Let’s Talk 5 Recently Recalled Rookie Starting Pitchers

This is a fun time in deep leagues as rookies ascend from the minor leagues and could deliver big value, even if you might not consider them in shallow mixed formats. I specifically like evaluating starting pitchers, as I always found it a bit easier to predict success or failure based on minor league metrics than hitters. So let’s discuss five recently recalled rookie starting pitchers.

Cam Schlittler | NYY

Schlittler debuted about a month ago and has made five starts to date. He was ranked as the Yankees second best prospect and 48th overall, with strong fastball grades and a curveball as his best secondary.

In the minors this season, he posted a 31.9% strikeout rate, backed by a 14.1% SwStk% and 31% CSW%. A minor league pitcher’s SwStk% is probably the most important metric in my mind as it gets right to the point — how good is a pitcher at generating swings and misses. Schlittler was clearly very good at it. Interestingly, he has consistently allowed a high BABIP in the minors. I’m curious to see how he fares in the Majors, as it could have been poor team defensive support or a lack of skill in preventing hits on balls in play. Perhaps a combination of both.

In the Majors, his strikeout rate has plunged to just 21.6% and his walk rate has jumped into double digits. His SwStk% has also declined to just 10.5%, while his CSW% sits well below average. That’s disappointing so far given his dominance in the minors, but it’s a tiny sample size, so it’s certainly not time to panic yet.

What’s particularly encouraging here is that his fastball velocity has been on a serious upward trend. The pitch averaged 95 MPH in 2024, then jumped to 96.6 MPH at Triple-A this year, and has averaged 97.9 MPH in the Majors. That’s a crazy progression! He has thrown the fastball much more frequently in the Majors so far, cutting down the usage of his slider and then rounding out his repertoire with supposedly his second best pitch, his curveball.

PitchingBot likes his fastball and slider, rating it above average, resulting in a slightly above average overall stuff grade. Stuff+ disagrees, as it thinks his fastball is actually slightly below average, but absolutely love his slider and curveball, the latter of which PitchingBot actually thinks is below average. So it’s difficult to gauge the quality of his stuff, though both models do calculate his overall stuff is above average, even if it hasn’t led to a whole lot of strikeouts yet. His four-seamer has generated a double digit SwStk%, which is excellent, but both his slider and curve are in single digits, which is not good.

So far, his fastball has missed bats, but he needs to improve upon his secondaries. This sounds like a typical evaluation of a rookie pitcher, and averaging in the high 90s with that fastball should give him a lot of room to improve. He’s a worthy gamble the rest of the way if you’re lagging in pitching and looking to hit gold.

Carson Whisenhunt | SFG

The southpaw debuted a couple of weeks ago and has made three starts for the Giants so far. He ranked as the team’s third best prospect and 88th overall, earning a perfect 80/80 changeup grade, but nothing else particularly encouraging. Can a pitcher succeed with an elite changeup and nothing else?

At Triple-A this year, his strikeout rate plunged to just 21%, even though he posted a 28.4% mark at the same level in 2024. His walk rate did improve dramatically though, but it wasn’t enough to avoid enduring a disappointing year. That said, it was still somehow enough to earn him a promotion to the Majors.

Whisenhunt throws his sinker most frequently, which is surprising considering he doesn’t have a groundball tilt. So either those sinkers aren’t generating grounders, or his other pitches are so fly ball generating that it more than offsets the grounders. Looking at his pitch type splits, it’s the former — his sinker has induced just a 40.9% GB% and has actually allowed a higher rate of fly balls, which is pretty shocking.

PitchingBot does really like his changeup, and it’s enough to result in a slightly above average stuff grade, despite a poor sinker grade. On the other hand, Stuff+ dislikes everything, with his changeup actually grading out as slightly below average and his sinker extremely weak. That has led to poor Stuff+ and Pitching+ grades. His changeup has generated an elite 22% SwStk% so I would probably side with PitchingBot here as it’s hard to record such a number without the pitch being well above average!

Given the poor Triple-A performance this year and lack of other pitches besides the changeup, I’m not enthused here. Perhaps he’ll prove to be a streamer at home in deeper leagues, but that’s about it.

Jack Perkins | ATH

Perkins was recalled in late June, made eight appearances from the bullpen, and has now moved into the rotation, where he’s made two starts. He ranked 10th among Athletics prospects, with abov average grades on both his fastball and slider.

He was a starter over his minor league career and posted some strong strikeout rates the last two years. This year at Triple-A, he posted an absurd 38.4% strikeout rate in 44 innings over nine starts, driven by a 14% SwStk%. However, a 29.5% CSW%, while above average, in no way matches with such a lofty strikeout rate, suggesting there was some good fortune there. He has also generally walked batters at a double digit clip, which should give potential fantasy owners pause.

In the Majors, he’s been darn good at generating whiffs, as he stands with a 15.5% SwStk%. It hasn’t all been from his days in the bullpen, as he has still posted a sterling 14.4% SwStk% over his two starts, but that’s resulted in just a 23.1% strikeout rate.

Also good news is his fastball velocity has only dropped marginally, from 96.3 MPH in the bullpen to 95.7 MPH in the rotation. He has continued throwing his slider second most frequently, though cut down on his usage as a starter to throw his cutter and changeup more often.

Finally, we have some semblance of agreement between the pitch models on his pitches! Both think his fastball and cutter are below average, even at his above average velocity, while his slider is elite and changeup is above average. It results in overall above average stuff and you have to wonder if he could improve his fastball given the plus velocity. The command and location in both models are below average though, which is no surprise given the elevated walk rate.

I think he’s similar to Schlittler in that he has clear strikeout ability and is worth speculating on if you’re in desperate need of pitching gambles to move up in those categories.

Hurston Waldrep | ATL

The fifth best prospect in the Braves organization actually debuted last year, making two starts, before being recalled just over a week ago this year to make his debut this season. He served as a follower during his first game and then made a traditional start last Saturday.

Waldrep’s prospect status is driven by an elite splitter that earned 70/70 grades. He recorded 91.2 innings at Triple-A this season, but with disappointing results. His strikeout rate has been in the low-20% range the last couple of seasons and his walk rate has been in double digits. So that excellent splitter simply hasn’t been enough, even though he has generated double digit SwStk% marks.

Over his 11.2 MLB innings this year, he has actually thrown the kitchen sink, featuring a whopping six different pitches, all thrown at least 8.5% of the time. His most used pitch has actually been that splitter, but it has only been thrown 28.5% of the time. Talk about batters not knowing what’s coming next! His pitch mix so far is completely different than what he had thrown at Triple-A this year, which is really weird.

Both PitchingBot and Stuff+ agree that his splitter is absolutely elite. It has generated an unbelievable 27% SwStk%, so here’s when the pitch grades and results do match up. Unfortunately, the good news ends there. PitchingBot does think his fastball is above average, but every other pitch is below, while Stuff+ thinks the fastball is actually below average…along with everything else. Amazingly, the splitter is good enough that both models agree his overall stuff is above average.

Waldrep’s pitch mix will make him interesting to follow. If his control was better, he’d be more intriguing, but with consistent double digit walk rates and really only that splitter, no matter how good it is, it’s hard to get very excited here.

Cade Cavalli | WAS

The Nationals’ seventh best prospect, Cavalli debuted last year, making one start of 4.1 innings, before returning to the Majors last week and making a start of…4.1 innings. Hopefully he doesn’t become just a 4.1 inning guy! His scouting grades suggest he lacks a dominant pitch, with three pitches that are average to slightly above average and above average command. Will that be enough to interest fantasy owners?

In the minors this year, he has posted just acceptable skills, though mixed with a high groundball rate, which makes him the only one in this post that is such a groundball generator. He also posted an inflated 5.35 ERA, including a 6.09 mark at Triple-A, so one actually wonders why he was recalled in the first place. Of course, he was doomed by the combination of inflated BABIP and HR/FB rates, along with a suppressed LOB%, so perhaps the Nationals were able to look past the results, chalking it up to bad defensive and bullpen support, along with poor fortune.

Though it’s only been 4.1 innings, his fastball velocity was up 1.3 MPH from his time at Triple-A, as he averaged an exciting 97.3 MPH with the pitch. He also apparently introduced a knuckle curve, which he didn’t even throw in the minors, and made it his second most thrown pitch. Since he seemingly didn’t throw his curveball, perhaps this is just the same pitch classified differently by Statcast.

PitchingBot and Stuff+ loved his stuff during that first start. Both agree he featured an above average fastball, an elite sinker, and fantastic changeup. Only Stuff+ grades his knuckle curve, and that’s elite as well. So every pitch he threw a reasonable number of times graded out as well above average. That resulted in an incredible 21.6% SwStk% during that first start. Obviously, the stuff was far superior to what he showed at Triple-A, when his strikeout rate was just 24.7% and SwStk% at just 11.8%.

We’ll see how much of this improved stuff was real or just increased adrenaline, but this is pretty intriguing considering he also generated a high rate of grounders. Though the scouting grades were uninspiring, I might be most interested in Cavalli out of all the names in this post.