Archive for Glen Perkins

Here is the latest update to Week 11 two-start pitchers. Again this list is subject to change going forward.

Pitchers not listed on last update

NYY – Sabathia
MIL – Gallardo
TEX – Millwood
TOR – Romero
MIN – Perkins

Pitchers from Friday no longer scheduled for two starts

MIN – Liriano
NYY – Wang
TEX – Mathis

Sabathia reeled off five straight Quality Starts but has allowed four runs in each of his past two starts. Sabathia’s FIP (3.74) is almost identical to his ERA (3.68). He has an interesting mix as his BABIP sits at a low .261 but his strand rate is just 69.2 percent. Sabathia is one of the few pitchers seemingly not affected by the homer explosion at new Yankee Stadium. He has allowed just three HR in 42 IP at home this season.

Gallardo has allowed two earned runs or less in nine of his 12 starts this year. However, he has been lucky with a .243 BABIP and an 81.2 percent strand rate. Gallardo’s velocity has rebounded and his K/9 sits at a nice 8.88. Besides walks, his other ratios are in line with, or better than, what he did in 2006. Gallardo is doing everything owners could have reasonably hoped for coming into the season.

Millwood keeps pitching well despite, well, everything. In his last outing he pitched into the eighth inning without allowing a run despite striking out only one batter. His FIP is two runs above his ERA, his strikeout rate is at a career low and he has his highest home run rate since 2001. And according to CBS Sports, he is the 51st-best fantasy player in 2009.

Romero currently has a 3.71 ERA and a 1.37 WHIP. ZiPS is not impressed. For the rest of the season, ZiPS projects Romero to finish with a 6.04 ERA and a 1.70 WHIP. It just goes to show what an 86.4 percent strand rate can do for a fellow.

Perkins has not pitched in the majors since May 18th due to a sore elbow. He has made two rehab starts in Class-A, going seven scoreless innings with four strikeouts on June 9th. He gets home starts this week against Pittsburgh and Houston, two below-average teams in terms of runs scored and the bottom two squads in the NL Central.

Kevin Slowey shows us that it’s not enough to just not walk guys. If your stuff is hittable, batters will earn their bases on the field.

That said, Slowey had a very nice year last year, and with a K/9 right around the league average (6.90 K/9), there was some hope that he would build on the campaign and take another step forward this year.

So far, fans and fantasy managers are still waiting for that step forward. Instead, Slowey’s strikeout rate has fallen almost a full run (6.02), and his 1.54 WHIP is full of dinks, dunks and blasts. It’s certainly not walks, as Slowey still sports an elite walk rate (0.89 BB/9). The question lingers: how much of this poor start is lousy luck and how much is due to mediocre stuff?

Luck has surely played a big part. His BABIP is .370 and his FIP is 4.44, so his ERA is a little bloated by the luck of the bounce. But even the secondary statistics can’t agree about his luck. He’s sporting a 35.4% infield fly ball rate, which is unsustainably lucky (it’s 15% for his career). Also, he’s stranding 76.6% of his baserunners, which is slightly lucky. And for a guy with a career home run rate over 1 per game, his 10.8% home run per fly ball rate is very neutral.

He’s also giving up a career high 24.1% line drive rate, which is a good spot to start talking about his stuff. With an 89 MPH fastball, an 84 MPH slider, a 74 MPH curveball and an 83 MPH changeup, there’s just not enough differentiation in speed between his pitches to really keep the hitters off balance. He’s usually in the zone (see his walk rate), and his 91.3% contact rate in the zone puts him at 24th worst in the league in that category. (Teammate Glen Perkins ‘leads’ the league with batters making contact on 98% of pitches inside the zone, and Nick Blackburn is 23rd, so there’s something in the water in Minnesota, it seems.)

A quick look at some pitch F/X samples doesn’t provide too many clues. Slowey’s slider is actually breaking a couple inches more this year, and the rest of his stuff seems intact, with one major caveat. Slowey has lost almost a mile per hour on his fastball (89.9 to 89.2). His slider has lost one and a half miles per hour (85.7 to 84.1). Since he wasn’t much of a strikeout pitcher to begin with, and his stuff isn’t very fierce either, this slight velocity loss may be some of the reason for his poor start this year. Without more velocity history, it’s hard to tell if this is a temporary blip or not, but a peek at his next pitch f/x data would be a good idea for those thinking of acquiring him. A few ‘90’s on the gun would serve him well.

Another interesting question that arises when looking at Slowey’s numbers is if he should pitch outside the zone a little more. Batters are reaching on 26.2% of his offerings outside the strike zone, a number in line with his past (25.9% career). That number also puts him right next to such strikeout luminaries as Felix Hernandez and Jake Peavy. Since batters make contact on 72.9% on those pitches, it may be possible that Slowey could expand his zone a little for better results.