Short answer to title question: apparently not. But as onetime academics, we hate nothing more than doing even cursory research that doesn’t produce an article, however uninteresting or intuitive its conclusions. Thus, as part of our tireless quest for fantasy-baseball-pundit tenure, whatever that may consist of, here goes:

The prevailing definition of a “Quality Start” is one in which the starting pitcher goes at least six innings and gives up no more than three runs. Lots of people, us included, think the definition should change. We’d go with five innings and two runs, and we wouldn’t deprive the pitcher of a QS if he goes longer and gives up more runs. We figure it’s the manager’s fault if the bullpen doesn’t take over soon enough. But for the moment, we’ve got to use the readily-available stat, and that’s six and three. Read the rest of this entry »

Pitcher skill levels change far more quickly than hitter skill levels, thanks to the many ways they could improve, or decline. A pitcher could add a new pitch that immediately becomes effective, or similarly, stop throwing a pitch that had been ineffective. A pitcher could also gain or lose velocity. A pitcher could also reposition himself on the pitching rubber or even decide to pitch from the stretch or the windup regardless of situation. So let’s check in on the most dramatic SIERA improvers over the last 30 days compared with the period leading up to that date range.

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I’ve had the question written on my whiteboard for ever: are foul balls good or bad? It’s a glass-half-empty, glass-half-full conundrum. The former group might think a foul ball is simply a barely-missed opportunity at in-play contact. The latter group might view that same event as a positive — that the poor quality of contact on a foul ball is indicative of an ability to induce poor contact quality in general, and it’s not inherently different from a swinging strike.

In my heart of hearts, it makes more sense to me that a foul ball is closer to in-play contact than not. Considering the diameter of both a bat and a ball, and the nearly physically impossible feat of connecting the two in motion, a foul tip has a margin of error of mere inches, whereas a swinging strike, fully sans contact, can have a margin of error measured in feet. Yes, it seems like getting a piece of the ball suggests, from the pitcher standpoint, makes the glass appear more half-empty than otherwise.

I wanted to finally tackle the subject, but I didn’t really know how. I first looked at the outcome of the pitch directly following foul and non-foul pitches, but it was a bit noisy (although, to be fair, I may have missed clear patterns in that noise). I imagine the effects spawning from a foul ball are not exclusive to the next pitch; rather, they may manifest two or three or even four pitches deeper into the plate appearance. In other words, a pitch-sequencing analysis might be prohibitively difficult, at least for someone like me who lacks the brainpower or mental stamina to pull it off.

Instead, I opted for something a little easier yet arguably just as telling. Read the rest of this entry »

There is no getting around the fact that Blake Snell had a miserable, short outing against the Yankees on Wednesday afternoon. He had little control and wasn’t fooling any of the hitters he faced. I do give Gary Sanchez credit for hitting an outside changeup for an opposite-field home run, and the weak grounder DJ LeMahieu hit for a leadoff single had just a 23 percent chance of becoming a hit (per Baseball Savant). Still, Snell owns the four walks he issued, which is a true feat considering he faced only five other batters besides Sanchez and LeMahieu.

For those who have Snell on their fantasy rosters, the month of June has been a difficult one. He did have a strong outing on June 9 against the Red Sox in Boston (one run allowed in six innings with seven strikeouts), but across his other three starts, the lefty gave up 16 runs (15 earned) in only eight innings.
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Looking at team batting performance by handedness to identify some potential pitching pickups to exploit the matchups. This is using a probable starter schedule from June 24th – July 7th. It is subject to change (obviously!) so stay tuned, especially with the later ones.

Worst offenses against righties all season through June 19th by wRC+:

• Tigers – 74 wRC+
• Marlins – 75
• Giants – 77
• Blue Jays – 78
• Orioles – 81

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Jordan Yamamoto was ranked 23rd on the site’s 2019 Marlins prospect list, given a 40-grade future value as a potential backend starter. The right-hander, who came over in the Christian Yelich deal, was credited for his pitchability and depth of arsenal that would allow him to carve out a role in the backend of a rotation or as a multi-inning reliever. A 12th-round pick back in 2014, Yamamoto has put up a 26% strikeout rate, 7% walk rate, 3.75 ERA, and 1.24 WHIP in 463 innings. He put up a 3.58 ERA, 1.19 WHIP, and 14% K-BB in 12 starts at Double-A which earned him the call.

His prospect profile highlighted his four-pitch arsenal (FB, CB, SL, and CH), but may have sold him short as he’s also shown a cutter in his two MLB starts (though the CH has been relegated to a show-me pitch). The scouting report was AFL-focused as he threw 26 solid innings back in October/November so it was the freshest look at Yamamoto. His fastball was high-80s, with dips down to 86 mph, though there was a high end of 94 (not sure if that was done at AFL or during the 2018 season). This capped some of his upside per Eric and Kiley:

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I had some trouble figuring out whether to start Zack Greinke in my Ottoneu league tonight. By the merits of his fantasy stats, it should be an easy call. Greinke is the 10th-ranked starting pitcher in the format, and while his strikeout rate (24.4 percent) is merely decent, he racks up enough innings to compensate for that. With a .309 team wOBA against righties, the Nationals don’t rank as a particularly fearsome matchup, but with Greinke qualifying as a fantasy ace, the Diamondbacks’ opponent probably doesn’t factor into many owners’ decisions.

Yet in a game where the frequency of swinging strikes is critical to a player’s value — whether it’s a pitcher or hitter — it’s hard to ignore Greinke’s downward-trending SwStr%. It fell from 12.4 percent in 2017 to 10.8 percent in 2018, and while he has rebounded from similar drops before, this year it stands at just 9.3 percent. Digging a little deeper, the increase in contact is happening mostly on his pitches outside of the strike zone. Greinke’s 84.7 percent Z-Contact% is 1.3 percentage points above last season’s mark and o.1 percentage point below the major league median. While that’s not especially encouraging, it’s Greinke’s 73.7 percent O-Contact% that is truly concerning. It’s far worse than the median O-Contact% of 62.2 percent and six points higher than his rate from 2018.
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The general assessment of the 2019 season thus far is that pitching studs have disappointed while a throng of underrated arms have come to save the day. But is that true? We know the likes of Noah Syndergaard and Aaron Nola have fallen well short of expectations and gems like Mike Soroka and Matthew Boyd have picked up the slack. What does the whole picture look like, though?

I used the NFBC average draft position for the Main Event as a starting point and then compared that to where the pitchers are in our Auction Calculator.

THE TOP 20 DRAFTED

Let’s start with the studs. Guess how many of the top 20 drafted starters are still there thus far according to the Auction Calculator?

Ready?

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Last Thursday, I identified and discussed six starting pitchers worth targeting in trade given their dramatic SIERA underperformance. Today, let’s discuss the pitchers that SIERA is screaming SELL SELL SELL, if SIERA was human. These are the guys whose ERA marks are significantly outperforming their SIERA marks.

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6/7/19

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is brought to you by Out of the Park Baseball 20, 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 SLEEPER20!

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PROSPECT PITCHER ANALYSIS:

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