Projecting Strasburg
Stephen Strasburg is possibly the best starting pitcher so far this season. Here is a quick sampling of his stats:
11.6 K/9, 32% K%
2.6 BB/9, 7% BB%
2.82 ERA, 2.42 FIP, 2.60 xFIP, 2.60 SIERA
These numbers are good enough that I have him ranked as the best fantasy starting pitcher without taking the number of innings he pitches into account. The only knock against him is that he is not a ground ball pitcher with has led to a career BABIP 0.308. When he is on the mound, he is arguably the best fantasy pitcher in the in the game.
The problem Strasburg owners face this season is that he has a 160 IP limit placed on him by the Nationals. Once he has reached the limit, they plan on shutting him down for the rest of the season.
With this limit being used, he will have another 55 innings pitched in the majors this season. He is currently averaging just over 5 2/3 innings per start. The limit would then put him at 9 or 10 more starts. He looks to be shutdown once he is around 28 starts, so a replacement level pitcher would be needed for the last 5 to 6 starts of the season.
To find a pitcher he can be replaced with once shut down, I looked at ESPN for pitchers owned in around 30% of all leagues. Three starting pitchers with 30% ownership rates are:
Derek Holland (#62 my SP ranking)
Felix Doubront (#111)
Jake Westbrook (#135)
Not exactly the cream of the crop for starting pitchers. In a 20 team league I am in, the top SP available on the waiver wire are:
Jerome Williams (#133)
Chris Young (#145)
Brett Cecil (#134)
For argument sake, say Jake Westbrook is the pitcher who replaces Strasburg to end the season. Here is the composite pitcher created from the two using the 55 IP for Strasburg and 6 starts for Westbrook.
| Name | IP | K/9 | K | BB/9 | BB |
| Stephen Strasburg | 55.0 | 10.4 | 63 | 2.6 | 16 |
| Jake Westbrook | 37.7 | 5.6 | 24 | 2.5 | 11 |
| Composite | 92.7 | 8.4 | 87 | 2.6 | 27 |
The eventual pitcher ends with a K/9 of 8.4 and BB/9 of 2.6. Here are 4 pitchers with similar stats through the 2012 season.
| Name | K/9 | BB/9 | SP Rank |
| Mat Latos | 8.5 | 2.7 | #8 |
| James Shields | 8.3 | 2.7 | #12 |
| Matt Garza | 8.3 | 2.7 | #21 |
| Adam Wainwright | 8.4 | 2.6 | #25 |
The new composite pitcher is probably going to be near #20 in my rankings. This pitcher is still pretty decent. When I originally calculated the numbers to get the rankings, I ran the composite with a replacement pitcher worse than Westbrook and had Strasburg at #43. That composite pitcher was closer to Dempster or Peavy in the the rankings. This confusion shows the problem with trying guess where to rank Strasburg. Another possible wrinkle is that the Nationals could go back on their word and decide to throw the innings limit out the window and continue to start him. I would not count on it though
The rankings we create are for a shallow, roto, redraft league. His ranking is actually the highest it could probably be in that league type compared to any other league type. The ranking of Strasburg changes depending on the type of league (shallow vs. deep, roto vs. head-to-head, keeper vs re-draft).
Shallow vs. Deep League: In any shallow leagues, Strasburg is more valuable than in deeper leagues. The pitcher who will be used to replace Strasburg will be better than the one available in deeper leagues
Roto vs. Head-to-Head: Strasburg is going to be basically useless in a H2H redraft league. He won’t be there for the finals and no one will want him. Even in a H2H keeper league, I would look at trading him if I end up in the playoffs for a comparable pitcher with no IP limit. Banners fly forever.
Keeper vs Redraft: In redraft leagues, his value drops after every start he makes. Maybe he can be traded off to a team who thinks the Nats will not follow the IP limit. In a keeper league, teams who are out of the running for 1st place or money could look at trying to pick him up for next season. Strasburg’s owner may want a another decent pitcher for the 5-6 starts Strasburg looks to miss.
It will be interesting to see how the whole Strasburg situation plays out if the Nationals are still in the playoff hunt as the season winds down. For fantasy owners, they should assume that the IP limit will be used. When I valued him for the rankings, he took quite a hit for the time he will miss. Depending on the league setup, his value could be quite high (shallow, roto, keeper league) or really low (deep, H2H, re-draft league). It is time for owners to determine his value in their own league so if the right situation comes up, he can be moved or acquired.
Jeff, one of the authors of the fantasy baseball guide,The Process, writes for RotoGraphs, The Hardball Times, Rotowire, Baseball America, and BaseballHQ. He has been nominated for two SABR Analytics Research Award for Contemporary Analysis and won it in 2013 in tandem with Bill Petti. He has won four FSWA Awards including on for his Mining the News series. He's won Tout Wars three times, LABR twice, and got his first NFBC Main Event win in 2021. Follow him on Twitter @jeffwzimmerman.
I still prefer Ackley.
If Strasburg is worthless in redraft H2H leagues I should be able to get him for next to nothing, correct?
Haven’t they been backing off the innings limit lately?
Was offered the following deal in a head – to – head points league.
Strasburg and Harper for Cueto, B. Upton and Feliz
Under normal circumstances, you make the deal. Because of Strasburg’s unique situation and because I also own Chris Sale, you run into quite the dilemma.
Keeper league or redraft?
I disagree completely that fantasy owners should act as if he will be shut down. You have to weigh the utility of each scenario and the likelihood that it will happen.
Sooo you don’t disagree completely then!
Great article. I own Stras and have two offers:
Konerko & Waino
Adam Jones and Anibal or Josh Johnson
This is a H2H keeper where my top SPs are Sale and Gio, but I also just lost Votto. Thoughts?
I like the 2nd one quite a bit, especially if a keeper league. Jones is a stud.
“The only knock against him is that he is not a ground ball pitcher with has led to a career BABIP 0.308.”
Except that flyball pitchers tend to actually have lower BABIPs than groundball pitchers. Derp. In any case, he’s not really an extreme flyball pitcher by any stretch–he has a pretty healthy groundball to flyball ratio. The reason he has a high BABIP is much simpler than that–bad luck.
The Nats have never placed on IP limit on Strausburg. The ip limit rumor was spread by a writer in Washington Post (don’t recall name) based on what they did with Zimmerman. They do have a plan but they havent disclosed it and considering where Nats are part of the plan has to be how Staursburg feels and how he’s doing. Not saying he’s not going to be shutdown just that it’s not going to be clear cut like with Jordan.A lot will have to due with how he’s pitching and if he shows sign of fatigue. imo
That was my first thought in reading the article, except .308 isn’t really bad luck; I’d say it’s more on the high end of random variance. Since then, though, his BABIP has increased to .320, which I would say is bad luck. Anything between .285 and .310 I consider normal.
Jeff:
The guy is willing to do Jones and Anibal, but Anibal scares me. Also, in my keeper structure, Anibal would not be worth keeping.
You clearly aren’t as bullish on Waino as others around here. Or do you think Konerko’s slump is legit?
I like Waino, but not the Konerko part. If you could pull Jones and Waino, then go for it. Add in a small piece.
On Konerko.
I have is xBABIP at 0.300 vice 0.342
His power is down
he is old and slow
you have Votto
Thanks for the dialogue.
Unfortunately, those deals are from two different owners. The guy with Waino would do Waino plus Victorino or Hart. I like Victorino more than Hart, but feel like Victorino + Waino isn’t enough. Am I overvaluing Stras? I could see if the guy would throw in David Hernandez too, whom I like for his strong rate and K stats and his potential for saves.