Bottom 20 Starting Pitcher SIERA Laggards

Yesterday, I listed and discussed the top 20 starting pitcher SIERA leaders. Since the entire season represents a small sample size, you should be far more inclined to focus on a pitcher’s SIERA, driven by his underlying skills, than the ratios that actually count in your fantasy leagues, ERA and WHIP. The underlying metrics fueling SIERA stabilize far quicker and account for skills pitchers have more control over. It therefore makes for a significantly better rest of season projection, even though SIERA is meant to be backwards looking, not forward looking. With that said, let’s check in on the bottom 20 pitchers in SIERA and discuss the interesting names. As a reminder, just because a pitcher finds his name here doesn’t mean you should drop him or trade him away, as the pitcher could improve his skills, pushing his SIERA down into more attractive territory.

As a starting pitcher on the Rockies who has had to deal with one of the league’s most hitter friendly environments, it’s no surprise that Jon Gray’s ERAs have represented a roller coaster ride since his first full season in 2016. But his SIERA marks had typically been much more consistent, aside from last year’s jump. This year, his skills have completely collapsed, namely his strikeout rate has shockingly been cut in half. Although his SwStk% remains just barely in double digits, his strikeout rate sits at a lowly 12%. That ranks second worst among qualified pitchers. Who would have thunk that after 30 innings, Gray would be the guy who ranks that low?! One of the obvious possible reasons is a significant decline in fastball velocity, which has dipped two miles per hour from last year. He was always a risky asset as a Rockies starter, but with reduced velocity, I want no part of banking on a rebound.

I thought Dylan Cease was a reasonable buy in a shortened season as owners should be focusing on strikeouts, while the ratios bounce all over the place given small sample randomness. Cease has proven to be a partly correctly call as a target, as his ERA sits more than two runs below his SIERA, but the strikeouts have been weak. Unlike Gray, his fastball velocity is actually up by more than a mile per hour. He has also thrown his better whiff-inducing slider instead of his curveball, but neither of these factors have helped his strikeout rate. I’d bet he improves his skills, bringing down his SIERA, but it won’t be enough to fend off some major ERA regression.

Garrett Richards returned from TJ surgery last season, and he recorded just 8.2 innings. So the short season seemed the perfect chance to roster Richards, who wouldn’t have to worry about an innings limit. Unfortunately, his strikeout rate has collapsed and overall skills poor. He’s no longer a ground ball pitcher and still possesses below average control, so without the strikeouts, he’s a below average pitcher. His fastball velocity remains well below its peak, but he’s throwing his slider at nearly the highest rate of his career, which should be a positive for his strikeout rate, but it hasn’t been enough to offset the weaker fastball.

Chris Bassitt has enjoyed an outwardly strong start to the season, but a deeper look suggests trouble ahead. His skills are mediocre at best and comes with a below average strikeout rate. It’s worth noting that over his career, he has dramatically outperformed his SIERA, but that’s over just 368.2 innings, which is too small a sample to determine whether he’s inherently a SIERA outperformer or has just benefited from a string of good fortune over about two full seasons worth of innings.

After a slow start from a skills perspective, Mike Minor’s SIERA now sits almost exactly the same as last year, but his luck has turned. The entire difference is his HR/FB rate has skyrocketed, while his LOB% has plummeted. Both should move closer to his career norms, resulting in an improved ERA, but even a neutral luck Minor is pretty meh.

Jose Berrios has earned the perception of one of the better young pitchers in baseball and a targeted fantasy asset, but his underlying skills have never been very impressive. With a SIERA well above 4.00 once again, he’ll need to rely on some good fortune like last year to get that ERA below 4.00. I’d rather just own a guy whose skills actually support a sub-4.00 ERA than hope Berrios posts another better than league average HR/FB rate.

Sheesh, is Randy Dobnak playing with fire or what?! With a 1.78 ERA, he’s been a boon to fantasy owners, but a 13.5% strikeout rate means success is unlikely to last much longer. He does offset those lack of whiffs with an extreme grounder rate, so he could rely on double plays to erase all the baserunners he should be allowing. Those baserunners aren’t making it onto the basepaths though thanks to a crazy .226 BABIP, which makes little sense from an extreme ground ball pitcher, since grounders go for hits far more frequently than fly balls.

Lance McCullers Jr. was seemingly another short season beneficiary, as he missed all of 2019 recovering from TJ surgery and the shortened season means there wouldn’t be as large a difference between his innings and the top tier pitchers in innings. Unfortunately, while he has remained healthy, his performance has been quite disappointing, and it’s backed by weak skills. His strikeout rate has fallen below 20% for the first time, but while his fastball velocity is down, it’s only down marginally, and not enough to question how well recovered he actually is. I’ve been a big fan in the past, but it’s anyone’s guess whether he improves his skills the rest of the way given the uncertainty of pitchers’ recoveries from such major surgery.