Archive for Starting Pitchers

With the end of the season in sight, it’s time to kick season-long strategies out of the driver’s seat. Slow and steady may win the race if you’re a tortoise, but in fantasy baseball, it’s either sprint or switch over to football. And who even likes football?

When I say sprint, I mean sprint while throwing any and all things that could weigh you down over your shoulder. Especially in 12-teamers and shallow leagues, this needs to be the mindset. Small sample size holding you back? There’s only a small sample size left! Things are going to be random. It’s getting wiggy. 

Hitters have so many days to frustrate you. Owning Gunnar Henderson this season has been like wading into a pool with a freshly made pizza. Like sure, there’s moments you may enjoy, like the pepperoni-and-pineapple sweet 3-5 game with a bomb. But then your hands get wet, you can barely stand, let alone eat your pizza, and Gunnar is in the midst of a 3-43 stretch. Without a steal. 

You get the picture. 

But today, I’m going to focus on starting pitchers. Relievers are more volatile, and if you’re chasing saves in Roto, best of luck and look to Hogan Harris, I guess? But starting pitchers are truly the kings of the small sample size, especially when the calendar inevitably flips to August. 

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One area that I like to examine for pitchers is their arm angle, which consists of their vertical and horizontal release points. Arm angle is a quick way to see whether a pitcher might have different vertical and horizontal release points that could impact movement. Arm angle tends to correlate best with vertical movement whether it’s without gravity (0.225) or with gravity (-0.258). I tend to look at pitch movement without gravity as induced vertical break, especially on four-seam fastballs. There’s an inverse relationship between arm angle and vertical movement with gravity. That indicates that pitchers with high arm angles can throw pitches with greater downward movement.

I’m working on a way to find correlations between arm angle and horizontal movement since different sites list horizontal movement differently. For instance, Baseball Savant shows inch values with the words arm and glove after the number value. Meanwhile, other sites have negative or positive values, indicating glove- or arm-side movement. My guess would be that arm angle correlates similarly or slightly worse without bucketing by handedness and pitch types. That said, it’s still not that strong of a correlation to vertical movement. 

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We expect several familiar names returning to Major League rotations in the next month. Let’s dive into how they are progressing, when they might be activated, and what to expect from them for the rest of this season.

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In the heat of summer, it is always interesting to track pitchers who have gained velocity and who are losing velocity, and what the impact is on their results. While velocity alone does not guarantee success, meaningful changes often coincide with adjustments in command, pitch quality, or overall effectiveness. Identifying those trends mid-season can be a very useful indicator to see if a pitcher could strengthen as the season goes on or decline. This piece will look at those hopefully strengthening in the summer.

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Every Monday, this column will break down the most popular waiver wire and free agent acquisitions of the weekend. I dig into the top adds on the ever-popular Fantrax and in the NFBC Online Championship (OC), a national mid-stakes contest with 240 total leagues of 12 and a six-figure grand prize. Reviewing player adds between the two should provide us with a well-rounded perspective and barometer of the fantasy baseball marketplace.

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• I don’t rank longer term injury guys, but I did squeeze Ranger Suarez and Connor Prielipp back in as both are tracking to be back this weekend or very soon after.
• I’ll be adding comments to each tier over the rest of the weekend and happy to answer any questions or comments below!
• Zac Thornton added Saturday morning. Just accidentally left off, I like him.

Aces Commentary

• With Miz being managed, Skubal returns to the top spot, especially after Skubal put up 9 Ks in 4 of his L5 outings.
• I expanded the Ace tier and popped Greene back in there even after just three starts. He was bumpy in his season debut but then 2 gems since, including 12 Ks v. CHC.
• Same with Fried returning to the Ace tier really quick, but I don’t think he needs to earn his way back in. When healthy, he’s an Ace who never leaves the rotation.
• Much was made of a couple turbulent starts for Skenes. He looked a lot more like himself in the last couple with 15 Ks and 3 BB in 12.3 IP.

Must Start Commentary

• Cole’s had a few ill-timed HRs since his last two starts, but he looks completely dialed in with his stuff and I have all the confidence in him. That Cam-Cole-Fried top 3 is insane.
• I was scared about Pérez and actually cut him in my Main Event which definitely stings now that he’s back and dominating. The tough part of no IL spots is how long you want to block off that reserve spot and I was concerned this would be a multi-month absence. Since returning from his 27-day layoff: 1.24 ERA/0.79 WHIP/22% K-BB. Whoops.
• Wrobleski rode a skills tightrope for months, posting excellent results despite an outright terrible 15% K% through his first 12 outings. Everything has come together over his L5 with a 1.90 ERA/0.94 WHIP and most importantly a 23% K-BB. He has at least 7 Ks in each of his L3 including dialing up 11 in Sacramento!
• I love Brown in general and still have a hard time sitting him anywhere as he’s just 8 starts into his season, but I had to bring him way down in the rankings. The BB% explosion to 16% has saddled him with an untenable 1.45 WHIP. Impressively, his ERA is a palatable 4.05 despite the influx of free bases yielded. I’d like to get to ~12-14 starts before making any drastic moves. I’m at least sticking with him for the upcoming TEX and TOR starts.
• Is Ashcraft unraveling or just hitting a blip where the schedule gets the best of him (struggles at PHI, v. MIL, and at NYY aren’t exactly cause for concern even with PHI’s lagging offense and NYY being without Judge)? He still mixed in a gem at one of the hottest offenses in baseball during this run (5.7 IP/2 ER/7 Ks/2 BB at WAS). The HRs are concerning and a key driver behind these troubles. I’m willing to bet blip over fraud check and as such, I will stand by him as a rotation lock.

Full Rankings Without Tiers

We’re following up on an earlier piece covering starting pitchers who have been throwing fewer fastballs in June and July. One way to find pitchers making a pitch mix change is to look at players throwing more or fewer fastballs (sinkers and four-seamers). We averaged the fastball usage in June and July, then compared the pitch percentage to May. 

The visual below shows the starting pitchers throwing more fastballs in June and July.

Though we would love to examine more pitchers, we’re analyzing four that have been throwing more fastballs. If these pitchers have been throwing more fastballs, what’s different in their pitch mix? Does it matter? Why or why not? Let’s dive in.

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Below are the latest notable playing time projection changes for pitchers for the last two weeks, starting with starters and moving onto relievers in the second table.

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 for Ottoneu points leagues. 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.

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