MILWAUKEE -- Carmen Mlodzinski didn’t go looking for a mentor in December 2023. He just needed someone to throw with.
Coming off his first Major League season, the Pirates pitcher was spending the winter in Hawaii and wanted a partner. So he did what any resourceful pitcher with a curious streak might do: he searched for pro baseball players in the area. That search led him to Kirby Yates, the Kauai native whose splitter helped rescue his career after he adopted the pitch in April 2017.
Mlodzinski got Yates’ number through his agency and made the call himself, unsure of how it would go.
“There were definitely some nerves there,” Mlodzinski said. “For me, that comes from respect.
He’s had such a great career. He’s definitely somebody I’ve looked up to.
If I can have the career he had, I’ll be pretty happy.”
The nerves didn’t last long. The conversation went smoothly, and soon enough the two were throwing together at Kauai High School, where Yates’ older brother Spencer coaches. This week, after the Pirates traded for Yates at the MLB Trade Deadline, both pitchers called it “a full-circle moment.”
For Mlodzinski, the trip became a crash course in splitter obsession. He asked about everything: the grip, the intent, the arm action, the little details that make the pitch tumble the way it does. Yates didn’t hold back.
That kind of openness has always been part of Yates’ deal. He’s a veteran who gives back, and he seemed especially willing to dive into the mechanics of a pitch that changed everything for him.
Yates had his own struggles early on, getting roughed up with the Yankees in 2015 and then being traded twice in six weeks after that season. Questions about whether he could stick in the majors were very real.
While he was fighting through that stretch, he started picking Masahiro Tanaka’s brain about the splitter, then finally put those lessons to use two years later.
So when a younger pitcher came calling with the same kind of curiosity, Yates was ready.
“I’m always open to sharing whatever knowledge I’ve got, however I can help people,” Yates said. “If there are young guys and they have questions to ask, I will always answer them as truthfully as I can and try to help as much as I can.”
Mlodzinski took that advice and ran with it. He first became intrigued by the splitter through David Bednar, then got comfortable enough to use it in a big league game in 2025. This season, it has become his best pitch.
Opponents are batting .175 against Mlodzinski’s splitter, and they’ve managed only a .223 slugging percentage. He’s getting a 31.0% whiff rate with it and throwing it 26.5% of the time.
“You look at the last five years, [splitters] have performed really well,” Mlodzinski said. “What makes the pitch so good is the inconsistency of it.
It has such a late break. You have a changeup and a knuckleball, but the splitter is probably somewhere in between.
“You’re killing so much spin that it has a little bit of a wobble to it. It’s hard for a hitter to time up.
Everyone’s splitter can be a little bit different, as well. That can play into your favor.”
During those few weeks in Hawaii, Mlodzinski and Yates threw together about a half-dozen times. Along the way, Yates talked through the pressure points that can make the pitch move differently and stressed the importance of command. Mlodzinski said that’s the part Yates does better than anybody.
The pitch itself is awkward work, with the ball wedged between the index and middle finger, fastball arm action, and pronation at the end. Yates learned his own version of it through help from others too. Former Pirate Chasen Shreve showed him how varying arm speed could change the pitch, and in the offseason before he debuted the splitter, Yates threw constantly with Alex Cobb, who gave him instant feedback.
Like Mlodzinski, Yates knew he needed the splitter to stay in the league.
“The thing with the split, once you find your way with it, I think everybody has their unique way with throwing it and what they do,” Yates said. “It’s a unique pitch. I don’t necessarily think two people throw it alike.”
The pitch has become more common across baseball, at least in Yates’ view, because the data now backs it up and old worries about whether it was bad for pitchers have eased. In 2018, splitters made up just 1.3% of all pitches thrown.
That figure has climbed to 3.5% and 3.4% over the last two seasons. It still trails changeups, which sit around 10-11%, but the splitter remains a tough pitch to truly master.
Yates has done that better than most. When he saved 41 games for the Padres in 2019, his splitter carried a run value of 14, per Baseball Savant.
Opponents hit .267 against it last year, the first time in a full season that number had been above .200. In 2026, Yates’ splitter has a .216 batting average against.
“Specifically with Kirby, I think it comes from his command,” Mlodzinski said. “He has such good feel of his four-seam fastball, such good feel of his splitter that he’s really only needed those two pitches to have a special career.
“I don’t have that command. But that pitch has gone a long way for me.
I’m definitely glad he showed me it. Still a work in progress, as everything I throw is.
But it’s been good for me.”
What started with a cold call in Hawaii has now come full circle in Pittsburgh. Mlodzinski remembered how welcoming Yates was, even leading to a beachfront camping trip with Yates’ older brothers while Kirby was tied up with family obligations. Now the roles are reversed: Yates is the newcomer with the Pirates, and Mlodzinski is the one glad to have him around.
“The reputation that comes with him is more than just him being a good player,” Mlodzinski said. “He’s such a good human.
I think you see that already in the clubhouse. He’s very bright.
People want to be around him. He’s a really good dude.
“I’m super excited to play with him and get to watch him. It’s gonna be awesome to see that splitter in person. Little bit of a full-circle moment, for sure.”
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