Assembling The $80 Pitching Staff: Reviving The Quadrinity, Starting Pitcher Edition

According to the novelist Rick Moody, the purpose of literature is “to cast in language the nature of being.” And sure enough, that’s the Birchwood Brothers’ purpose, too–well, that and to recommend underpriced starting pitchers for your Fantasy Baseball draft or auction. To that end, we hereby cast in language the 2018 Trinity and Quadrinity, Starting Pitcher Edition.

To see a summary of what we’re doing, check out the installment of March 8, which used the same approach to spot an underpriced relief pitcher or two. If, after that, your thirst for knowledge remains unslaked, go here. As you see, this is a simple and self-evident approach, and it never fails to identify the usual suspects—the Kershaws, Sales, and Scherzers whom everyone knows and whom you’ll have to pay up for. But it also never fails to identify a handful of cheap pitchers, some of whom then have breakout seasons and who, collectively, can be used to assemble a bargain-basement pitching staff that outearns what it costs. In February last year, for example, we identified ten starting pitchers, a combination of six of whom, we opined, could form the basis of a good pitching staff costing $80 or less. Three of those guys—Smyly, McHugh, and Rodon—were hurting all Spring and on the DL when the season started. The other seven were Ervin Santana, Pedro Severino, James Paxton, Nathan Karns, Mike Foltynewicz, Tyler Anderson, and Jeremy Hellickson—not by any means an unflawed group, but if you had two (or all) of Santana, Severino, and Paxton, you had nothing to complain about.

This year even more than in past years, the Trinity is a somewhat unwieldy group (32 pitchers), and generally unsurprising. Kershaw’s there, Strasburg is there, de Grom is there, Kluber is there, Carrasco is there. Lance McCullers is there, though he’s not getting drafted because he’s a serious injury risk.Aaron Nola, Luke Weaver, and Jon Gray, all of whom we absolutely love this season, are there. Chris Sale and Max Scherzer aren’t—not enough ground balls—but we suggest that you not hold it against them. There are, however, some guys that you won’t find among either last year’s WAR pitcher top 30 or the first 30 or so starting pitchers off the board in this year’s draft. These include Gonzalo Marquez, Jameson Taillon, J.A. Happ, Patrick Corbin, Felix Hernandez, and Nathan Karns.

Sale and Scherzer made the Quadrinity, as did Kershaw, Kluber, Strasburg, de Grom, and Carrasco. So did some of last year’s other top pitchers who didn’t make the Trinity: Chase Anderson, Jose Berrios, Ervin Santana, perennial Fantasy underachiever Jeff Samardzija. And to our surprise and delight, so did Tyler Anderson, with whom our infatuation of last season endures. And among the two dozen or so guys who made both groups are some surprises, both mild (Jon Gray) and serious: Corbin, Happ, Taillon, Karns, and Hernandez.

There are, of course, reasons to avoid these five guys, some of them stronger than others. Happ is 35. Hernandez is 87, and his fastball is now slower than his curve. Corbin’s ERA and WHIP were nothing special, and last time he had a good season, he needed Tommy John surgery the following Spring. Karns has a habit of torpedoing otherwise good numbers with an atrocious outing or three. Taillon has had a Joblike series of health issues. But that’s the point. If they weren’t superficially unappealing, you’d have to pay more for them.

So there you go. We think that, by relying on the Quadrinity, and even confining yourself to pitchers who also made the Trinity, you can put together a very good pitching staff for about $80 (or, if a snake draft is your poison, or venom, without taking a starting pitcher before the sixth round). We recommend a Chinese menu approach: get two of Tanaka ($14 in Tout Wars mixed auction on March 17th), Weaver ($13), Hendricks ($11), Lester ($13), and Arrieta($12); two of Taillon ($7), Gray ($9), and McCullers ($9); and two of Happ ($3), Corbin ($4), Hernandez ($1), and Karns (not taken at all, even as a Reserve). That group plus two solid but sensibly-priced closers (Quadrinitarians Giles, Rivero, and Allen, or Trinitarian Hand) and a speculative relief pitcher (our man Luke Gregerson, Ryan Madson, or our heartthrob George Kontos, who will go so nicely on your mantelpiece with Rivero) should keep you within your budget.