… 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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12/4/19

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THE NON-TENDER TEAM

• C: Josh Phegley (3:03)
• 1B: C.J. Cron (4:55)
• 2B: César Hernández (14:55)
• 3B: Maikel Franco (23:12), Travis Shaw (31:40)
• SS: José Peraza (39:11)
• OF: Domingo Santana (45:08), Kevin Pillar (50:36), Steven Souza Jr. (59:33)
• P: Blake Treinen (1:06:22), Taijuan Walker (1:07:00)
• Ranking the Hitters (1:08:00)

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I was originally going to cover all of these moves (sans the Miami ones because they hadn’t happened yet) yesterday when I wrote up San Diego’s busy offseason, but that might’ve been pushing 2500 words so I broke it up into two pieces. Let’s get caught up on the latest offseason deals:

Mike Moustakas to Cincinnati

While the terms of deals aren’t a major concern for us in the fantasy realm (at least until they start to play a role in dictating playing time), it feels like Moose is finally getting the money he deserved the last few years. After making $12.5 million the last two seasons for production worth at least three times that, he’ll be paid $64 million over the next four seasons to play in Cincinnati and make a more permanent move to the keystone. With Eugenio Suárez locked in at 3B, Moose will now be an everyday 2B and also cement Nick Senzel’s future in CF.

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A total of 53 players were non-tendered prior to Monday night’s deadline, and a number of fantasy-relevant players were included in that group. Domingo Santana and C.J. Cron fit that description, and if they can successfully come back from injury, so may Steven Souza Jr., Taijuan Walker and Aaron Sanchez.

What is less clear is whether Blake Treinen, José Peraza and Kevin Gausman can still be called fantasy-relevant. They certainly were as recently as 2018, but each of them fell so far in 2019 that they failed to make the top 500 in ADP in the 2 Early Mocks. Yet, upon closer examination, all three have the potential to have comeback seasons in 2020. Even though they may not get much attention in fantasy circles this offseason, I’ll make the case as to why each is deserving of a spot on your late-round flier or watch list.

Blake Treinen

In 2019, Treinen lost all of the gains he made in his strikeout and swinging strike rates in 2018, and he even lost his long-held knack for getting grounders. This combination led to the escalation of Treinen’s ERA from 0.78 to 4.91 and to him losing the Athletics’ closer role to Liam Hendriks. The loss of whiffs is likely related to a decrease in average sinker velocity from 98.0 to 96.7 mph, as well as a drop in average sinker spin rate form 2371 to 2250 rpm. He was generally locating his pitches higher (see below), which would explain his middling ground ball rate (42.8 percent) and HR/9 ratio (1.38).
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We’ve actually enjoyed a pretty busy offseason thus far. Today, I’m focusing specifically on the big moves of the Padres and then tomorrow I’ll dive into the other moves including the big news this afternoon that Mike Moustakas is headed to Cincinnati.

Padres get Trent Grisham and Zach Davies; Brewers get Luis Urías and Eric Lauer

Grisham actually joins a relatively crowded outfield with Hunter Renfroe, Wil Myers, Manuel Margot, and Franchy Cordero also on board, though given how active the Padres have already been this winter, I wouldn’t be surprised if they had plans to clear the logjam a bit before the spring. Grisham’s season obviously ended on a down note with the fielding flub that hurt the Brewers in the wildcard game, but now he gets a fresh start in San Diego.

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In a shocking free agent move, the Chicago White Sox have signed Yasmani Grandal to a 4-year, $73 million-dollar deal. Several teams were said to be in on Grandal as he was not only the best catcher available this offseason, but also one of the very best catchers in all of baseball. After showing some flashes with San Diego, Grandal broke out with the Dodgers and wound up with a healthy 116 wRC+ over his four seasons in LA.

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The Braves continued the upgrading of their bullpen, which they began at this year’s trade deadline, by signing Will Smith on Thursday. In inking the lefty to a three-year, $40 million deal with a fourth-year team option, they added a reliever who struck out 96 batters over 65.1 innings and recorded 34 saves for the Giants in 2019. Smith’s ex-teammate (and now new teammate), Mark Melancon, was effective as the Braves’ closer down the stretch this season, but I was probably not alone in assuming that Smith would go into spring training as the team’s new closer.
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