2015 Starting Pitcher DL Projections
As our own Brad Johnson stated today, one of the reasons pitchers are difficult to evaluate in their inconsistencies. One of the biggest reasons for the inconsistencies is pitcher health. While a few hitters can lose an entire season because of injury, it is just a fraction compared to pitchers who have to sit out. To help understand each pitcher’s injury risk, I will release my 2015 starting pitcher rankings.
I have been releasing the values for a few seasons with accurate results. Last season, I estimated 50 of the 128 pitchers who threw 120 innings in 2013 would end up on the DL. I was a little low since 53 starters made a least one trip. It work out to 41% or 2 out of every 5 starters. The percentage always seems to hover around 40%.
The get the values, I used the same trustworthy formula I created a few years back which looks at three items:
- Age: The older the pitcher, the more the injury risk (+1% point increase each year older)
- Injury history: Nothing predicts future injury like past injuries (+10% points for each season of the past three on the DL).
- Games Started: A pitcher needs to show they can throw for an entire season without breaking down (-3% points for each full season up to three).
Additionally besides the overall injury percentage, I have found high breaking ball usage and ability to throw strikes pointing to higher injury risks. Here are the categories noted on the spreadsheet.
- Slider% > 30%
- Curveball usuage > 25%
- Throw strikes < 60%
- Pitchf/x Zone% < 47%
All the information can be found in this Google doc. For a reference, here are the top ten most and least likely players to go on the DL
| Name | Age | DL Stints (last 3 seasons) | GS (last 3 seasons) | DL% |
| Bartolo Colon | 41 | 2 | 85 | 60.3% |
| Tim Hudson | 38 | 2 | 80 | 57.1% |
| Colby Lewis | 34 | 2 | 45 | 55.6% |
| John Lackey | 35 | 2 | 60 | 55.3% |
| Charlie Morton | 30 | 3 | 55 | 55.0% |
| J.A. Happ | 31 | 3 | 68 | 55.0% |
| Ryan Vogelsong | 36 | 2 | 82 | 54.4% |
| A.J. Burnett | 37 | 2 | 95 | 54.4% |
| Matt Garza | 30 | 3 | 69 | 53.6% |
| Clay Buchholz | 29 | 3 | 73 | 51.9% |
| Travis Wood | 27 | 0 | 89 | 32.1% |
| Wily Peralta | 25 | 0 | 69 | 31.6% |
| Lance Lynn | 27 | 0 | 95 | 31.5% |
| Wade Miley | 27 | 0 | 95 | 31.5% |
| Mike Leake | 26 | 0 | 94 | 30.5% |
| Jose Quintana | 25 | 0 | 87 | 30.1% |
| Shelby Miller | 23 | 0 | 63 | 29.9% |
| Julio Teheran | 23 | 0 | 64 | 29.8% |
| Rick Porcello | 25 | 0 | 91 | 29.7% |
| Madison Bumgarner | 24 | 0 | 96 | 28.3% |
Old, injured guys on the top … healthy established kids on the bottom.
Predicting exactly which starting pitcher will get injured in nearly impossible, but we can understand the pitcher’s injury chance. An owner just has to understand the risks involved with pitcher and make their own evaluations.
Jeff, one of the authors of the fantasy baseball guide,The Process, writes for RotoGraphs, The Hardball Times, Rotowire, Baseball America, and BaseballHQ. He has been nominated for two SABR Analytics Research Award for Contemporary Analysis and won it in 2013 in tandem with Bill Petti. He has won four FSWA Awards including on for his Mining the News series. He's won Tout Wars three times, LABR twice, and got his first NFBC Main Event win in 2021. Follow him on Twitter @jeffwzimmerman.
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