needs it most. That takes moxie. I like a player with moxie.

I don't think his 2.11 ERA will survive this learning process—which is totally fine. His BABIP is .237 (about 60 points below league average) and his strand rate is 93.6%, which is a number elite closers sustain but starters don't. His FIP is 3.77. Depth Charts projects 3.82 for the rest of the season; ZiPS says 3.98. His Stuff+ is 111, his Pitching+ is 117—above-average, not elite-ERA caliber, not with the current arsenal. I think his performance will bounce between being lights out one week and uneven the next. Which isn't a bad place to be for a pitcher with less than a year of service time under his belt.

The biggest thing to look out for is how left-handed batters perform against Burns the third time through the order. It hasn't been great so far.

To be upfront, we have only seen twenty of these plate appearances against Burns so far. But those 20 plate appearances produced a microscopic 5% strikeout rate, a 50% hit rate, and three home runs. Five of Burns' six career home runs allowed have come against left-handed batters, three of those during the third time through. And three were off fastballs located middle-to-high in the zone.

In general, Burns's fastball gets less effective the deeper he gets into games. Against lefties and righties, we see a 99.5 mph average exit velocity and 67% hard-hit rate off his fastballs the third time through. But lefties are the ones who capitalize on his fatigue and mistakes the most. The slider's new shape plays worse against them (whiff dropped from 52.5% to 41.3%) because it no longer sweeps away as dramatically as the 2025 version did.

FWIW Burns is fine against righties the third time through: 21% strikeout rate, 16% hit rate, one home run in 19 plate appearances. The slider carries deep into games against same-handed hitters.

Let's return to Burns's obvious comp on the roster. Hunter Greene throws 99 with a 54% four-seam usage rate, his slider generated a 46.9% whiff rate in 2025. Burns' slider now matches or exceeds that. Greene has survived as a two-pitch starter because they're nasty and he can locate them (which wasn't the case when he was Burns's age). But his third pitch—a splitter he throws 10.8% of the time—only produced a -2.9 run value per 100 and a .334 xwOBA against.

The difference between Burns and Greene is mostly experience, but both have enormously high ceilings. I think Burns can be as good as Greene, if not better if he proves to be more durable.

But let me go out on a limb to wrap this up—I think for Burns, Paul Skenes is the ceiling. While he'll never have the arsenal that Skenes has, I think mastering a changeup will allow him to be just as productive. Also, insert the obligatory "the splinker is a fake pitch" comment here.

So watch his ball rate on the changeup moving forward, especially going into the fifth and sixth innings. Right now it's 42.6%. If it drops below 35% by mid-June, I think it's developing and Burns will outperform his pre-season and ROS projections. Like I said, the stuff is already there, command just needs to show up.

And if it doesn't drop, he's still a 23-year-old who redesigned his slider in a single offseason and might figure out the changeup in the next one.