Yesterday, I went beyond the obligatory 10 bold predictions and shared my bold hitter league leaders in each of the five standard fantasy categories. So today, I take on the pitchers. Although still difficult to hit on any, the pitchers are a bit easier to get right than the hitters for two reasons. One, there are two ratio categories, rather than one, so playing time expectations are less important. And two, there’s a larger luck component involved in pitching which makes the elite guys less of a lock to lead the league in any specific category.

In 2012, I hit on one of my 10 picks. Last year, I was demoted back to the minors after putting up an 0-fer. Let’s hope that lit a fire under my butt and results in a breakout predictions year.

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Yesterday, we looked at the elite pitches when it came to whiff rates. Today, we’ll look at things a bit differently. The following pitchers rated highly by swinging strike rate across multiple offspeed pitches. You might notice a certain deficiency in the group. Not a lot of great fastballs! As always, here are the benchmarks for each pitch type.

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If you’ve been listening to the podcast, you know I’m very interested in looking at peripherals by pitch type. Looking at the swinging strike and ground-ball rates against benchmarks for each pitch type can give us an idea of which arsenals are the most well-rounded, and which pitches are elite when set against the league benchmarks. Let’s use last year’s per-pitch numbers to see if we can identify some undervalued pitchers. Today, we’ll go with the elite single pitches by whiff rates. Tomorrow, we’ll look at balanced arsenals.

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I’ve been working through a series of posts on how to prepare for leagues that use non-traditional categories. My concern is that people are going into drafts with materials that are geared toward 5×5 categories because almost any set of rankings or values from a major industry source services the traditional categories. Unless you’ve created your own rankings with projections for non-traditional categories or found rankings geared toward them, your draft materials are hurting you to some degree.

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Today marks the end of the 2014 Pod’s Pick series and we finish off with my favorite position, starting pitcher. This is where we find the most divergent opinions as an extra projected win or two or a slightly higher expected strikeout rate is enough to push a player up a whole bunch of spots in the rankings.

The starting pitcher edition of Pod’s Picks may help you find value or learn who to avoid at their current going rates. The bullish section will only include players from my top 78 (which assumes 6 1/2 starting pitchers active per team with 2 1/2 closers), while the bearish group will only include those whose RotoGraphs consensus is in the top 78.

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After five respectable outings in 2013, Erik Johnson will begin his rookie campaign as a relative unknown in the fantasy world. This season is just his third as a professional and his quick ascension through the minors bodes well. The White Sox are hoping that Johnson can fill a mid-rotation role behind Chris Sale, and he could offer possible value to 12-team mixed league owners too.

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The way I am drafting this year, which isn’t much different than most years, is to wait a long while on pitching and stack my roster with mid rotation types along with some young guys with high upside. There is always debate on whether or not that strategy is appropriate, and this post is certainly not expected to start that debate. But one guy I have had on my mind was Ervin Santana. As someone who has added a sinker and regularly shows great command, Santana is a guy I was looking at pretty aggressively entering my drafts.
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Without Mat– okay, I won’t even say it. Without their ace and one of the best pitchers in the game, the 2014 Mets rotation takes on a decidedly different look, one led by…

The big four

Bartolo Colon

Colon was a pretty fun fantasy option when you could get him for a buck or two, which you almost certainly could since he was lousy in 2009, out of baseball entirely in 2010, and looking like this in 2011. (You’re staring at that picture. You’re wondering if it’s fake. I’m not going to spoil it.) Then he had to go and win 28 games in two years for Oakland, and put up a 2.65 ERA last year, and you’re left with the reality that he’s clearly going to cost more than a buck this year, but he’s still 41 years old and hasn’t had a swinging-strike percentage of even seven percent since 2005. He’s obviously clearly rosterable, but at what price?

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Okay, technically Petco Park is in the 619 area code, however Kanye West never had an album that sounded similar to “619s & Hearbreaks.” With that out of the way, we can now take a look at my thoughts on a long time favorite, Andrew Cashner. Minds smarter than my own have already compiled the consensus starting pitcher rankings, but there was dissenting opinion regarding Cashner. His highest rankings were 35 and his lowest was 64, meaning that the jury was still out on Cashner’s ability to put up strong fantasy numbers as a starter.

There were plenty of reasons to fall in love with Cashner’s ability. He kept the ball on the ground with his 52.1% ground ball rate. Moving from Wrigley Field and the windy city to spacious Petco Park should have (and did) help his home run rate. Last season Cashner managed to post a 3.09 ERA and trimmed more than a walk off of his BB/9 rate. So why am questioning my love for Cashner?
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Need a warm body at the end of your draft to fill out a bench spot? Struggling to see straight after putting down too many Yuenglings? Mock Draft Central tells us there’s no shortage of commoners to be had: Jason Vargas and his lifetime 51-58 record will be there for the taking; Josh Johnson and his patched-up elbow can be had on the cheap; and Trevor Cahill, owner of a 15.6 percent career strikeout rate, stands ready to be selected should you have something better to do than sit patiently and wisely craft the back end of your roster.

There’s no crime in being haphazard, but us FanGraphs folk prefer the whiff of upside to the constraints of guaranteed mediocrity. So it’s in that spirit that I wonder if Wily Peralta, currently being priced at a 324 ADP, is deserving of more love.

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