On Saturday, I examined the five pitchers whose SwStk% increased the most from 2010. Today, I will look at the opposite: the five pitchers whose SwStk% declined the most this season.

Read the rest of this entry »

It is hard for me to go very long without writing an article that focuses on SwStk%. It is like the equivalent of having a man-crush, but the object of my affection is actually a statistical metric. Maybe I have a metric-crush? Below are the five pitchers who experienced the biggest increases in their SwStk% from 2010 to 2011.

Read the rest of this entry »

As you have no doubt noticed, being the regular reader of RotoGraphs that you are, we have been rolling out position by position keeper rankings all week, beginning with the top tier. The biggest question I had was how exactly I was going to handle these rankings. Given the numerous format and rule differences from league to league, I thought it would be unwise to make any reference to draft cost. We simply cannot assume a player’s cost from 2011 drafts, yet cost is one of the main factors you must consider when making keeper decisions. So, cost will be ignored in my tiers, and the job is up to you to compare projected value with the keeper cost.

Read the rest of this entry »

Being tasked with ranking the NL starting pitchers is a mixed blessing.

On one hand, there’s so much talent here, I don’t have to worry about having to recommend someone like Derek Lowe as a tier three pitcher, which is nice, since Lowe really isn’t a SP3 option in any sense of the term. On the other hand, someone like Matt Garza may end up in the fourth tier or perhaps even the fifth, which always gets someone’s goat. I love Garza — and I’m quite sure I’d never trade him for Theo Epstein — but if you’re giving me the choice between Garza and Roy Halladay, suddenly I love Garza a lot less.

Tiers are derived from Zach Sanders’ retrospective auction values. If I think a guy isn’t likely to stick near the same level next year — either that he’s tiered too high or too low — I’ll let you know in the comments, but this is reflective of what they did this year.

Joining the chorus of keeper rankings that have popped up over the last day or two, here are your NL starting pitching ranks.

Clayton Kershaw — $35

Not much to argue about here. Kershaw may not have saved many games, but he dominated the other four standard pitching categories with nearly 250 strikeouts, an ERA of 2.28, a WHIP under 1.00, and more than a quarter of the Dodgers’ wins this season. He was good last year, so it isn’t as though his success is unexpected, but he took a huge step forward this year and should continue to be dominant for the foreseeable future. If he’s the first pitcher off the board next year, I can’t say I’d disagree with that choice. He’s just 23 after all, it’s entirely possible that he’ll improve from here, which has to be a downright terrifying thought for the divisional rivals that have to see him multiple times a year. Projecting someone to reach Pedro Martinez’s level of outrageous dominance is foolhardy at best, but if I had to put money on some current pitcher to get there, Kershaw would be hard to pass over, though Stephen Strasburg makes a compelling case as well.

Roy Halladay — $30

Doc set a career high in strikeouts last year with 219, then bested that record this year with…220. Ok, he didn’t exactly blow away that mark, but the strikeouts are a relatively recent addition to Halladay’s arsenal, which has made him more valuable in almost every format over the last two seasons; clearly, the move to the National League did him some good, but facing a pitcher instead of a DH will do that. I’m not at all portending doom for Halladay in the near future, but next season will see him turn 35. It’s entirely possible to pitch well at ages more advanced than that, but not everyone ages so well. Of the 10 best seasons since 1960 turned in by a pitcher age 35 or older — determined by ERA+ — Randy Johnson owns five, Roger Clemens and Kevin Brown each have a pair, and Whitey Ford has the remaining one. Halladay looks like he could turn in a season good enough to join the list, but we’ll see what next year brings.

Cliff Lee — $30

Like his teammate Halladay, Lee set a career high in strikeouts this season with 238, and unlike Halladay, it was an appreciable improvement over his previous career high of 185. Concerns over Lee moving to hitter-friendly Citizen’s Bank Park proved to be overblown as his H/9 dropped to a near career-low 7.6 and he allowed opposing hitters to slug just .339 against him. In fact, Lee pitched much better at home, allowing hitters just a .559 OPS in Philly compared to .672 on the road. No one will mistake the Phillies’ rotation for a bunch of college kids, but there’s no reason to believe Lee is going to suddenly “regain” his 2007 form.

Ian Kennedy — $25

There’s no surprise that Halladay and Lee were among the top five pitchers this season; Kershaw and Hamels weren’t givens to join them, but were obviously capable. Kennedy is the man who looks out of place in this list, but he certainly earned it. His H/9, HR/9, and BB/9 all dropped from 2010 while his K/9 rose; the 21 wins are just the icing on the cake. In an objective sense, there are other players who might be better than he is, but if he can keep his strikeout rate reasonably high, there are few who can match his combination of low acquisition price and high production.

Cole Hamels — $24

Hamels did lose a few strikeouts this year, but in exchange he also gave up fewer hits, fewer home runs, and fewer walks. Given that he had strikeouts to spare last year, it seems like pretty a fair trade off to me. He still struck out nearly 200 hitters, so it isn’t as though he turned into Livan Hernandez, and the balance made him a better option across the board. He’s the youngest of the Phillies’ Four Aces, so he’s got that going for him. If he can add in the strikeouts he lost this year, while keeping the other peripherals down, I see no reason he can’t be even higher on this list next year.

Roy Oswalt heads into the off-season with about as much uncertainty as he’s ever had as a major league pitcher. After suffering through some back injury and flirtations with retirement, Oswalt, 34, will be a free agent unless the Philadelphia Phillies exercise his $16 million dollar option. Rather nebulous on an epic scale, GM Ruben Amaro has mentioned they’re having “internal discussions” about whether or not to pick up that option. Now, internal discussions could be serious consideration or it could be smoking cigars and playing Donkey Kong — we’re merely left to speculate.

Smart money says they aren’t likely to pick up the option, but that doesn’t mean they don’t want him back on more team-friendly terms. Obviously, where he ultimately lands will have implications for his fantasy value, but before we can make any determinations about park factors and defense, it’s worth looking at how Oswalt has evolved over the past couple of seasons and investigate what kind of performance we can anticipate going forward.

Read the rest of this entry »

In the short period I was able to watch last night’s Rangers-Tigers game, I unfortunately chose the time when the announcers reminded us Braves fan of the trade several years ago. The trade being the one that sent Mark Teixeira for half a season to Atlanta and brought back Neftali Feliz, Elvis Andrus and Matt Harrison, amongst others (including one catcher whose name I don’t feel like spelling at the moment). Andrus and Feliz have already been contributed good value to the Rangers and Harrison decided that in 2011, it would be his turn to make the Braves look foolish.

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s not news to say that Clayton Kershaw had a fantastic 2011, and we’ll know on November 17th if it was good enough for the Baseball Writers Association to hand him any hardware because of his efforts. What’s been so interesting to research is how Kershaw has evolved over the last four years from a very good 4-win player to an elite 7-win player.

Kershaw has been good pretty much from the moment he arrived Los Angeles, but even throughout very successful 2009 and 2010 campaigns, he had his limitations. His walks were out of control, he struggled against right handed batters, and because he pitched like he was trying to strike out every batter, his pitch counts kept him from going deep into games. It’s almost as if Kershaw systematically addressed every single one of his shortcomings in the off-season to become something of a superhero version of himself.

What follows is a graphical homage to his ability to adapt, and to just be freakishly good.

Read the rest of this entry »

On Saturday, I took a look at the five pitchers whose ERAs were the most below their SIERA marks, which suggests that they may be overvalued in next year’s drafts. Today I will look at the opposite, the five pitchers whose ERAs were the most above their SIERA marks, which might lead to them being undervalued in drafts next season.

Read the rest of this entry »

The review of the 2011 season has just begun and it is time to look at one of my favorite all-encompassing numbers, the ERA-SIERA differential. The pitchers with the largest differences between the two are likely to over overvalued or undervalued in fantasy leagues next season, depending on which end of the list they fell on. Today I will look at those whose ERA was most below their SIERA marks, suggesting that these pitchers may be disappointments next year.

Read the rest of this entry »

Every year when the regular season ends, I breathe a sigh of relief. As much as I love baseball, it’s a long year and it feels great to finally relax and really take in everything that had just happened. And of course, as a fantasy player, I am already looking forward to what might happen next year. Ricky Romero is a name that is rather surprising to see on the AL ERA leaderboard. Let’s see what we should expect from him next season.

Read the rest of this entry »