It’s still super early, with only some teams playing as many as 10 games. And yet, those 10 games already represent 16.7% of the season! CRAZY. So yes, it’s still super early to evaluate most performances, but by the time we have enough of a sample to make better judgments, the season will have ended. So like I discussed last week with pitcher fastball velocity, let’s look at another underlying skill metric that stabilizes more quickly than a results-based metric — exit velocity. I like barrels more, but with the tiny samples so far, one more or less barrel will make a significant difference in barrel rate, so it’s simply too soon. So we’ll stick with average fly ball/line drive exit velocity, as it’s pretty straightforward — all else being equal, the faster the bat meets the ball, the further the ball will travel.

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On Tuesday, I shared and discussed the starting pitchers that have suffered the largest declines in their fastball velocity compared with 2019. A significant drop in fastball velocity could be a warning sign of injury, and already one decliner, Reynaldo Lopez, has hit the IL. Today, I’m going to update the list again with starters who have pitched since my last post. Once again, these are the starters whose “Pitch Type” fastball velocity has decreased by at least one mile per hour versus last year.

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On Monday, I shared and discussed the 10 starting pitchers that have increased their fastball velocity the most compared with 2019. Finding the early velocity surgers is one of the best ways to identify the season’s breakouts, as velocity has a high correlation with strikeout rate, so a higher velocity should result in more strikeouts, which should reduce ERA. Since it’s so important, I’m going to update the list again with starters who have pitched since then. Once again, these are the starters whose “Pitch Type” fastball velocity has increased at least one mile per hour versus last year.

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Yesterday, I identified and discussed starting pitchers who have experienced at least a one mile per hour jump in fastball velocity. Sure, it’s just one start, but velocity stabilizes much faster than any result or skill-based stat. Today, I’ll look at the flip side – those pitchers who have suffered a velocity decline versus last year. Note that my level of bullishness is higher for the velocity gainers than the level of bearishness for velocity decliners (assuming the same amount of gain and decline if comparing two pitchers). You can’t really fake a velocity jump, but there are myriad reasons why a pitcher’s velocity was down in his first start.

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It’s super early, so there’s not a whole lot to analyze at this point, aside from injuries and playing time. However, there is something that stabilizes very quickly, and that’s fastball velocity. It also carries great significance, as fastball velocity is highly correlated with strikeout rate. All else being equal, a higher strikeout rate should result in a lower ERA and WHIP. So after one start, whose fastball velocity has spiked by at least one mile per hour versus 2019? I used the “Pitch Type” velocities, rather than “Pitch Info Pitch Type”, because the latter section takes a full day to update and therefore doesn’t have the velocities from Saturday’s games. I also only compared 2020 velocity to velocity during games started in 2019, so if a starter made any relief appearances, those wouldn’t be counted as part of 2019 velocity.

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Finally, the season is about to begin! Typically, my bold predictions comprise 10 crystal ball forecasts. However, I ended up coming up with just six and am not in the mood to try to come up with four more. I simply can’t boldly predict things when the season sample is small, and frankly, anything could happen (Dee Gordon – 10 home runs?!). They all happen to be positive predictions as well, even though I usually like throwing in a couple of negatives. Oh well, you get three hitter and three pitcher boldies. So let’s do this…

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Yesterday, I unveiled my bold hitter league leaders, of which I expect to go 10 for 10. The pitching side of the ledger is a bit easier. Given that there is both more luck and factors outside the specific pitcher’s control that shapes his surface results, it’s more conceivable that a non-favorite leads the league in a category. This is even more so over a shortened season.

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Every season, in addition to posting my standard bold predictions (which I’ll publish on Thursday), I up the ante with my bold league leaders. If you thought nailing a bold prediction was tough, the bold league leaders are even more difficult! Just getting one right is worthy of celebration. Because these are bold, I automatically disqualify players I don’t personally believe would be considered bold or is already projected to finish top five in the category. So I challenge myself and it typically causes me to bat .000. This is more for fun and dreaming of what could be than any serious attempt at being right. That said, if there’s any season to get a bold league leader choice correct, this is it. We might see some very surprising names atop the categorical leaderboards.

We’ll start with the hitting league leaders in each of the five categories, split up by league.

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As I type this, it’s now July 19, and my 2020 fantasy season auctions and drafts have all officially been completed. That is such a strange sentence to type. I am guessing the majority of you are in the same boat, with some of you auctioning/drafting this week as well. Not only is it hard to be excited about the season, but I still feel like it’s going to be a complete crapshoot between small sample performance randomness and COVID-related injuries and issues galore. Given the smaller sample size, I thought the correct pitching strategy was to discount ratios and buy strikeout rates. That strategy gave me five names to target if executing it.

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Yesterday, I discussed five starting pitchers to buy cheap, with the idea that over a smaller sample of games this season, ratio categories are going to be much more volatile than counting stats, and therefore should be discounted on draft/auction day. Instead, perhaps we should just buy strikeouts and cross our fingers the ratios settle into a good range after 10-12 games started. Today, let’s apply the “discount ratios, buy counting stats” concept to hitters. This time, I’m going to ignore batting average and buy power.

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