Archive for Daniel Cabrera

Here on Saturday in the final week of the season most leagues have already passed their deadline for waivers. But for those of you in daily transaction leagues with moves still available and innings left to play with, there are no shortage of pitchers to consider. Here are the pitchers going Saturday owned in fewer than 50 percent of CBS Sports leagues. Matchups come from ESPN.com.

Daniel Cabrera (2%) – Has a road start in Chicago versus Wells. Cabrera does not have the fastball he once had, although he can still reach the mid-90s. However, the walks are just as bad as they have always been. He is averaging 7.63 BB/9 this year. As if that was not bad enough, he has a .321 BABIP and a 58 percent strand rate.

Yorman Bazardo (1%) – Has a road start in New York versus Misch. In five games as a starter, Bazardo is 1-2 with a 9.43 ERA. He can hit the mid-90s with his fastball, but like Cabrera he has averaged more walks (6.26) than strikeouts (5.60) per nine innings this year. Bazardo has a 1.44 GB/FB ratio but a 25.8 LD%. It all adds up to a pitcher who has allowed 25 ER in 27.1 IP in the majors this season.

Pat Misch (3%) – Has a home start versus Bazardo and the Astros. After three straight poor outings, the Mets threatened to remove Misch from the rotation. But he got another chance and hurled a complete game shutout in his last start. Misch is 0-3 with an 8.57 ERA in Citi Field but has not faced Houston this season.

David Bush (22%) – Has a road start in St. Louis against Lohse. In his last seven starts, Bush is 2-5 with an 8.10 ERA. He is 4-4 with a 6.79 ERA in road games this year. Against the Cardinals Bush is 0-2 with an 8.71 ERA and a 1.935 WHIP.

Kyle Lohse (41%) – Has a home start versus Bush and the Brewers. In his last eight games, Lohse is 2-3 with a 6.48 ERA. This year he is 5-3 with a 3.75 ERA in Busch Stadium. In two appearances versus Milwaukee, Lohse is 0-1 with a 7.20 ERA.

Dana Eveland (5%) – Has a home game versus Kazmir and the Angels. In 12 IP since being recalled from the minors, Eveland is 1-0 with a 5.11 ERA. Overall, he is 2-0 with a 4.60 ERA in McAfee Coliseum. In two games this year versus the Angels, Eveland has no record but a 7.71 ERA.

Anibal Sanchez (35%) – Has a road game in Philadelphia against Hamels. Sanchez is 1-2 in his last five games but he has a 2.51 ERA in that stretch, with 27 Ks in 28.2 IP. This season he has a 2-5 record with a 4.80 ERA in road games. In his only game against the Phillies, Sanchez pitched eight scoreless innings with seven strikeouts.

Scott Richmond (35%) – Has a road game in Baltimore against Hendrickson. In his last 10 games, Richmond is 2-5 with an 8.21 ERA. This year he is 4-5 with a 5.99 ERA in road games. But against the Orioles, Richmond is 2-0 with a 3.75 ERA this season.

Mark Hendrickson (2%) – Has a home start versus Richmond and the Blue Jays. Hendrickson started the first seven games of the season and then moved to the bullpen in mid-May. He returned to the rotation in mid-September and has made three straight starts, in which he is 0-1 with a 4.11 ERA. In that span, Hendrickson has 3 Ks and 5 HR in 15.1 IP. He is 3-2 with a 5.73 ERA at Camden Yards this year. In four games against Toronto, Hendrickson is 1-1 with a 4.38 ERA.

Freddy Garcia (14%) – Has a road game in Detroit against Figaro. Garcia has pitched at least six innings in each of his last seven games. In his last outing against the Tigers, he allowed 7 ER in 6.1 IP on 9/26.

Alfredo Figaro (1%) – Has a home start versus Garcia and the White Sox. Figaro had two starts for Detroit in the middle of the season and two relief appearces since being recalled in mid-September. He can dial it up in the mid-90s, which has led to an 8.04 K/9 this season for Detroit. But a 4.60 BB/9 combined with a .374 BABIP has made things tough for the rookie from the Dominican Republic.

Aaron Laffey (28%) – Has a road start in Boston against Beckett. Laffey has lost five consecutive starts and has a 5.46 ERA in that stretch. In 29.2 IP, he has a 2.023 WHIP and 9 Ks. He is 3-5 with a 4.98 ERA in road games this year and in 3 IP versus the Red Sox has not allowed an earned run.

Ryan Rowland-Smith (43%) – Has a home start versus Hunter and the Rangers. In his last 13 games, Rowland-Smith has eight Quality Starts. He is 3-2 with a 2.88 ERA at Safeco Field but has not faced Texas this season.

Wade LeBlanc (16%) – Has a home start versus Cain and the Giants. In his last five games, LeBlanc is 2-0 with a 2.48, with four of those starts coming on the road. In two games at Petco, LeBlanc has no record and a 4.00 ERA. He allowed 2 ER in 7 IP and picked up the win in his only outing against San Francisco this season.

Stock Up

Andruw Jones, Rangers

Remember the state of Jones’ career one year ago? He was coming off an incredulously bad beginning with the Dodgers (.159/.282/.250 last April), on his way to an apocalyptic .234 wOBA and -17.9 Batting Runs in just 238 PA. It was a startlingly abrupt fall for a guy who had posted 3.6 Wins Above Replacement in a “down” 2007 season. Essentially given a settlement package by the Dodgers to leave LA and never, ever return, Jones has crushed the ball thus far with the Rangers. The corpulent out-maker of ’08 is nowhere to be found, as the 32 year-old has a .507 wOBA (.333/.500/.718) in 52 plate appearances. With Jones channeling his inner Barry Bonds, David Murphy getting in touch with his inner Juan Pierre (.260 wOBA) and Josh Hamilton hitting the DL (finding his inner Milton Bradley?), Andruw should definitely be on your radar.

Dexter Fowler, Rockies

A lanky 6-4 center fielder endowed with a full complement of tools, Fowler is off to an excellent start with Colorado. Aside from his five SB bonanza versus Padres righty Chris Young, Fowler has a .363 wOBA in 82 PA after jumping straight from Double-A. He’s working the count well (10 BB%, 19.7 Outside-Swing%), has shown some pop (.153 Isolated Power) and he’s 9-for-10 in the steals department (a welcome change for a guy whose raw speed had produced a pernicious 66.4% SB success rate over the past three minor league seasons). The 23 year-old switch-hitter has earned an everyday gig with the Rockies, and his broad skill-set makes him well worth acquiring.

Kevin Youkilis, Red Sox

When Youkilis slugged .569 and thumped 29 homers in 2008, most figured that his power numbers would regress more toward his career averages in 2009. After all, his career-high SLG% prior to that was .453, in 2007. So far, the 30 year-old has done his best to quash those thoughts: with 6 dingers and a .744 slugging percentage, Youkilis has produced a .528 wOBA that leads all major league hitters. After four straight seasons of decreasing walks and increasing Outside-Swing percentages (chronicled in more detail here), Youk is drawing free passes at a career-high 15.7% clip.

Adam Jones, Orioles

Jones was covered here a few weeks ago, but his significant progress with the lumber deserves further mention. Jones was among the most free swingers in the game during the 2008 season (his 36.2 Outside-Swing% was leaps and bounds above the 25.4% MLB average, and ranked 9th-highest among all hitters), but he’s curtailed that Francoeur-esque approach in 2009. His O-Swing% is down to a more reasonable 26.5%, and his walk rate his climbed to 8.8% from a paltry 4.6% in ’08. As a result, the 23 year-old has put himself in the hole with less frequency this season: his First-Pitch Strike% has fallen from 66% in 2008 to 59.1% in 2009 (57.6% MLB average). No, he won’t come anywhere close to hitting .355, but Jones’ more enlightened plate approach is a welcome sight.

Yovani Gallardo, Brewers

Gallardo has been every bit the ace he was billed as, with a slick 3.78 K/BB ratio and a 3.37 FIP. He’s benefitting from a .220 BABIP, but with 8.83 K’s per nine, 2.34 BB/9 and a greater number of grounders (47.7 GB%, compared to a 38.7% career average), Gallardo has the skills to remain among the very best in the NL.

Stock Down

David Ortiz, Red Sox

During the off-season, I wondered if the days of “Big Papi” were now a relic of the past, to be replaced by the much-less-catchy “Medium Papi” era. Right about now, Boston would love to have even a mildly productive Papi: the 33 year-old has a sordid .271 wOBA in 114 PA. Ortiz has been uncharacteristically impatient at the dish: his 28.2 Outside-Swing% is well above last year’s 20.6% mark and his 18.3% career average. He’s also making more contact on those outside pitches (59.4 Outside-Contact%, 53.4% in 2008), likely meaning he’s been making more weak contact on “pitcher’s pitches” off the plate. Combine the hacking with an ISO that looks like a misprint (.094) and a tendency to get jammed (his Infield/FB% is 18.6%, compared to an 8.3% career average), and you have a fellow who has produced -6.8 batting runs on the season.

Daniel Cabrera, Nationals

The Nats brought in Cabrera from the O’s this past offseason, hoping to find even remnants of the 6-7, hard-throwing groundball pitcher who looked highly promising during the middle part of the aughts. Unfortunately, Cabrera’s skills have eroded even further this season. His K rate (just 4.75 in ’08, after sitting in the 7-9 range earlier in his career) has dropped to a microscopic 3.33 per nine innings, and he’s issuing an absurd number of free passes (6.29 BB/9). Cabrera sat at 96.2 MPH with his heater in 2005, yet he’s barely cracking 90 this season (90.5 MPH, down over 2 MPH from last season).

Perhaps in recognition of his diminished fastball, Cabrera is mixing in more breaking pitches: his league-high fastball usage in 2008 (82.5%) has been ratcheted down to 67.9%, with more sliders and changeups instead. Unfortunately, he has next to no control of those secondary offerings, either: just 41.8% of his pitches have crossed home plate (48.9% MLB average). The result of all this ugliness is a 5.72 FIP. Cabrera won’t turn 28 until the end of the month, yet it seems as though he’s completely lost the ability to pitch at the major league level within a span of four seasons.

Joe Saunders, Angels

How long can Saunders keep this act up? He posted a 3.41 ERA last season, but a low whiff rate (4.68 K/9) and good fortune on balls in play (.267 BABIP) indicated that regression would find him: his FIP was a less-impressive 4.36. In 2009, Saunders has posted an identical 3.41 ERA in 31.2 frames, yet his FIP has trailed further south (4.87), while his strikeout total (2.56 K/9) would make Kirk Rueter blush. Again benefitting from a low BABIP (.252), Saunders is a great sell-high candidate.

Travis Hafner, Indians

Wither Pronk? Hafner (coming off an ugly, injury-marred 2008 season) had been doing his best “Hulk Smash” impression in the early portion of the season, posting a .394 wOBA and a .270 ISO. Unfortunately, his surgically repaired shoulder again acted up, pushing him to the DL. On the positive side, Hafner’s absence should open the door for the recently recalled Matt LaPorta.

Oliver Perez, Mets

Perez’s scattershot control has come completely off the rails in 2009. Never known for painting the corners, Perez has issued 8.72 BB/9 this year, with a near-ten ERA and a 6.17 FIP. When he’s not walking the yard, Ollie has surrendered line drives at a 29% clip. Batters have understandably plastered the lumber to their shoulders, chasing Perez’s outside offerings just 13.2% of the time (the lowest rate among starters). The 27 year-old’s fastball is coming in at 89.2 MPH (down two ticks from last year). Is Perez hurt? And if not, isn’t that almost worse?

Several years back, Daniel Cabrera was one of the more intriguing young arms in the American League East. A hulking 6-9, 270 pound righty who missed plenty of bats (and often the strike zone) while generating some grounders, Cabrera appeared to be Baltimore’s best hope at cultivating a home-grown starter to front the club’s rotation. If you squinted really hard, you might have even seen a Carlos Zambrano starter kit on the mound for the O’s.

After a wobbly introduction to the big leagues in 2004 (0.85 K/BB ratio, 5.10 FIP in 147 IP) in which his upper-90’s heater often missed the mark, Cabrera turned in an impressive campaign as a 24 year-old during the 2005 season. The Dominican Republic native punched out 8.76 batters per nine innings and kept his infielders busy with a 52.7 GB%. His walk rate remained tenuous at 4.85 per nine innings, but the overall result of those whiffs and grounders was a tidy 4.02 FIP. With 96 MPH cheese, Cabrera figured to establish himself as Baltimore’s ace if he could pare those free passes down to a more reasonable level.

Instead of building off of that promising season, however, Cabrera seemed to take a step backward in 2006. His K rate climbed all the way to 9.55 per nine innings (3rd among all starters tossing at least 140 frames), but his already-high propensity to issue ball four rose to an untenable level: 6.32 BB/9. After posting an above-average groundball rate in ’05, Cabrera found his pitches being lifted more frequently, with just a 40.7 GB%.

His FIP was still a decent-looking 4.20, but that figure was held down by a low home run/flyball rate: after surrendering a homer on 10.4% of his flyballs in ’05, Cabrera lucked into a 7.6 HR/FB% in 2006. If we adjust for that HR/FB rate by using Expected Fielding Independent ERA (XFIP) from The Hardball Times, we find that Cabrera’s XFIP rose from 4.20 in ’05 to 4.83 in ’06.

In 2007, Cabrera essentially made a trade-off, swapping some strikeouts for (relatively) improved control. His K rate fell to 7.31 per nine, with his walk rate falling from cartoonishly bad to just mediocre (4.76 BB/9). The result was a nearly unchanged strikeout-to-walk ratio, as Cabrera posted a 1.54 K/BB that mirrored his 1.51 showing in 2006. His groundball rate recovered (49.5%), but Cabrera didn’t experience the same good fortune with the longball, surrendering 1.1 HR/9. His FIP rose to 5.01, with his XFIP ticking up slightly to 4.89.

If the 2007 season was a disappointing showing from a stagnating pitcher, then 2008 was an unmitigated disaster for the 27 year-old Cabrera. Once a high-octane, high strikeout hurler who walked more than his fair share of batters, Cabrera lost the velocity and strikeout portions of that equation while still showing little ability to paint the corners. In 180 innings, the big righty saw his K rate plummet to 4.75 per nine innings, while his walk rate remained a ho-hum 4.5 per nine.

Once capable of reaching the upper-90’s with his fastball on a consistent basis, Cabrera averaged a more tame 92.6 MPH in ’08, down nearly 4 MPH since his solid 2005 campaign. Cabrera has actually become more reliant on his heater despite its loss of zip: after throwing his fastball about three-quarters of the time in 2006 and 2007 (an already lofty rate), he used his diminished heat 82.5% of the time in ’08. No other starter in the majors relied on his fastball as much as Cabrera.

With waning stuff that led to a nasty 5.61 FIP and 5.41 XFIP, Cabrera was pretty easy to make contact with this past season. He hit the DL in September with a sprained elbow, after barely cracking 90 MPH with his fastball during two ineffective late-season starts. Courtesy of Josh Kalk’s pitch F/X tool, let’s take a look at the difference in Cabrera’s arsenal between 2007 and 2008:

2007

Fastball: -5.16 X, 10.06 Z, 4.2 Swinging Strike%
Slider: 6.16 X, -0.9 Z, 18.5 Swinging Strike %

2008

Fastball: -8.49 X, 8.02 Z, 3.2 Swinging Strike%
Slider: 0.68 X, 1.13 Z, 13.5 Swinging Strike%

(X is horizontal movement. A negative X number means that the pitch is moving in toward a right-handed hitter, while a positive X means that the pitch is moving away from a righty hitter (in to a lefty). Z is vertical movement- the lower the Z number, the more the pitch “drops” in the strike zone.)

Cabrera’s fastball was never a big swing-and-miss pitch to begin with (the average Swinging Strike% for a fastball is about six percent), but batters whiffed at the pitch even less in ’08, as the offering tailed in on the hands of right-handed batters more but featured less vertical break. Cabrera’s slider, a pretty lively pitch in ’07, didn’t have near as much jump this past season and saw a five percent dip in swinging strikes. Perhaps in an effort to preserve his elbow, Cabrera mixed in his slider just 15.3% of the time in ’08, down from 23% the previous year.

Basically a one-pitch starter with an occasional hanging slider, Cabrera saw his Contact% rise considerably. He was once pretty difficult to put the bat on the ball against, but hitters made contact with 87.6% of pitches thrown by Cabrera this past year, up from 81.9% the previous season. Those figures are a far cry from the mid 70’s contact percentages that Cabrera compiled in 2005 and 2006.

That high-80’s contact figure placed Cabrera among groundball machine Aaron Cook, as well as recently retired control artists Mike Mussina and Greg Maddux. Suffice it to say, Cabrera does not fit in among this group. And, not only are opponents putting the ball in play often against him, but they just plain don’t chase his offerings out of the strike zone. Cabrera’s 18.9 O-Swing% in ’08 was by far the lowest rate among all starters.

Despite receiving a major-league worst 5.38 FIP from the club’s starting pitchers and resorting to allowing Steve Trachsel to make eight starts, the Orioles cut ties with Cabrera this off-season by non-tendering him. Scooped up by the pitching-starved Washington Nationals, Cabrera will team with the equally enigmatic Scott Olsen in hopes of reviving the promise of years past.

It was pretty easy to be optimistic about Daniel Cabrera’s future following his 2005 showing. However, he stagnated for two seasons after that, before doing a Wile E. Coyote style cliff dive in 2008. Perhaps an offseason of rest will heal his elbow and restore his stuff, but it’s best to just pass on Cabrera at this point- 2005 seems like an awfully long time ago for this hurler.