Is Felix Pena Saving the Best for Last?

For a pitcher who has been ignored by the vast majority of fantasy owners this season, we’ve given Felix Pena quite a bit of attention here at RotoGraphs. Back in July, both Jeff Zimmerman and Paul Sporer noted Pena’s somewhat limited sleeper appeal. More recently, Jeff pointed out Pena’s declining fastball velocity and strikeout rate in his analysis of most-dropped players.

With just over three weeks left in the season, Pena is looking yet again like a deep-league sleeper. Owners can’t be faulted for passing on the 28-year-old starter-turned-reliever-turned-starter-again, but the Angels’ righty is looking much more like the version of himself we saw prior to the All-Star break. The similarities are enough to warrant a closer look, and possibly some consideration as you search the waiver wire for pitching help.

As Jeff noted in his recent piece, Pena’s fastball velocity is not as high as it was back in June and early July, when he was stirring up a little interest in deeper leagues. His fastball velocity has, in fact, rebounded slightly over his last three starts, but going back four starts, Pena has averaged at least 82 mph on his slider in each outing. This roughly mirrors his slider velocity from his brief first half heyday.

Through his first four turns in the Angels’ rotation, Pena compiled a 2.75 ERA and 30.1 percent strikeout rate. With a return of his slider velocity, his last four starts have produced a 2.88 ERA and 27.0 percent strikeout rate. Another common link between Pena’s mid-summer peak and his current rebound is the frequency with which batters are chasing his out-of-zone pitches. He began his tenure in the Angels’ rotation with a 33.5 percent O-Swing% through his first four starts. During his subsequent five-game slump, Pena’s O-Swing% was just 27.4 percent. Since then, he is back to getting chases at a 33.5 percent rate, and Pena has achieved that despite facing a disciplined Astros lineup in each of his last two starts.

Pena throws mainly sinkers and sliders, and his slider (37.9 percent O-Swing%) has been a far better pitch for inducing chases than his sinker (22.9 percent O-Swing%). Not only has he been throwing a harder slider lately, but he has been throwing more of them. The graph below shows the coinciding of an increase in Pena’s rolling slider usage rate and rolling O-Swing% with the increase in his per-game slider velocity.

Getting batters to swing at more pitches out of the strike zone is generally a positive, but for Pena, it may be an even better thing than it is for most other pitchers. Think about how well that skill has served Patrick Corbin this season. As the graph below shows, Corbin has been among the best pitchers at getting out-of-zone swings and allowing little production on said swings, but no one has been his equal in terms of being elite in both regards.

The archipelago of pitchers just up and to the left of Corbin on the graph may not be on a par with Corbin in terms of being effectively wild, but they have still been quite good at it. That cluster includes Kyle Freeland, Dallas Keuchel, Zack Greinke and Blake Snell, all of whom are top 40 starting pitchers. All four of them have thrown at least 54 percent of their pitches outside of the strike zone, and none has allowed a wOBA as high as .245 on out-of-zone pitches, according to Baseball Savant.

Just a little further up and to the left is Pena, who has thrown 52.5 percent of his pitches outside of the strike zone and allowed a .256 wOBA on those pitches. His 60.3 percent O-Contact% is a little better than the major league average, but even so, it’s not a bad thing for Pena to allow contact on out-of-zone pitches, given that hitters are not producing much on those offerings.

Two strings of four starts with lots of chases, high K-rates and low ERAs may not stack up to the accomplishments of Corbin, Greinke and company, but it’s reason enough to give him a chance in deeper leagues. Pena is still available in more than 85 percent of the leagues on Fantrax, CBS and ESPN, so in leagues where the waiver wire looks thin, he could your best option. Better yet, if you are in a league with weekly FAAB, you have an opportunity to see if Pena can keep the streak going on Friday night at the White Sox. Sure, they happen to have the second-highest O-Swing% in the majors, so if Pena regresses in that start, that’s a red flag. Still, it provides you with one more chance to see if Pena will continue to throw his slider with some additional velocity.