Andrew Cashner’s Strange Path to Fantasy Relevance

Andrew Cashner did not get much respect from fantasy owners this season. Given that he finished with the highest contact rate and lowest swinging strike rate for any qualified starting pitcher, it may look like he was undeserving of widespread ownership. Cashner’s 12.2 percent strikeout rate was lower than all qualifiers, except for Ty Blach, and that paucity of Ks usually doesn’t bode well for one’s fantasy value. Not only does it put an owner behind in the strikeout category, but K-rates inversely correlate with ERA.

Run prevention was not a problem for Cashner, as he ranked 15th among qualifiers with a 3.40 ERA. On the basis of that, along with 11 wins, a 1.32 WHIP and just 86 strikeouts, Cashner was a top-70 starter, both in Roto value (per ESPN’s Player Rater) and in CBS fantasy points. That may not sound like a big deal — okay, it’s not a big deal — but it does mean that Cashner was more valuable than several more popular starters. For example, the 31-year-old outearned Tanner Roark, John Lackey and Sean Manaea in Roto value and amassed more CBS fantasy points than Taijuan Walker.

While Cashner was the most contact-friendly starter among qualifiers, he compensated by doing something less valued extremely well. Few pitchers, if any, were more successful once a ball was put in play. Cashner’s .266 BABIP was the seventh-lowest and only Michael Fulmer had a lower proportion of plate appearances result in an extra-base hit. Even with the low BABIP, Cashner was only able to hold opponents to a slightly-lower-than-average .250 batting average, but the .365 slugging percentage he allowed was 61 points below the major league norm.

As the rate of extra-base hits has increased steadily over the last three seasons, no pitcher has gotten more mileage out of limiting opponents to singles than Cashner did in 2017. In 16 of his 28 starts, Cashner allowed no more than one extra-base hit. While 14 qualified starting pitchers over the last three years have had a season in which they bested his 5.8 percent rate of extra-base hits (per plate appearance), only Cashner has managed an ERA- below 80 while posting a strikeout rate below 18 percent. The Rangers’ righty was nowhere close to that strikeout rate threshold, yet he finished with an ERA- of 74.

A common link among several of those 14 extra-base-averse pitchers, including Jake Arrieta, Sonny Gray, Tyson Ross and Carlos Martinez, has been an ability to induce grounders at a high rate. With a 48.6 percent ground ball rate, Cashner was hardly a standout in that regard this season, but he was unmatched in his ability to limit hard contact on flyballs. Among pitchers who accumulated at least 40 innings on flyballs, Cashner’s 22.4 percent hard contact rate on flies was the lowest. The only other pitchers to register a rate under 30 percent were Marco Estrada (24.2 percent), Mike Foltynewicz (27.2 percent) and Chris Sale (29.1 percent). Estrada, Foltynewicz and Sale were all able to limit average flyball distances below the median of 320 feet (minimum 100 flyballs, per Baseball Savant), but none were close to Cashner’s average of 306 feet. Only Blach’s average distance of 305 feet was lower, but the lefty still allowed hard contact on flyballs at a 34.8 percent rate. That — and a 66.3 percent strand rate — prevented Blach from replicating Cashner’s run-prevention magic, as he was saddled with a 4.78 ERA.

This was not the first season in which Cashner had successfully limited extra-base hits, but he had received a much bigger assist from his home parks in previous years. As a Padre and a Marlin, between 2012 and 2016, he allowed hitters to compile a .112 Iso in his home starts but a .187 Iso in road starts. He needed the help from PETCO Park and Marlins Park, because during that span, Cashner had allowed hard contact on flies at a 42.8 percent rate. That’s nearly double his rate from 2017.

Cashner relied on his sinker much more this season, increasing his usage from 25.3 percent in 2016 to 40.4 percent in 2017, while decreasing his four-seamer usage from 40.1 to 25.6 percent. As the table below shows, Cashner got more horizontal movement on both pitches and lower Isos.

Whether or not Cashner gets drafted outside of deeper leagues will be a referendum on whether owners think he can sustain these gains from 2017. Having this degree of success with such a high contact rate is rare, so there is not much of a precedent to go on in projecting his 2018 numbers. The three most similar cases from recent years are Tanner Roark (2014), Yovani Gallardo (2015) and Miguel Gonzalez (2016), but the track records of these pitchers don’t offer much of a guide for our expectations of Cashner. Roark’s strikeout rate in 2014 was just 17.3 percent, but his success in 2016 and in the second half of 2017 had more to do with increases in his strikeout rate than with a continued trend of limiting hard contact on flyballs. Gallardo’s 2015 campaign with the Rangers bears a strong resemblance to Cashner’s just-completed season, but his hard contact rate on flyballs regressed over the last two years.

Gonzalez may provide the most useful comparison. His 2016 hard flyball contact rate of 27.8 percent was a career low, but since his rookie season of 2012, only 10 pitchers have bested his career hard flyball contact rate of 32.6 percent (min. 160 innings pitched on flyballs). He has never matched his rookie strikeout rate of 17.7 percent, yet his ERA- has been 92 or lower in four of his six seasons. If Gonzalez had pitched in more favorable home park environments, his ERAs could have been even lower. He has thrown more than 40 career innings at Fenway Park (3.95 career ERA) and Tropicana Field (career 1.92 ERA), and at each park, he has an Iso below .140.

If Gonzalez provides the best-case comp for Cashner going forward, there is not much for fantasy owners to get excited about. Owners in deeper leagues, however, should pay attention to where Cashner signs this offseason, as he could put up a mid-3.00s ERA with the right home venue, even with some regression in his hard contact rate on flies.

Then again, maybe Cashner can fare much better than Gonzalez has. At his best, Gonzalez was far better than average at avoiding hard contact on flies, but Cashner has already been better in this regard than Gonzalez was at his peak. Incredibly, Cashner translated his mastery over flyballs into a 3.40 ERA despite a K-BB% of 3.1 percentage points. Just imagine if he improves his strikeout and walk rates while continuing to stymie opponents on flyballs. This possibility alone means a wider array of mixed leagues owners should put Cashner on their radar for draft day and beyond.

Even if Cashner goes undrafted outside of deeper leagues in 2018, owners in 12-team mixed leagues should still track his early starts to see if he continues to be stingy with extra-base hits. It may be worthwhile to do the same with Rafael Montero and Brent Suter, if they lay claim to rotation spots. Neither was even average as a strikeout pitcher in 2017, but both had average flyball distances lower than Cashner’s and hard contact rates on flies well below the major league average of 38.3 percent. If you’re looking for a pitcher who might outearn Cashner with an even lower strikeout rate, check in on Paul Blackburn. In 10 starts, he registered a 3.22 ERA despite a 9.2 percent strikeout rate, but he limited opponents to a 24.5 percent hard contact rate on flyballs and an average flyball distance of 307 feet.