Deep League Starting Pitchers: Severino, Fedde, Holmes, Detmers, & Garcia

Previous deep starting pitcher profiles:

Luzardo, Keller, Myers, & Ortiz
Taillon, Harrison, Martinez, & Singer
Herz, Bassitt, Civale, & Bradford
Birdsong, Littell, Boyd, & Peterson
Sasaki, Singer, Bello, Soriano, & Weathers
Nelson, Brown, Lowder, & Megill
Montas, Holmes, Sugano, Miller, & Montgomery

Luis Severino (308 ADP)

Historically, the 30-year-old righty had issues staying healthy. Since throwing 191 IP in 2018, he never exceeded 102 IP until last season when he had 182 IP. His 2024 season was fine with an 8.0 K/9, 1.24 WHIP, and 3.91 ERA (4.12 xFIP). With Severino, it was a tale of two halves.

While his ERA was better in the first half (3.78 vs 4.11), everything else pointed to huge second-half improvements. The most obvious change was his K%-BB% nearly doubling from 9.6% to 18.7%. Of the 69 qualified second-half pitchers, he ranked 21st in K%-BB%.

The only obvious change was him throwing his sweeper/slider (14% SwStr%) more (22% usage to 27%). His sweeper/slider is the only pitch with a 14% or better swinging-strike rate. Any other improvement was small like his Ball% dropping from 35% to 34%. I feel he’s a steal where he’s going even after signing with West Sacramento. Take the discount and hope the second half production repeats.

Erick Fedde (318 ADP)

The 31-year-old righty had a solid 2024 with a 3.30 ERA (4.12 xFIP), 7.8 K/9, and 1.16 WHIP. It’s a boring profile with no upside short of him adding a pitch and/or velocity.

Last season, he showed no in-season improvement with a first half 3.88 xFIP and 4.51 xFIP in the second half. His slider was the only pitch with a swinging-strike rate over 10% (11.3%). His sinker was at 93.3 mph in April and 92.9 mph in September.

Besides some upward ERA regression, I’d rubber-stamp his 2023 results as his 2024 projection.

Grant Holmes (348 ADP)

As news trickles in and people research the 28-year-old righty, his ADP will rocket up. He’s out of minor league options so he’s stuck on the MLB team that plans on him being the the rotation. And most importantly, he was a damn good pitcher last year (3.56 ERA, 1.19 WHIP, 9.2 K/9 in 68 IP).

The craziest part, he threw better as a starter (3.30 xFIP) than as a reliever (3.74 xFIP). He attacked batters with a 94.6 mph fastball (9% SwStr%), plus slider (24% SwStr%) and plus curveball (23% SwStr%, 56% GB%). Additionally, he effectively ditched an ineffective cutter (7% SwStr%). All that and a 2.0 BB/9. His starter’s 28.2% K%-BB% would rank first among all qualified starters last season with Chris Sale second at 26.5%

I’d not be surprised to see his ADP get cut in half as the season nears with the upside as the… game’s best pitcher.

Reid Detmers (366 ADP)

I’m amazed the 25-year-old righty is still going so early in drafts. In 385 career IP, he has a 9.8 K9, 4.90 ERA (4.24 xFIP) and 1.37 WHIP. While the strikeouts are nice, there are some worries.

He couldn’t keep his fastball velocity up.

He can’t find the plate with a career 3.6 BB/9 (3.9 BB/9 in 2024) leading to a 1.37 WHIP (1.56 WHIP in 2024). In a 2024 Roto league, a 1.37 WHIP did as much damage in the standings as a 4.75 ERA.

On the positive, he does strikeout batters as seen by his 11.2 K/9 last season which improved from 10.0 K/9 in the first half to 14.4 K/9 in the second half thereby dropping his xFIP from 4.13 to 3.18. He gets hitters out with a fastball (94 mph, 11% SwStr%), slider (19% SwStr%), and changeup (17% SwStr%).

There are two issues with his repertoire. First, he throws a useless curve (7% SwStr%) 15% of the time. Second, he relies on his fastball 47% of the time. It would be interesting to see him focus on the change and slider.

There is hope that Detmers can improve but he’ll need to get those walks under control. At this late ADP, I’m not opposed to rostering him in an FAAB league where he can be dropped if the walks continue.

Luis Garcia (373 ADP)

I don’t have much on the 28-year-old righty returning from elbow surgery. All we have are 2.1 IP he threw in rehab. In his AA start, he averaged 93.0 mph on his fastball with a max velocity of 94.8 mph. In his last healthy season, he averaged 92.8 mph and 93.6 mph for his career. He threw strikes with a 30.2% Ball% (equivalent to 1.7 BB/9) in the short outings. That’s it for now.

So many unknowns exist with Garcia but more information will be available once Spring Training starts.