McClanahan looks like Cy Young Snell 2.0

Does this sound familiar?

A 25-year-old Rays left-hander becoming a breakout ace and an All-Star, leading the league with a sub-2 ERA and racking up strikeouts, throwing a power fastball, dual wipeout breaking balls and a changeup as a fourth weapon?

Doesn't 2022 Shane McClanahan sound a lot like 2018 Blake Snell?

2022 McClanahan: 1.73 ERA, 0.81 WHIP, 12.2 K/9, 5.7 H/9, 210 ERA+
2018 Snell: 1.89 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, 11.0 K/9, 5.6 H/9, 217 ERA+

Like Snell four years ago, McClanahan could be on his way to a Cy Young Award. And the Rays' new ace might even come with a few upgrades.

Let's take a look.

McClanahan has the same arsenal as Snell

McClanahan dominates with the same four pitches that Snell did when he was with Tampa Bay.

• An upper-90s four-seam fastball that he throws up in the zone
• A slider/curveball breaking ball combo -- one hard breaker, one soft
• A hard changeup that he uses to neutralize right-handed hitters

Let's take a closer look at the two breaking balls. That lefty slider/curveball two-pronged attack was Snell's signature with the Rays. And there are a lot of similarities between McClanahan's breaking balls now and Snell's in his Cy Young season.

Slider
2022 McClanahan: 88.7 mph / 32.4" of drop / 4.0" of break
2018 Snell: 88.0 mph / 32.9" of drop / 4.9" of break

Curveball
2022 McClanahan: 81.5 mph / 53.6" of drop / 8.6" of break
2018 Snell: 81.3 mph / 54.1" of drop / 6.0" of break

McClanahan and Snell's breaking ball velocity/movement profile is almost identical. And McClanahan's slider and curve are nasty strikeout pitches just like Snell's were.

When Snell threw his slider or curveball with two strikes in 2018, they put the hitter away 31% of the time. When McClanahan throws his slider or curveball with two strikes in 2022, they're putting the hitter away 30% of the time. Snell racked up 135 strikeouts on his two breaking balls in 2018; McClanahan has 66 K's on his near the end of the first half.

But even pitching with Snell's arsenal and trademark breaking ball combo, McClanahan is doing several things to separate himself.

He has an even bigger fastball

Snell in 2018 was throwing the hardest fastball among lefty starters. So is McClanahan in 2022.

But McClanahan's is harder than Snell's. His four-seamer is averaging 96.8 mph; Snell's averaged 95.2 mph.

Over one in five fastballs McClanahan throws is 98 mph or faster; only one in 50 that Snell threw in 2018 was that fast. McClanahan has reached 99 mph 26 times, and 100 mph three times, including a 100.4 mph strikeout of Adam Frazier on May 5. Snell didn't break the 99 mph mark once.

McClanahan has also turned his four-seamer into a rising fastball like the one Snell threw with the Rays. Last season, his fastball dropped 13.3 inches on its way to the plate, but this season it's only dropping 11.9 inches, taking his "rise" from around an inch below average to an inch above average.

That's about the same rise that Snell had on his fastball in 2018 … but McClanahan's fastball gets more run than Snell's. McClanahan's four-seamer averages 10.7 inches of arm-side run; Snell threw more of a true four-seamer, with only 4.7 inches of horizontal movement.

With McClanahan's extra velo and movement, his fastball has become a little more of a swing-and-miss pitch than Snell's was. McClanahan has a 28% whiff rate on his four-seamer this season (up from 19% in 2021) and a 24% putaway rate (up from just under 20%). Snell in 2018 had a 25% four-seam whiff rate and 20% putaway rate.

He has an extra strikeout pitch

We've covered the four-seamer and the two breaking balls. But the changeup is important, too. McClanahan's changeup is a different type of changeup than Snell's was.

Even though McClanahan uses a hard, high-80s changeup specifically to attack right-handed hitters, like Snell, and even though they're both effective pitches (McClanahan is allowing a .137 batting average on changeups, Snell allowed a .195 average), McClanahan's changeup is a strikeout pitch. Snell's wasn't.

McClanahan has gotten 40 strikeouts with his changeup this year. Snell only had nine K's with his changeup all of 2018.

That gives McClanahan four real strikeout pitches -- everything he throws -- where Snell really only had three.

It's a change from 2021, when McClanahan relied much more heavily on his four-seamer and slider. Those accounted for over 75% of his total pitches. This year, he's throwing a lot more changeups and curveballs, which have gone from just under a quarter of his pitch mix to just under half. He's a more balanced pitcher in 2022.

Now, McClanahan is one of only three pitchers with 20 or more strikeouts on four different pitch types this season:

• McClanahan: curveball (44), changeup (40), 4-seamer (35), slider (22)
• Max Fried: 4-seamer (26), curveball (25), slider (22), changeup (22)
• Tarik Skubal: changeup (26), sinker (22), 4-seamer (21), slider (21)

He attacks the zone

Stylistically, 2022 McClanahan has one big difference from 2018 Snell: He pounds the strike zone with everything, even his secondary pitches. Snell won the Cy Young Award because he was an elite chase pitcher.

Check out McClanahan's strikeout and walk rates this season. He's striking out 36% of the batters he faces and walking less than 5% of them. His 7.42 strikeout-to-walk ratio leads the American League.

Over 51% of his pitches are in the strike zone, where Snell was only throwing 44% of his pitches in the zone in 2018. McClanahan has gotten 54% of his strikeouts on pitches inside the zone, and even 53% of his breaking-ball K's. Snell got 58% of his strikeouts on pitches out of the zone in 2018, and two thirds of his breaking ball K's.

Most in-zone strikeouts, 2022
1) Shane McClanahan: 76
2) Aaron Nola: 72
3) Gerrit Cole / Cristian Javier: 66
5) Carlos Rodón / Chris Bassitt: 64

McClanahan's approach might be helping him go deeper in games -- one of the main points against Snell in his Cy Young race against Justin Verlander in 2018. He's averaging 6.14 innings per start in 2022, vs. Snell's 5.83 innings per start in '18. McClanahan has gone seven-plus innings in six of his 17 starts, over a third; Snell went seven-plus in only seven of 31 starts in '18, under a quarter.

Still, it's cool how two different young Rays southpaws can ride different approaches to dominant seasons. McClanahan challenges hitters in the zone and wins; Snell made them go after unhittable pitches. Both styles can produce a Cy Young-caliber ace.