Reviewing 2016 Pod’s Picks & Pans: Starting Pitcher

Alas, we made it to the last Pod’s Picks & Pans recap, as we conclude with the starting pitchers. Since I pride myself on my pitcher projections, I always feel pressure to deliver more accurate forecasts, and ultimately, rankings. Let’s see how things turned out this year.

As happens often, my rankings and the consensus split the wins right down the middle. Let’s dive into each to see what happened.

Corey Kluber had exactly the season I was expecting, as his ERA improved thanks to better batted ball fortune and his LOB% increased. He also doubled his win total (how the heck does one go 9-16 with a 3.49 ERA anyway?!), which will do wonders for any pitcher’s fantasy value. He would have ranked better if it weren’t for a couple of surprises that ranked ahead of him. Figures though that his skills actually declined though. His strikeout rate fell for a second straight season, while his walk rate jumped to a career high. It still remained better than average, but departed elite territory. He clearly received the best defensive support he ever has, as his BABIP dropped to a career low after he was one of the poster boys of the elite pitchers for supposedly being a poor contact manager. With luck and defensive support such huge drivers of BABIP, the vast majority of pitchers are simply going to bounce around the league average, so please remember that. Kulber didn’t suddenly go from a poor contact manager to a strong one overnight.

And once again, Stephen Strasburg reminds us that health is a skill. Obviously, my ranking of seven was predicated on him pitching a full season, which he has only done basically once in his career. Yeah, he made 30 starts in 2013, but threw just 183 innings, a low total for an ace, making it difficult to wiggle into the top 10 in fantasy value (unless your name is Clayton Kershaw). His overall skills were as good as usual (his strikeout rate has now risen three straight seasons!), but injuries made it nearly impossible to jump into the top 10. It’ll be interesting to see if his health improves or his performance changes next year if he does decide to throw his slider less frequently.

Justin Verlander was a divisive projection heading into 2016, as both Steamer and ZiPS were quite pessimistic, while the Fans were extreme bulls, and I took the middle ground. The Fans were right! But I was righter than the consensus, even if I was still not nearly as optimistic as I could have been. Verlander’s fastball velocity rebounded, jumping to its highest average since 2012, and his strikeout rate actually set a new career high…at age 33! That was certainly unexpected. It was all about that fastball, which recorded the highest SwStk% of his career, as all his other pitches were in typical SwStk% range. Are you going to bet on a 34 year old continuing at a career best SwStk% pace with his fastball. I sure as heck won’t. Which means that without knowing his current market price, there’s great risk he ends up being overvalued.

Despite moving back to the American League, I loved Ian Kennedy for his new pitcher friendly home park and the elite defensive support he would likely receive. Sure enough, his BABIP hit its lowest mark since 2010. While his HR/FB rate was about league average, the damage was primarily done in away parks, where he sported an inflated 15.2% mark versus a 10% mark at home. So Kauffman Stadium certainly helped ensure things weren’t worse on the home run front. And despite his SIERA jumping to the highest mark of his career, his ERA tumbled back below 4.00 and his WHIP was at its best since 2011. Also interesting to note is that his fastball velocity crept up to a new career high, but that didn’t help his strikeout rate any.

Surprise, surprise, another 50/50 split!

My Lance McCullers ranking reflected both health risk and playing time risk. I was actually more bullish on his performance than the two projection systems, but was concerned that the Astros had too many starters. McCullers ended up battling injuries, which limited him to just 81 innings over 14 starts. But he was as good as could have been hoped, as he posted an identical ERA to his 2015 debut and recorded gobs of strikeouts thanks to a devastating curve ball that he threw nearly half the time. Health is going to remain a question mark and his control clearly needs work. But he’s got the strikeouts and big ground ball rate, so there’s serious upside here. A fantastic shallow league buy where replacement level is much higher than a deeper league.

I feel like everyone is typically overly bullish on TJ surgery returnees, so I was skeptical of Yu Darvish from both a playing time and performance perspective. I was right on playing time — he only started 17 games and pitched 100 innings. But damn was he good in those 100 innings, seemingly feeling no ill effects from the surgery. His strikeout rate was right there, fastball velocity reached a new high, and his walk rate even fell to a career low! I doubt he’ll reach 200 innings in 2017, but it looks like he’ll be back to his perch near the top tier.

I had no idea I was bearish on Madison Bumgarner, but three spots in the rankings that high up really isn’t a whole lot. However, I was clearly more pessimistic than the projection systems, having forecasted an ERA a bit over 3.00. Instead, he posted a sub-3.00 ERA for the fourth straight season, as his strikeout rate inched up for the fourth consecutive year. Unfortunately, his fastball velocity dropped more than a mile per hour and he continues to rely on suppressed BABIP marks that don’t seem explainable from his batted ball profile. I’ll probably be on the bearish end of things again in 2017, except this time I’ll have company with Steamer projecting a 3.12 ERA.

After a luck driven 2015, many were excited about Wei-Yin Chen’s move to the National League. I, however, figured he would have difficulty sustaining that strikeout rate spike (and technically he did, as typically a move to the NL would result in a strikeout rate boost, whereas Chen’s dropped by a smidgen), while there was no way he would repeat that 80.5% LOB%. Instead, his good luck completely reverse and he endured some terrible fortune with the Marlins. His LOB% ended up dropping to a career low, and despite similar skill sets, his ERA shot up by a run and a half. He’ll most certainly rebound, but the upside here just isn’t all that appealing. Then again, he’ll earn some value in NL-Only leagues and will likely come cheaply.