Nah, its not a pitch recognition issue, its just a "guessing at what's coming and deciding what to do ahead of time" issue
His first PA, as soon as he swung and missed at 2 breaking balls away, i knew he would strike out looking on an outer half fastball because he would just be assuming everything outer half was another breaking ball. Granted... Schmidt painted the crap out that 4 seamer on the edge, but Vlad didn't even really think about swinging. He was guessing. He guesses a lot.
When he's in a groove, he spits on those sliders and cutters off the plate, so he can recognize pitches just fine for the most part.