Quick Looks: Ramirez & Clevinger
In my AL-only league, I needed to fill in a couple pitching slots with James Paxton and Corey Kluber on the DL (and Berrios still in the minors). With almost no time for research (8 pm Sunday deadline), I bought both JC Ramirez and Mike Clevinger on a whim. Here’s what I ended up with.
Ramirez was exclusively a reliever in the majors until his last five starts. While his 3.74 ERA is not ideal, he has an 8.8 K/9 and 2.9 BB/9. I went back and watched his start on April 19th against the Astros (great camera angle). Here’s what I saw.
Fastball: 94-97 mph with release-side run. It’s labled a 2-seamer, but it does not have a ton of downward break (or the rise of a four-seamer). For the season, it has only a 35% GB%. While the velocity is nice, there is nothing else to it. It’s not a good pitch with a 4.4% SwStr% on the season (4.7% for his career).
Slider: 87-90 mph with a 2-8 break (pitcher’s perspective) A nice chase-and-miss pitch. He has no issues throwing it for a first-pitch strike. Also, he’s throwing it 44% of the time (2nd highest among starters) which is more than his fastball (40%). I’m surprised other pitchers don’t go with this approach more, especially those who can throw it for strikes.
Curveball: 78-81 mph. 12-6 small late break. A couple times, the pitch broke like his slider to the glove side. A few times he hung them up in the zone. This curve might be more of a ground ball than a swing-and-miss pitch.
The posed 28-year-old righty throws each of his pitches consistently so he can successfully mix them together. As long as he continues to throw like he has so far this season, he should stay productive. I don’t have a good feel for the pitching depth still available in 10 and 12-team leagues but I would not be surprised if he was at least a streaming option in those shallow league. He’s a most own in anything deeper.
I do have a couple of concerns. First, his fastball velocity hasn’t dropped since starting. I would not be surprised to see it drop as the season goes on. A velocity drop may make his fastball go from bad to horrible.
The second issue I have with Ramirez is his health. It will be interesting to see if he can hold up throwing breaking pitches 60% of the time.
Clevinger made his season’s first start against the Royals this past Sunday. Even though he didn’t allow any runs, he only threw 5.2 innings and walked 4 batters.
Fastball: 91-94 mph, straight. He generally keeps the pitch down in the zone. He gets some swinging and called strikes off it when hitters were looking for one of his breaking pitches. Otherwise, it is a pretty bland and subpar pitch.
Change: 86-87 mph. The pitch comes right at the plate and drops down late. I would not be surprised if the pitch was a split-finger fastball. It’s by far his best pitch. He can throw it for strikes or bury it for swinging strikes.
Slider (81): 80-82 mph, 12-6 drop. He was able to throw it for strikes. Sometimes he hung the pitch. The Royals didn’t make him pay for them but other teams might.
Normal
.
Hanging
Curve(75): 74-75 mph. Again, another pitching breaking 12-6 with the only difference being velocity. It’s only a swing-and-miss pitch.
The 26-year-old’s jerky windup and follow through are a mess. He looks like a reliever out there. There is no flow to his motion. If his motion gets out of sync in just one spot, he could struggle with location. Additionally, he just gives away too many pitches which can lead to a high number of walks and limit his innings.
I wonder if he needs all four pitches. I don’t think the slider gains him anything. If he dropped it, he could concentrate on his other three pitches and possible improve.
I really don’t like what I saw from him. I wish I wasn’t stuck starting him against the Twins on Saturday. Oh well. Sano can only hit three home runs off Clevinger before he gets replaced.
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.
Wow, Clevinger’s delivery is certainly funky – being that hunched, I wonder if he’s maximizing his body extension. A little surprised to hear that he topped out at 94 with the heat, I recall reading reports that he was hitting triple digits at the start of spring, I was hoping he would gain a few permanent ticks.
If you can believe it, his delivery used to be even funkier last season. It’s considerably smoothed out.
Good piece, been thinking about streaming Ramirez in my mixed 12-teamer (although I’m sure I won’t need to once Hill and Nola come back at 100% and never get DLed again, hardy-har).
I assume “but it does have a ton of downward break” is meant to read “but it does NOT have a ton of downward break.”
Thanks, fixed
For Ramirez in paragraph 2 I think you meant to say his FB does NOT have a ton of downward break. For Clevinger, pardon the pedantry, you mean out of sync (or synch), not out of sink.
Thanks, its been a long day.
No doubt. It makes sense, you are talking about fastballs without any downward break, out of sink. It all blends together when you are tired. Hope all is well. I enjoy your work.
added JC to all teams after start #2 put him near the top of the K%-BB% leader board
ride the lightning
Picked up Ramirez a couple weeks ago after Eno Sarris’ piece on him. You said that his velo hasn’t dropped but it has. After sitting 96.5 or so (per numbers here at Fangraphs), he’s been 94.0 and 94.9 his last 2 starts. 2 starts ago it didn’t affect him much (9K, 2 BB, 4 H incl a HR) but his last start was 2 K, 2 BB and 8 H (but 0 HR).
Brooks of course has slightly different velo numbers but they also have his velo dipping about 2 MPH the last 2 starts. I”m eager to see how he does tonight.
Looks a little to me like a guy figuring out he can’t throw as hard as a starter. Doesn’t mean he won’t succeed, but I’m a little less enthused about a guy throwing 94 than a guy throwing 97.
I was just going to write I noticed the same thing with Ramirez velocity dropping off quite a bit in his last two starts. We shall see tonight if this continues and how it effects him going forward.
These are great snippets. Please keep them coming.
Great stuff!
Go back and look at Ramirez’ velocity numbers from last year. You’ll see his numbers go up and down, so I’m not surprised it has happened again this year. (Of course, he was a RP then so that’s important to remember.)
In my case, I had no choice but to pick JC up in a 16 team points league. Here’s what’s happened to some of the starters I drafted or kept (it’s a 12 keeper league): Nola DL; Paxton DL; Guerra DL; Skaggs DL; Chen DL; Cotton demoted; Conley demoted and subsequently released.
Anybody got an idea for another replacement? I’m looking at either Bolsinger or Ubaldo right now.
Go to the “quick looks” article before this — Nick Martinez was mentioned.
Thanks! I saw that article too. But Nick Martinez is taken too.
I was also thinking about adding Hoffman to my roster. I followed his start last night on GameDay and he was throwing heat. But I double checked this morning and it was just a spot start for him.
Looks like Bolsinger for me.
I’m in on Clevinger in my AL-Only league. I’m buying him based on 8+ K/9 and a good chance to get a win every time out on that team in a weak division. As a flyball and strikeout guy, if he can keep the walks reasonable, the ratios shouldn’t be too bad, either.
Agreed on Clevinger, no matter how jerky windup he is. John Sickels liked him as a prospect before his TJ surgery, so Clevinger is a bit of a forgotten product. He pitched pretty well in the minors this year and, though he had a rough debut last year in the majors, maybe Clevinger has worked out some issues. On the Indians, he’s worth a gamble given the state of pitching these days.