Rick Porcello and Tanner Roark are both leaving the Winter Meetings with new teams, as Porcello agreed to a one-year, $10 million deal with the Mets and Roark will provide much-needed innings for the Blue Jays on a two-year, $24 million deal. Neither pitcher has had an ERA below 4.00 in any of the last three seasons, but both pitchers have been remarkably durable and largely reliable as innings eaters.

Porcello, of course, has a 2016 American League Cy Young Award on his résumé. While he has not pitched close to that level since, ample run support and regular turns in the Red Sox’s rotation have helped him to win 31 games over the last two seasons. In 2018, he went 17-7 with a 4.28 ERA, and that was good enough for Porcello to rank 41st among starting pitchers in 5×5 Roto value. With the Mets, he will hold down the fourth or fifth spot in the rotation, depending on whether they trade one of their other starters in the wake of adding both Porcello and Michael Wacha during the Winter Meetings.
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Some team was going to end up with Anthony Rendon and after missing out on the Gerrit Cole sweepstakes, the Angels ponied up and signed Rendon. It’s a simple signing and here how the various players see their fantasy values change.

Anthony Rendon (down)

From 2016 to 2018, Rendon was about the same hitter with between 20 and 24 home runs, .270 to .308 AVG, and never breaking a 190 Runs+RBI. He just destroyed those numbers last season with 34 homers, a .319 AVG, and 243 Runs+RBIs. With nothing changing in his hitting profile (plate discipline and batted ball stats), the career season can be based on a little luck but mainly the happy fun ball which is back for another season.

The change in scenery factors seem to point to his value going down a bit. The park factors between Washington DC and Orange County are about the same. The division opponents are a mix of competitive and non-competitive teams. The biggest difference will be the lineup quality. Even with a DH, the Angels averaged 4.75 runs per game last season and the Nationals were at 5.4 runs per game. Even though the best player in baseball will be in the Angels lineup, it’s a huge downgrade for Rendon. While the juiced ball will keep his home runs up, the Runs+RBI total should be around 200 to 210 instead of 240.

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The Mets signed Michael Wacha to a one-year, $3 million deal with $7 million worth of incentives on Wednesday afternoon, and he ostensibly fills the rotation vacancy left by Zack Wheeler, albeit as their fifth starter. Wacha has exceeded 170 innings only once in his seven-year career, and his 2019 season was discouraging, featuring a 4.76 ERA and a couple of demotions to the Cardinals’ bullpen. On the plus side, he recorded a 3.20 ERA in an injury-shortened 2018 season, and at 28 years old, he could still have several good seasons ahead of him.

Wacha’s fantasy appeal has never been about strikeouts, but he has authored four seasons with a sub-3.50 ERA. In each of those years, he has had low HR/9 ratios and BABIPs, both of which were frequently aided by soft contact rates. Pitching at Busch Stadium helped as well. Over his first six seasons, Wacha had a 3.54 ERA and an 0.7 HR/9 at home,, but a 4.02 ERA and a 1.0 HR/9 on the road. This past season, he was better at home yet again, but neither set of splits was very good. Wacha was abysmal on the road with a 5.30 ERA, and he gave up more than two home runs for every nine innings. At home, his ERA was superficially respectable at 4.07, but he needed to strand 81.7 percent of his baserunners to keep it that low, as hitters collectively put up a .278/.338/.481 slash line against him.
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Gerrit Cole signed by NYY (9 years/$324 million dollars)

I’ll be honest, I was really hoping Cole would sign with the Angels but that’s only because I really want Mike Trout in the playoffs and that would’ve really helped. Brian Cashman has landed his white whale and the Evil Empire has returned with this incredible deal. This is unfathomable money and congratulations to Cole for securing the bag. Here’s the thing, he’s coming off a truly masterful season in 2019 meaning he can’t really go anywhere but down from this insane peak.

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Last week, Jonathan Villar was traded to the Marlins, which will be his third team in three years. For a guy who has posted six WAR in the last two seasons, that’s pretty surprising. He’s been quite the exciting power/speed contributor over the past four years, with double digit homers and steals galore. Will the park switch affect his offensive output? Let’s check the park factors to find out.

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Didi Gregorius signed by PHI (1 year/$14 million dollars)

Just like last offseason, the Phillies aren’t playing around. They’ve already addressed their pitching issues with a big five-year deal for Zack Wheeler and now they’ve got the last piece for their offense in place with the signing of Didi Gregorius. After César Hernández was non-tendered, we started to see rumors ramp up that they were interested in Gregorius. The one-year, $14 million dollar deal will install Gregorius at shortstop while moving Jean Segura to spot that Hernández’s departure opened up at 2B.

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… probably not, but anyone probably already guessed that considering Stephen Strasburg’s injury history. The answer isn’t that far off after digging through some historic comps. Only once in his 10-year career has he topped 200 innings (215 in 2014) and only over 180 one other time. He’s thrown under 160 innings six times in ten seasons. Another issue besides the limited innings is that he’s going to be on the wrong side of 30 where pitcher breakdown faster. It’s time to look a little deeper and see what innings total should be expected.

I need to start with some guidelines. First, I’m only going to examine pitchers who throw the 200 innings between their ages 28 and 32 seasons. Also, the pitcher needs to be considered a starter with at least half of their games as a starter (GS/G >= 0.5). Finally, I rode the fine line of using recent data and having enough samples. With pitchers recently throwing fewer innings, I only used pitchers from the past 10 seasons.
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The Rays agreed to trade Tommy Pham, along with two-way prospect Jake Cronenworth, to the Padres for Hunter Renfroe and middle infield prospect Xavier Edwards on Thursday night, but this isn’t exactly a trade impact piece. I don’t see the deal having much of an impact on the fantasy value of any of the players involved, or at least not enough of an impact that the changes of scenery are likely to affect my 2020 rankings.

In sizing up how the trade might affect Pham’s fantasy value, I noticed something odd in his month-by-month trends from 2019. He had never recorded a BABIP below .333 in any of his four previous seasons, and through the end of May, Pham had a .346 BABIP that looked quite normal for him. Then, all of a sudden, he stopped BABIPing. Pham’s rates for the next three months were .288. ,265 and .303, though he did rebound for a .338 BABIP in September. His .299 BABIP over those four months combined is normal for most hitters but unusually low for him.
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It’s so nice to have a winter that actually includes substantial movement before the new year. After a painfully slow last two years, we’ve been running a toasty hot stove this year and the Winter Meetings haven’t even kicked off yet (they start Sunday!).

Zack Wheeler signed by Philadelphia (5 years/$118 million dollars)

This is one of those interesting moves that causes a big splash on the national landscape, especially being a high-profile arm joining a new team in the same division, but it’s not quite as impactful in the fantasy realm. It’s a big deal for sure, but Wheeler’s fantasy outlook for 2020 isn’t greatly altered by the move. He moves to a worse park but gets a markedly better defense supporting him. Neither bullpen was particularly good in 2019 and I actually expect both to improve in 2020, so let’s call that neutral.

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Cole Hamels could have signed with several different teams and help clarify the team’s rotation. Instead, he went to Atlanta and made a murky situation worse.

While Hamels has not been competing for a Cy Young for several seasons, he has been a production pitcher. Over the last 10 years, he has never posted an ERA over 4.20 (3.42 on his career) or threw fewer than 141 innings. The innings low point was this past season when he lost a month due to a strained oblique.

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