Archive for Starting Pitchers

Maybe it’s unfair to do a “what’s wrong with this guy?” piece on a guy the night after he goes 7 IP, 6 H, 1 BB, 1 ER, 5 K, but I don’t think a strong outing against KC does much the quell the concerns those have with Justin Verlander. I decided to write this up last night after watching the outing and learned quickly this morning that I wasn’t the only one still concerned as I received this text:

I pay people to address me as that in texts and real life conversations. LOL, just kidding, I don’t have real life conversations. On the year, Verlander has a 4.50 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 21% K, 10% BB, 9% SwStr, and 1.2 HR in 68 IP. I dug into the numbers and here are the findings:

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We decided to push the waiver wire pod this weekend for the holiday, but I wanted to write up a little something about pitchers to keep an eye on tonight.

TWO-START ARMS

Shallow:

• Matt Moore – v. WAS, at PHI
• Jeremy Hellickson – at MIA, v. SF
• Jordan Montgomery – at BAL, at TOR
• Chris Tillman – v. NYY, v. BOS

Moore has been rounding into form a bit over his last four starts with a 3.28 ERA and 21 Ks in 24.7 IP, but he does have a 1.49 WHIP and I might be careful with that Washington start. Hellickson has a 1.7 K:BB and 1.6 HR/9 so I just can’t see starting him anywhere right now. I like Montgomery, but he’s been markedly worse on the road with a 16% K rate and 1.3 K:BB, compared to 27% and 3.4 at home. I’d probably start Tillman if I have him, but I’m not sure I’d seek him out on a waiver wire.

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Sonny Gray | 3.34 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, 23% K, and 7% BB in 29.7 IP

Gray has only made five starts, but he’s looking as sharp as ever. He missed all of April, but he certainly looks health right now. His velocity is at a career-best 93.4 mph (94 w/the four-seamer; 93 w/the sinker). Here’s what else I’ve seen in the stats and video of his last two starts:

• He’s using the sinker more than ever and working both fastball iterations down in the zone at a career-high clip, too.
• His fastballs are down in the lower third of the zone 52% of the time and they are fueling a career-best 59% groundball rate.
• The slider has always been a weapon, but it’s been a plus-plus monster and generated 9 of his 11 strikeouts on Wednesday.

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Dinelson Lamet (Padres)

Note: The camera angle was a little off, so my takes on his horizontal breaks may be off also.
The 24-year-old righty throws out of a high 3/4 arm slot. He’s a maximum effort guy and at times falls off to the mound’s first base side.

• Fastball (4-seam): 95-98 mph and straight. For such a basic pitch, it is not even near the strike zone at times and he threw too many away. I’ve read several souces the pitch breaks late break but I could never see it.

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5/25/17

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 18, the best baseball strategy game ever made – available NOW on PC, Mac, and Linux platforms! Go to ootpdevelopments.com to order now and save 10% with the code SLEEPER18!

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Leading Off: Question of the Day

• Which surging vet do you trust most: Jason Vargas, Ervin Santana, or Mike Leake? (4:10)

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Last season the Cubs pitching had a great BABIP, .255, the best in MLB by quite a margin.  This has been attributed to superior defense and great pitching. Both of these seem like good enough explanations. This season, with roughly the same team, their BABIP has dropped to .286, effectively league average.

Now, there is a lot you may assume from these numbers. You may think, of course, BABIP is so unpredictable. Of course a team that was above average one season would return to average the following season.  Fair enough, you could say that. Some argue their outfield defense has taken a step back. That might be true.

These are all guesses and assumptions, but fortunately we have a few more tools for evaluating quality of contact, so let’s see what they may tell us about this Cubs pitching staff. We can use Statcast to evaluate quality of contact. When we do so, it paints a bit of a different picture.

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Last week, I discussed five surprising American League starting pitchers sitting among the leaders in SwStk%. All of them had enjoyed surging versus 2016. Today, I’ll discuss pitchers on the other side of the coin, surprises toward the bottom of the SwStk% leaderboard, all of whom have suffered declines compared to last season.

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Note: I am using velocities from BrooksBaseball.net which has corrected their values from the 2016 to 2017 transition.

Dylan Bundy -2.5 mph (2016 FBv: 94.8mph, 2017 FBv: 92.3 mph)

Bundy’s decline is being obscured by the fact he relieved in 2016. Owners can see the 2017 drop and chalk it up to the normal velocity difference between starting and relieving. After removing the 2016 relieving values, his velocity is still down 2.5 mph.

For reference, here are his 2016 stats as a starter all of his 2017 ones.

Bundy’s approach and results are almost a textbook example of fastball velocity loss. The swinging strike rate on his fastball has dropped from 8.2% to 4.8% and therefore his strikeout rate dropped. Bundy realized his fastball isn’t the same, dropped its usage (61% to 50%) and relied on breaking pitches more.

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For a full primer on the process behind these rankings, check out episode 458 of The Sleeper & The Bust.

I decided to go a different route than the traditional 1 to whatever listing and went a step beyond the tiered rankings which allow for more nuance than just a numbered ranking, but still feel inadequate to tackle the many challenges of in-season pitcher management. I do still have tiers, but they are much different tiers and so they aren’t just talent-based groupings. They are more about usability in the fantasy game.

I have five different levels for active arms and then injury and minor league groupings for those we’re waiting on. We always talk “rest of season” when looking at deals and pickups, but I think we have to be more short term than that, especially with pitching. This doesn’t mean I’m wildly shifting rankings and my outlook on pitchers after every start, but rather I’m acknowledging that the landscape is going to shift so much throughout the six month season that trying to focus beyond a month or two is foolhardy.

The tiers are as follows:

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The leaderboards at FanGraphs is a fun place to poke around. Behold this list of pitchers:

What do they all have in common? Aside from having thrown at least 20 innings, these are the only hurlers in baseball who rank in the upper half of the stats I first look to when evaluating pitchers. Namely, they all boast better than average K-BB%, GB%, Z-Contact%, and swinging strike rates. There are some obviously great pitchers on this list but I’m not interested in talking about Clayton Kershaw, Jon Lester, or Carlos Martinez. Though if you’re a little frustrated with Lester or CarMar, I both empathize and suggest exercising a little patience. Rather, I’d like to dive deeper into some of the list’s lesser-owned and lesser-known players who won’t cost nearly as much to acquire.  Read the rest of this entry »