Coming up through the Astros’ minor league system, hard-throwing Mike Foltynewicz was pretty good at getting the swings-and-misses that fantasy owners crave. Yet in his first season with the Astros and his subsequent three seasons with the Braves, Foltynewicz failed to stand out as a swing-and-miss pitcher or as a source of strikeouts.

Through his first 18 starts of 2018, Foltynewicz has fared a little better at getting whiffs and a lot better at getting strikeouts. His swinging strike rate of 10.6 percent is a career high but only 0.6 percentage points better than his previous best in 2016. His strikeout rate of 28.9 percent is more than one-third greater than his 2016 high-water mark of 21.1 percent, and it is the 11th-highest rate among qualified starters this season.
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Auto Out% (AO%) surgers…huh?! Yeah, I just made it up. But you know what this metric is because my colleagues have written articles about it. It’s simply strikeouts plus infield flies as a percentage of batters faced. These are essentially automatic outs, hence the name Auto Out%. We know that for pitchers, strikeouts are the best plate appearance result because it’s an almost guaranteed out. But infield fly balls aren’t too far behind in terms of out conversion. Yet, we focus far more on a pitcher’s strikeout rate than his popup rate, which is often completely ignored. Combining them gives us even better information than focusing on just one of the pair. So let’s find out which starting pitchers have improved their AO% the most versus 2017.

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I’ve decided to update my 2018 pERA rankings since I’ve been diving for some starter sleepers. Usually, this procedure helps to find underperformers with inflated ERAs. This time, it was mainly under the radar pitchers.

If anyone is unfamiliar with pERA, it combines the swinging strike rate and batted ball data from each pitch along with the walk rate into an overall ERA estimator (full explanation). Besides the few pitchers listed below, here is a link to the full 2018 values.

The top starters are as expected:

Rank. Name: pERA
1. Max Scherzer: 2.34
2. Chris Sale: 2.44
3. Jacob deGrom: 2.52
4. Noah Syndergaard: 2.57
5. Ross Stripling (w/ RP stats): 2.65
6. Trevor Bauer: 2.75
7. Gerrit Cole: 2.83
8. Justin Verlander: 2.88
9. Patrick Corbin: 2.91
10. Dereck Rodriguez: 2.92

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I started the Two Good Starts, Two Bad Starts column a few weeks back when I realized that I often begin to change my perception of a pitcher after a pair of consecutive starts that defy my expectations. It’s rarely a good idea to change your decision rule about starting or sitting a pitcher on the basis of two starts, but at least you can be more open to the possibility that the pitcher in question maybe isn’t as good or as bad as you thought.

In last week’s column, I raised the possibility that Wei-Yin Chen might be viable at some point in some deeper mixed leagues by drawing attention to a couple of good starts that were backed up by a rising whiff rate and increased fastball velocity. In his subsequent outing against the Nationals, his velocity remained higher than it had been, but he got just three swings-and-misses on his way to a seven-run shellacking over 4.1 innings. I’m still intrigued by Chen’s resurgence in velocity, but I’m glad I haven’t dedicated a roster spot to him yet.
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I released my July rankings last week, my fourth update of the year. Today, I want to look at the biggest movers since the very first run of rankings back in March when we ran the consensus lists. We’ll look at three groups of pitchers: those in the top 50 who didn’t even make March list and then the biggest risers and fallers for those who did make that original 162.

Let’s get started!

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As we push toward the All-Star break, it’s time to look at young arms and how their innings are tracking. I used last year’s total plus 25% for a rough estimate of what teams might be looking to use as their bar for a guy who they want to limit. Now just they because they might have enough innings “available” based on this calculation doesn’t mean the team won’t still look to limit them if they have health concerns. I think it’s fair to say that if they have about 85 innings or so left in the tank, then overwork won’t be a driving force behind limiting a pitcher in the second half.

• 85+ IP left isn’t a major concern
• 65-84 IP left are guys to watch
• <=64 IP left are probably in danger as they were probably injured in ‘17

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During last night’s chat, I got the usual “Rank these five pitchers….” questions. Similar names kept popping up and I felt I was using dated information. I decided to dive into a couple pitchers to see if my previous valuations should be adjusted.

Nathan Eovaldi

The 28-year-old righty has always been a disappointment with a mid-90s fastball and a sub-7 K/9 strikeout rate. After missing the 2017 season for Tommy John surgery, the Rays starter is putting up his best season ever with a 3.35 ERA with matching ERA estimators.

The reasons for the turnaround can be inferred from this simple graph.

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Coming into the 2018 season, it looked like Jordan Zimmermann was finished as a fantasy-relevant starting pitcher. He was entering his age-32 season, and he had essentially been a train wreck ever since he turned 30. In other words, I certainly didn’t expect to be sitting here in July 2018 recommending Zimmermann in basically any fantasy format.

After a strong first month in a Tigers uniform in 2016, Zimmermann unraveled entirely. As for that month of April, it wasn’t without its warning signs either — even though he pitched to a pristine 0.55 ERA in his first 33 innings as a Tiger, he just wasn’t missing many bats, as his 6.27 K/9 indicated. He was getting outs, but for a guy who recorded strikeout rates of 8.20 K/9 and 7.32 K/9 in his previous two seasons with the Nationals, that was a pretty steep drop — even for a guy moving from the National League to the American League.

As soon as the 2016 calendar turned to May, Zimmermann experienced a meltdown that lasted for about two full years:

• May-Sept 2016:
  • 72.1 IP, 6.84 ERA, 1.51 WHIP, 5.4 K/9, 2.4 BB/9, 1.6 HR/9
• 2017 Season:
  • 160 IP, 6.08 ERA, 1.55 WHIP, 5.8 K/9, 2.5 BB/9, 1.6 HR/9

He continued to allow way too many runs in April 2018 (5.81 ERA), but there were also some signs that he might finally be turning it back around after two years plagued by nagging injuries to his neck and back. He struck out 27 batters in 26.1 IP in April — which was the first time he averaged more than a strikeout per inning in any month since August 2015 — but when he hit the disabled list with shoulder discomfort in early May, it looked like he might be heading for another lost season in Detroit.

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7/8/18

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Fantasy Zombies

• Jordan Zimmermann (3:40)
• Anibal Sanchez (12:47)
• Jhoulys Chacin (23:33)

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I recently updated my Starting Pitcher ranks for July and as always, there was some difficult arms to place. Here are some thoughts on the tougher ranks:

#19 Patrick Corbin – After a velo spike to start the seasons (), Corbin has been sitting 89-91 over the last two months which was jarring to see as a velo dip can portend trouble, but he’s posted a 3.50 ERA and 1.15 WHIP in that time with ERA indicators that like him even more (2.82 FIP). He has a 21% K-BB rate during these 12 starts and appears to be just fine with the lowered velo. Since he’s more two-seam/sinker, the lower velo might actually be an aid in terms of movement. I eventually left him in his top-20 spot because he hasn’t done anything to be removed.

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