Welcome back to the Ottoneu Starting Pitching Planner. Based on the Roster Resource Probables Grid, I’ve organized every starter slated to start next week into four categories: start, maybe, risky, and sit. The first and last category are pretty self-explanatory. Starters who fall into the “maybe” category are guys you could start if you need to keep up with the innings pitched pace in points leagues or need to hit your games started cap in head-to-head leagues; they’re good bets to turn in a decent start, but you shouldn’t automatically insert them into your lineup. If you’ve fallen behind on the innings pitched pace or you’re really starving for starts in a head-to-head matchup, you could turn to a “risky” starter or two.

I’ve also calculated a “Matchup Score” for each series using a straight combination of opponent’s home/away wOBA, opponent wOBA over the last 14 days, and the park factor for the ballpark the teams are playing in. It’s indexed so that 100 is average and anything above that is a favorable matchup and anything below is unfavorable. That matchup rating informs some of the sit/start recommendations I’m making, though the quality of the pitcher definitely takes precedence.

A few general schedule notes first:

• The Brewers embark on a pretty tough road trip next week with stops in Toronto and Cincinnati. Both of those ballparks are incredibly conducive to home runs and both opponents play extremely well at home. Half of their rotation wouldn’t be recommended even if the matchup was good, but it’s probably a week where you’re more likely to sit Corbin Burnes and Freddy Peralta.
• After a tough pair of matchups on the road this week, the Marlins return home next week to host a couple of pretty weak lineups in their cavernous ballpark. The Orioles also have two easier matchups on the schedule which should help with some of your decision-making if you’re rostering any of their starters.
• The Royals and Cardinals have a weird two-game series next week followed by two off days in a row. It’s a scheduling quirk that’s a result of the holiday on Monday. St. Louis will get a chance for some extra rest during a week where they’re facing two weak teams.
• The Rockies are on the road next week and have a particularly enticing matchup in Kansas City next weekend giving you an opportunity to start Kyle Freeland or Austin Gomber — if you’re rostering them, you’ve been waiting for exactly this situation!

The Nationals offense has been hitting really well over the last two weeks and they’ve been pretty productive on the road this year making that matchup in Los Angeles particularly tough for the Dodgers. It doesn’t help that Dodger Stadium is pretty home run friendly either. After the Nats, the Yankees come to town which looks like an equally challenging series. Due to all the injuries sustained in their starting rotation, rookies Bobby Miller and Gavin Stone are lined up to take the ball in three games next week; all three look like pretty risky propositions even if the matchup against Washington seems enticing on paper.

The Mariners head to Texas to face the red hot Rangers next weekend which opens up some tough choices for a couple of their starters. Marco Gonzales is an easy sit, but Bryce Miller and Luis Castillo are scheduled to take the mound in the other two games and they’ll face a really strong offense. I’ve listed them both as starts since Miller has been simply dominant across his first five starts in the majors and Castillo looked much better in his last start against the A’s. I’d understand if you chose to avoid that matchup though since it looks really poor on paper.

Notable two-start pitchers:

• Joe Ryan
• Shane McClanahan
• Sandy Alcantara
• Zac Gallen
• Nathan Eovaldi
• Sonny Gray
• Anthony DeSclafani
• Bryce Miller
• Tyler Wells
• Logan Allen

As we near the end of May, we are moving beyond the point at which you can tell yourself it is still early. It’s not imperative that you start to buy or sell right now this very instant or even on June 1, but you do have to start developing a plan for how you will compete this year or, failing that, next.

I often find that part easy. My 12th-place team in the Keep or Kut Listener League is not going to make a miraculous comeback, so I will be selling. My first-, second-, and third-place teams across four leagues are going to fight for the top, even if in some cases it is an uphill battle.

But having decided to buy or sell, I find the hard part is determining which players I will sell or use to buy.

Read the rest of this entry »

The 2023 version of Ottoneu Hot Right Now will include three different sections:

1. Current Auctions: A closer look at players being auctioned at a high rate.
2. Roster Adds: Analysis of players with high add% changes.
3. Hot Performers: Players with a high P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

The FanGraphs Ottoneu team plans to run this feature weekly, updating fantasy managers on the biggest movers in Ottoneu leagues with an analysis of how these players could or could not help your roster.

Read the rest of this entry »

After rethinking what my Friday column looks like last week, I think I’ve settled on what this Tuesday column will cover for the foreseeable future. Instead of focusing on making recommendations for starters each week (which I’ll be doing anyway in my Friday SP Planner), I’ll cover under-rostered pitchers more broadly. I’ll switch off between covering starters and relievers each week with the goal of finding pitchers who are performing well and deserve a second look.

Keeping track of the machinations of 30 major league bullpens is pretty tricky. In standard leagues, it’s hard enough trying to discern which relievers are earning save opportunities, especially since more and more teams are using a committee approach in the ninth inning. In Ottoneu, with both saves and holds earning points, that search for high leverage relievers becomes even more of a challenge. There are plenty of resources out there — the Roster Resource Closer Depth Chart is one of my favorites — but even the most vigilant fantasy player can’t keep track of everything going on across the majors.

The first thing I do when looking for under-rostered relievers is look at Leverage Index, first at the seasonal averages and then the change in Leverage Index over the last two weeks. Generally, teams know what they’re doing when deploying their relievers, and they’ll use their best pitchers in the most high leverage situations. When the bullpen hierarchy shifts, LI is pretty quick to pick up on those changes, though it’s obviously limited by the number of high leverage situations a team sees.

Here’s a list of relievers who have seen the highest positive change in Leverage Index over the last two weeks, who are also rostered in less than 60% of all Ottoneu leagues:

It’s tough to own any Rockies reliever, not only because they pitch half their games in Coors Field, but because the team sees fewer high leverage situations than a more competitive team would. Pierce Johnson is definitely seeing all the save situations in Colorado, though his peripherals aren’t anything special with both his walk rate and his HR/FB rate approaching 15%.

Zach Jackson was just placed on the IL with an elbow injury and there really isn’t anyone in Oakland’s bullpen that’s worth rostering because they’re seeing even fewer high leverage situations than the Rockies are.

The Rangers bullpen situation could be an interesting one to speculate on. Jonathan Hernández was holding the eighth inning role, setting up for Will Smith the closer, but he has allowed eight runs in his last three appearances. He’s probably pitched his way out of the high leverage calculus for now, opening an opportunity for the other two Texas relievers listed above. Josh Sborz had collected holds in three straight appearances before allowing five runs to score across his last two outings. He might have the best peripherals of the bunch, but his footing seems to be unstable after his last two meltdowns. Brock Burke doesn’t have the high strikeout rate you’d expect from a high leverage reliever, though it was 27.4% last year. He might be next in line for the eighth inning based on the struggles of the pitchers who were ahead of him on the depth chart.

There are a few interesting names in the Royals bullpen, though they suffer from the same problem as the A’s and the Rockies. Taylor Clarke seems to have the seventh inning role locked down ahead of Aroldis Chapman and Scott Barlow. He’s increased his strikeout rate by more than seven points behind a new emphasis on his breaking balls. Kansas City seems to have given up on using Carlos Hernández as a starter and have transitioned his extremely hard fastball to the bullpen where it’s already elite velocity and ride will only play up. He’s responded with a strikeout rate north of 30% and a couple of high leverage appearances. Of course, the Royals have used him as a short-stint opener in his last two outings so maybe they’re not ready to put him in a back-end role yet.

Here are 10 more relievers rostered in less than 60% of all Ottoneu leagues who have been performing well over the last few weeks and are seeing high leverage opportunities in their respective bullpens.

After making four starts at the beginning of the season, Nick Martinez has transitioned to the bullpen and has been thriving in a high leverage role for San Diego. His strikeout-minus-walk rate out of the pen is a fantastic 25.4% and he’s only being held back by the lack of hold opportunities for the scuffling Padres.

It looks like Miguel Castro is at least getting some consideration in a closer committee in Arizona. He earned two saves last week before getting inserted into the game in the seventh inning as the Phillies were threatening in a two-run game yesterday. He allowed an inherited runner to score but escaped the jam to earn a hold. He’s cut his walk rate by nearly three points while maintaining his strikeout rate this year.

The White Sox bullpen has been in flux all season long as they’ve tried to cover for the loss of Liam Hendriks. Joe Kelly might have emerged as the best option for Chicago; he’s struck out nearly 40% of the batters he’s faced this year. Hendriks is on the mend and working through his rehab assignment right now which means Kelly might settle in as a seventh or eighth inning option for the White Sox once their closer returns.

John Brebbia and Danny Coulombe are in weird positions in their respective bullpens. The former has been used as an opener a number of times this year, including yesterday ahead of Sean Manaea, but is seeing regular work in the seventh inning when he’s working out of the pen. His strikeout rate is 35.9% which is up among the league leaders and a huge improvement over what he was posting earlier in his career. Coulombe has also been striking out gaudy amounts of batters this year, but it’s been really hard to stand out in a very good Baltimore bullpen. His 28.2% strikeout-minus-walk rate sits behind only Yennier Cano and Félix Baustita in the Orioles ‘pen and it seems like it’s inevitable he’ll eventually start seeing more and more high-leverage opportunities if he continues to pitch this well.

Much like Hot Right Now, Cold Right Now will be a weekly Ottoneu feature, primarily written by either Chad Young or Lucas Kelly, with a focus on players who are being dropped or who maybe should be dropped in Ottoneu leagues. Hot Right Now will focus on players up for auction, players recently added, and players generally performing well. Cold Right Now will have parallel two of those three sections:

1. Roster Cuts: Analysis of players with high cut% changes.
2. Cold Performers: Players with a low P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

There won’t be a corresponding section to Current Auctions because, well, there is nothing in cuts that correspond to current auctions.

Roster Cuts

Ian Hamilton, Add% (7 days) – 29.49%

Sad news for Hamilton on the injury front has a lot of managers dropping him from their teams. Hamilton worked his way into the crowded closer committee in New York, but may now be out for a month or more. That 12.27 K/9 and a 1.23 ERA really had managers thinking they made the waiver claim of the season. Wise managers will find another reliever with save prospects to claim, they probably won’t keep him and stash him on the IL.

John Schreiber, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 28.85%

I don’t know what a “right teres major strain” is but it must be the reason Schreiber is being dropped. Schreiber had an 11.12 K/9, but a 4.24 BB/9 in 17 IP this season before his injury. Many managers were likely adding him because he probably would have accumulated holds and wins. He only has one win on the season but he does have six holds and last season, he had 22 holds. The smart move would be to cut him and find another reliever who is consistently lined up for hold opportunities. Going to the Steamer Rest of Season (ROS) projections page can help you identify some of those relievers who may be worth adding.

Hayden Wesneski, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 22.68%

Four home runs given up in his last appearance sent him back down to AAA. This is to be expected with a young pitcher, Wesneski is only 25. In eight starts, Wesneski gave up 10 home runs and he’ll have something to work on while he’s back at Triple-A Iowa. I don’t have anything else to write because Eric Longenhagen and Tess Taruskin have already written it:

“Nothing about Wesneski’s stuff suggests his early 2023 swoon will continue; his slider’s movement is identical to 2022 and still projects as a plus pitch, the best of a repertoire that should enable him to be a stable fourth starter. Even though the early results at Wrigley have not been good, there’s no reason to come off of Wesneski’s long-term projection.”

Alek Thomas, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 17.63%

Headed back to AAA, Thomas will, “work on fixing [his] swing while he’s in the minors[.]” He had a rough time against lefties batting .028. Against righties, he hit .273 with five doubles, two triples, and two home runs. But he and you and his coaches probably don’t want such a talented athlete to be isolated to only batting against right-handed pitchers. Esteban Rivera recently wrote a great piece about swing adjustments that really encapsulated Thomas’ issues with big-league pitching. Keeping him or cutting him in Ottoneu leagues is very dependent on where you currently find your team in the standings.

Wade Miley, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 15.71%

RotoWire reported that Miley, “is likely to be sidelined 6-8 weeks” due to a lat/rib injury. It’s difficult to keep an injured 36-year-old on your fantasy team, but Miley has produced a sub-3.50 ERA in his past two seasons and currently has a 3.67 ERA. He’s been steady and reliable, but managers will have to make a tough call when it comes to using an IL spot or not.

Cold Performers

Player stat lines reflect last 14 days among players with at least 20 PA in that time frame.

Mitch Haniger:  40 PA,  .200/.200/.250, 1.18 P/G

With only 76 AB on the season as a whole, Haniger is still trying to get things going after

But, he may be starting to turn a corner as he has eight hits in the last 14 days, six singles, and two doubles. In that time period he 32.5% of the time and walked 0% of the time. That wouldn’t be so bad if he was hitting home runs in between. There is some reason to believe he could be on the cusp of a breakout. Take a look at his actuals vs. Statcast expected numbers in 2023:

AVG: .211 xAVG: .244

SLG: .329 xSLG: .418

wOBA: .240 xwOBA: .291

In addition, he’s hitting the ball hard, and if he continues to put the ball in play, he should see his stats come up. But, he’ll need to add some walks and home runs to make fantasy managers really be bought back in.

Jorge Mateo: 38 PA, .083/.105/.083, -1.09 P/G

This is a rough slump after starting the year so hot. The first month of the season shows that it wouldn’t be smart to drop Mateo. He can get hot and when he does it is absolutely electric. Right now, however, times are tough. The frustrating part about rostering Mateo is that in times like this when you make the very pertinent decision to leave him on your bench, he’ll find his way on base and steal every bag between him and home plate.

Jordan Montgomery: 10.1 IP, 0.89 P/IP

It’s odd to see Montgomery getting BABIP’d to shreds (.321) but with actuals and expected stats so closely in-line:

ERA: 4.21 xERA: 4.25

FIP: 3.82 xFIP: 3.97

Let’s compare Montgomery’s last three starts with his first six starts:

Home runs have really gotten to him in his last three starts where he gave up five total. When nearly of quarter of your fly balls go for home runs, there could be an issue. However, he’s still keeping his walks down, his BABIP is high across both time frames and he’s striking batters out. HR/9 is volatile and if Montgomery, or the wind, can find a way to keep balls in the yard, Montgomery should level out to what we expect from him as a fantasy starting pitcher.

Julio Urías: 10 IP, 1.9 P/IP

According to RotoWire News, “Urías was placed on the 15-day injured list by the Dodgers on Saturday with a left hamstring strain” and perhaps some time to re-group and rest up will help the Dodgers lefty get back on track. He’s currently sporting a 4.39 ERA and a 4.37 xERA. Urías has a home run issue in 2023. So far, he’s given up 2.28 HR/9, he’s given up 14 so far this year, and he was projected by THE BAT, the projection system that gave him the highest mark, to give up 1.46 HR/9.  There have certainly been a few changeups hung up in the zone. According to PitcherLists’ “loLoc%” which details the location of pitches low of the batter, Urías’ changeup is at 58.8% when the league is at 66.9%. The same thing is happening to his curveball or slurve, depending on which pitch identifier you’re looking at, where he is locating it low 52.5% of the time compared to the league average of 62.0%. In Ottoneu points leagues where home runs really hurt, Urías hasn’t been the pitcher most expected him to be, but he’ll come around.

Welcome back to the SP Drip— *record scratch* Wait, that headline doesn’t say “Drip.” After gathering feedback from across the Ottoneu universe, I’ve heard loud and clear that streaming recommendations — even in their adjusted form I presented in this biweekly column — just weren’t providing enough value for owners. Instead, they’re looking for sit/start recommendations further up the SP chain. Personally, I found that the same handful of pitchers ended up being recommended over and over again in the Drip — it turns out that the deep rosters of the format mean there are very few viable starters who are owned in less than half the leagues across Ottoneu. I’m still not sure what Tuesday’s article will look like moving forward, but on Fridays, you’ll get the full picture of the week ahead. Introducing the Ottoneu Starting Pitching Planner!

What I’ve done below is organize every starter on all 30 teams based on the Roster Resource Probables Grid and sorted them into four categories: start, maybe, risky, and sit. The first and last category are pretty self-explanatory. Starters who fall into the “maybe” category are guys you could start if you need to keep up with the innings pitched pace in points leagues or need to hit your games started cap in head-to-head leagues; they’re good bets to turn in a decent start, but you shouldn’t automatically insert them into your lineup. If you’ve fallen behind on the innings pitched pace or you’re really starving for starts in a head-to-head matchup, you could turn to a “risky” starter or two.

I’ve also calculated a “Matchup Score” for each series using a straight combination of opponent’s home/away wOBA, opponent wOBA over the last 14 days, and the park factor for the ballpark the teams are playing in. It’s indexed so that 100 is average and anything above that is a favorable matchup and anything below is unfavorable. That matchup rating informs some of the sit/start recommendations I’m making, though the quality of the pitcher definitely takes precedence. As this is the first run of this new format, please let me know if there’s any feedback or questions.

A few general schedule notes first:

• The Red Sox have a couple of tough matchups on the West Coast in Los Angeles and Arizona. Angel Stadium is a home run heaven and the Angels are always dangerous with Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani swinging big sticks, and the Diamondbacks have been one of the hottest teams in baseball recently.
• The Marlins also get to visit Angel Stadium but they have a date in Coors Field first. That means there are a bunch of solid Miami starters who have really poor recommendations this week and it’s a rough stretch for the rookie Eury Pérez.
• The White Sox will face the two worst offenses in baseball next week which means guys like Mike Clevinger and Michael Kopech are viable starters.
• The Rangers also have a pair of favorable matchups next week in Pittsburgh and Baltimore. Dane Dunning has been brilliant since joining the rotation and he gets a pair of starts in some cavernous ballparks.

Despite their fantastic record recently, the Dodgers offense has been particularly bad on the road this year and hasn’t been hitting all that well over the last two weeks either. That makes the matchup against the Rays next weekend particularly enticing for Tampa Bay starters. Tyler Glasnow is scheduled to come off the Injured List during that series and I want to rank him higher with the nice matchup to cushion his activation, but it’s so hard to predict what we’ll see from him after his spring injury.

The Mets travel to Coors Field next weekend and Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander are lined up to start two of those games. Neither one has been an automatic start this year anyway — both have dealt with injuries and Scherzer has been inconsistent when he’s been healthy. It’s tough to sit the pitchers you’ve invested a ton of your salary cap into, but I wouldn’t trust either of them in the thin air in Denver.

Notable two-start pitchers:

• Eduardo Rodriguez (@KCR, vCHW)
• Gerrit Cole (vBAL, vSDP)
• Dylan Cease (@CLE, @DET)
• Spencer Strider (vLAD, vPHI)
• Cristian Javier (@MIL, @OAK)
• Alex Cobb (@MIN, @MIL)
• Corbin Burnes (vHOU, vSFG)
• Luis Castillo (vOAK, vPIT)
• Dane Dunning (@PIT, @BAL)
• MacKenzie Gore (vSDP, @KCR)
• Brady Singer (vDET, vWSN)

There have been fluctuations in how teams think about relievers in the Ottoneu Prestige League over the two years OPL has been around. And it seems the pendulum has swung once again.

Early in OPL, we learned that you can have basically as many RP as you want without hurting your team. Then we saw a number of teams have success last year carrying no RP and zero-RP became the fashionable approach to OPL.

Read the rest of this entry »

The 2023 version of Ottoneu Hot Right Now will include three different sections:

1. Current Auctions: A closer look at players being auctioned at a high rate.
2. Roster Adds: Analysis of players with high add% changes.
3. Hot Performers: Players with a high P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

The FanGraphs Ottoneu team plans to run this feature weekly, updating fantasy managers on the biggest movers in Ottoneu leagues with an analysis of how these players could or could not help your roster.

Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome back to the SP Drip. My goal for this bi-weekly column is to comb through the upcoming schedule each week to find a few under-owned pitchers (less than 50% ownership across Ottoneu) who could be used to help you hit your games started cap in head-to-head leagues or to make sure you’re hitting your innings pitched cap in points leagues. Tuesday’s article will cover the weekend (Friday, Saturday, Sunday) and Friday’s article will cover the upcoming week (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday). That way, you’ll have time to start your auctions in time to actually drip these pitchers into your lineup.

Upcoming Schedule:

Teams with favorable schedules over the weekend include the Braves, Diamondbacks, Giants, Marlins, Mets, Nationals, Rays, Rangers, and Red Sox.

Teams with tougher schedules include the Angels, Blue Jays, Cubs, Mariners, Orioles, Padres, Phillies, Reds, Rockies, Twins, and Yankees.

Highlighted matchups:

There’s a couple of recommendations in that Nationals-Tigers series. I’ll talk about Irvin below, but Patrick Corbin deserves some more attention after holding the Mets to just two runs in six innings yesterday. The strikeouts weren’t there — just one in the outing — but he’s now strung together four good starts in a row.

James Paxton came off the IL over the weekend and looked pretty good in his first start in more than two years. He struck out nine, walked one, and allowed just four hits in five innings. His velocity looked good and his stuff looked as good as it did back when he was a frontline starter for the Mariners. He’s lined up to start against the Padres which feels like a pretty risky matchup, but San Diego’s offense is mired in a season-long slump and you have to hope that Paxton is up to the challenge of shutting down their star studded lineup.

Carlos Carrasco is scheduled to come off the IL on Saturday and gets a nice easy matchup against his former team to ease him back to the big leagues. He wasn’t pitching very well before hitting the shelf with his elbow injury and I’d usually recommend waiting a bit after a pitcher is activated off the IL to let him settle back into their routine. The matchup is just too good to pass up and he’ll be extra motivated since this is the first time he’ll be facing the Guardians since coming over to the Mets a few years ago.

Hot Starters:

Since being called up at the beginning of the month, Jake Irvin has made a couple of good starts against the Cubs and Giants but was blown up for six runs in his last start against the Mets. The good news is that he struck out six and walked just one in that outing. He wasn’t a highly regarded prospect in the Nationals organization with the profile of a back-end starter. He’s got a nice matchup against the Tigers on Friday and that’s a good opportunity to see if he can bounce back from his last start and continue building on the success he saw in San Francisco.

Zack Greinke is still hanging around pitching for the Royals in his old age. His crafty approach to pitching worked well for him in his return to Kansas City last year and he’s back at it again this season. Over his last three starts, he’s allowed six runs in 15.2 innings with a 10:1 strikeout-to-walk ratio. He’s lined up to face the White Sox this weekend and then the Tigers next week.

Recap: May 12–14

Another rough round of recommendations as Ryne Nelson, Matthew Boyd, and Adrian Houser just didn’t have it last weekend. J.P. France looked pretty good against the White Sox, lasting into the seventh inning with just a single run allowed on three hits and one walk.

Much like Hot Right Now, Cold Right Now will be a weekly Ottoneu feature with a focus on players who are being dropped or who maybe should be dropped in Ottoneu leagues. Hot Right Now will focus on players up for auction, players recently added, and players generally performing well. Cold Right Now will have parallel two of those three sections:

1. Roster Cuts: Analysis of players with high cut% changes.
2. Cold Performers: Players with a low P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

There won’t be a corresponding section to Current Auctions because, well, there is nothing in cuts that correspond to current auctions.

Roster Cuts

Tyler Mahle, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 31.41%

Mahle’s injured elbow is going to require Tommy John surgery and it seems that many Ottonue managers are not interested in hanging on long-term. Mahle was off to a really nice start in his age-28 season but will be out of commission for the rest of the season and most of next.

Michael Brantley, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 17.31%

Sadly, Brantley has gone through some setbacks as a result of shoulder surgery forcing many Ottoneu managers to abandon their optimistic rostering of the 36-year-old outfielder.

Trevor Larnach, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 16.67%

Skip over this part if you recently dropped Larnach:

“RotoWire News: Larnach went 2-for-4 with a home run, a double, four RBI, one walk and two total runs scored in Sunday’s 16-3 win over the Cubs. (5/14/2023)”

Regardless, Larnach’s .167 vs. lefties may just have him platooning with any of the right-handed hitters on the Twins bench. In addition, Larnach really needs to improve his O-Contact%, Z-Contact%, and Contact% overall as they are all below league average. He’s striking out 34.1% of the time and that number is way too high.

José Leclerc, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 15.70%

It’s possible that some envisioned Leclerc fighting for a spot as a closer in Texas, but Will Smith has been holding down the position so far. Setup men Jonathan Hernández and Brock Burke stand in the way of Leclerc collecting holds and saves and Leclerc’s xERA of 4.86 is well above his actual ERA of 3.00. In addition, a .222 BABIP further suggests his 12 innings pitched have been supported by luck.

Jose Miranda, Leagues with a Cut (7 days) – 13.78%

After being sent back to AAA some managers are dropping Miranda. I don’t think it’s the right move given his young age and power potential. It’s possible that managers were too high on the youngster as his average price in Ottoneu points leagues is $6. Yes, he has been slumping but here’s a funky chart that gives some hope:

Miranda’s K% is decreased from last season, and his BB% is increased from last season, but all of his outcomes are declining. The point is, he’s showing skills improvements without the results. With Kyle Farmer the only man realistically playing 3B in Minnesota, you have to figure Miranda will be down in AAA for as long as it takes to get his bat going again. I like Miranda as a buy-low candidate at this point.

Cold Performers

Alek Thomas:  109 AB,  .202/.261/.339, 2.4 P/G

Thomas continues to hold down the center-field position in Arizona, having played 37 games at the position this season, but that low .202 batting average is being brought down by struggles against left-handed pitchers. He’s hitting .280 against righties, but only .029, one hit in 34 at-bats, against southpaws. He’s right around league average when it comes to most of his plate discipline metrics, but he’s not producing at the plate. While he is a fast player, he only has three stolen bases this season in four attempts. Thomas needs to start getting on base for his value to increase.

Myles Straw: 127 AB, .228/.313/.268, 2.88 P/G

Here’s a busy chart that should explain a lot about Straw’s season:

His quick and hot start was fueled by patience, decent hitting, and luck. His wOBA is now going up thanks to an improvement in BB% after a slump, but BABIP and batting average are not following. Straw has come back down to earth.

Alek Manoah, 2.31 P/IP

Manoah’s four-seamer is his only pitch with an above-average swinging strike rate (SwStr%). His sinker, slider, and changeup are all below average on swinging strikes compared to major-league starters, leading to a career-low 16.8% K%. He’s using his changeup and slider more than ever yet they have produced negative pVals so far this year. Manoah doesn’t have a lefty/righty problem, his numbers are distributed somewhat evenly when facing batters from either side. The scary part is that his xERA of 6.30 is way higher than his actual ERA of 4.83. He may just need to work out his pitch mix and there’s hope when you look at how his BB% is coming down and his K% is going up:

Lance Lynn, 2.40 P/IP

Let’s start with the good stuff. A .364 BABIP, a 10.96 K/9, and a near two-point difference between ERA (7.51) and xERA (5.43), all point to a rebound. Now, the bad stuff. His 8.5% walk rate is the highest it’s been since 2018 and a 2.23 HR/9 is not helping his ERA. If we had to boil it down to an obvious and unhelpful sentence, perhaps, “He’s walking too many hitters and then giving up home runs”, would work. If you look at Lynn’s average velocity charts, all of his pitches are trending down:

But if you look closely you can see a game in April where he was really low and that one outing is dragging his season average down. Statcast is now identifying a sweeper that has been thrown five times in which opponents hit 1.000 against it. If you need more to be hopeful about, Lynn’s four-seamer, cutter, sinker, and curveball all have a swinging strike rate (PitcherList) above the league average for starting pitchers proving the reason for the high K/9 that Lynn has displayed.