Sleeper Pitchers With Multiple Pitches

If you use large samples and go looking for pitchers with many different plus pitches by whiff type that aren’t yet fully appreciated by the masses, you’ll get guys that we’ve been talking about all year here: Carlos Carrasco, Garrett Richards, Homer Bailey, Jake Arrieta, and Marcus Stroman, to name a few.

But if you relax the samples a bit — in this case down to thirty pitches thrown per category — you get some names that might be interesting to dynasty leaguers looking to the future, or deep leaguers looking for a sneaky late-season play. Or even mixed leaguers looking for names to stash for next year.

So here are a few interesting pitchers that have at three non-fastball pitches that qualify as ‘good’ by the benchmarks set by Jeff Zimmerman and I.

Cory Rasmus
Rasmus has actually gotten a couple starts, but he hasn’t lasted more than three innings yet. He’s essentially the team’s fifth starter, but it’s hard to stream him as such because it doesn’t look like he’ll go long enough to get the win. That said, Rasmus is now on the team’s depth chart as a starter, and you can see why from his arsenal. The change (29.5% swinging strikes), slider (15.3%) and curve (13.2%) are all beyond above-average. Those are plus whiff rates (and Brooks has them even higher). The fastball isn’t great by whiffs (3.8%) but it sits close to 93 and he has a nice home park to suppress homers. In his longer stints, his fastball has been down a bit, but even at 92, he’s above average by velocity. Inconsistent command is a question mark, but this is a deep league dynasty sleeper.

Randall Delgado
Where Rasmus doesn’t have the innings to be a streamer this year, Delgado came out and gave five good innings his first start back in the rotation. It went well in terms of results, but two strikeouts in five innings was not the kind of work he was doing this year. This year in the pen, there were all those strikeouts and walks and runs — will that translate to his work in the rotation? What he’s got going for him is a 28.8% whiff rate on his change, plus a strong slider (22.6%) and a good curve (11.6%). That slider is why there’s hope that this is a new Delgado — he hasn’t been throwing it long. Since June, though, he’s gone to it about 15% of the time, and the pitch has had great results. Delgado might be more 92/93 out of the rotation, and his command is always a question mark, but this new pitch absolutely makes him something more than a deep league sleeper. Many leagues could stream him in the right opportunity — his next start against the Giants at home is attractive in 15-teamers and deeper.

Bryan Morris and A.J. Ramos
This pair at the back of the Marlins bullpen both have three non-fastballs that qualify as good. Ramos hasn’t shown great control this year, but he has a curve (16.7% swSTR), change (25.3%), and slider (25.3%) that are all putting up the whiffs. Maybe the cutter (19.4%) and slider (17%) are the same pitch, but with a good curve (12.5%) and a sinking fastball that averages close to 96, Morris and his better command are probably in the first chair for replacing closer Steve Cishek. What, you don’t think the Marlins will spend to keep Cishek, do you?