Archive for Ian Kennedy

On the surface, Joe Jimenez secured his seventh save in eight chances last night. He survived loading the bases on three consecutive hits with two outs by striking out Trey Mancini. Delving into his splits since ascending to closing for the Tigers, Jimenez owns a 15:6 K:BB, 3.09 ERA, 1.71 WHIP and 5.10 xFIP in 11.2 innings since August ninth. He’s yielded a 53.1 fly ball rate and 17.6 home run per fly ball percentage resulting in three home runs along with a .292/.370/.521 slash line against. Less than optimal. Fantasy owners will take the production of seven saves over his last 13 appearances but should proceed with caution due to the inflated WHIP and xFIP predicting some regression to the mean. Read the rest of this entry »

After a couple of days off, the Bullpen Report returns with a host of issues to address. First, Oakland removed the mystery of who will close despite the return of Blake Treinen from the injured list:

Liam Hendriks is now in essence the A’s closer. Team plans to ride his performance as long as possible, with Treinen available if needed at some point when he gets on track. But it’s Hendriks’ job now.

— Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) July 6, 2019

Liam Hendriks notched his fourth save since Treinen landed on the injured list on June 21st with a clean ninth striking out two last night. This extends Hendriks’ scoreless streak to 15.2 innings and he’s not given up a run in 27 of his last 29 outings spanning 34.2 innings (0.78 ERA). Dating back to last September, Hendriks last 53 appearances yields a 1.29 ERA. He will get an extended view as the team’s closer going forward, plan accordingly.

On the other side of the spectrum, Edwin Diaz suffered his sixth loss giving up three hits, four earned runs and a walk in one-third of an inning recording his only out via a strikeout of Maikel Franco. However, Diaz allowed a lead-off double to J.T. Realmuto then a single by Jay Bruce snapping a tied game without recording an out. On April 29th, Diaz owned a 0.84 ERA converting all eight save chances. Since then, he’s worked 22.2 innings with a 7.89 ERA, 1.80 WHIP with 10 saves in 14 opportunities losing six decisions. Within this stretch, Diaz has allowed hitters a .330/.392/.560 slash line and a 47.4 hard hit rate against. But, he’s not alone in struggling in the Mets bullpen:

Of course, it's not just Diaz. Since May 27, the Mets' bullpen has produced an 8.06 ERA.

Let me repeat that: over a span of more than 100 innings, the Mets' bullpen has produced an 8.06 ERA.

— Anthony DiComo (@AnthonyDiComo) July 6, 2019

Quotes from the team and Diaz do not provide a warm fuzzy going forward. Diaz has bounced back from struggles due to performance or his mechanics being out of whack during his tenure in Seattle before, can he do it again? Time will tell.

Edwin Diaz on potentially moving into lower-leverage spots:

"I want to be the closer of this team. But if Mickey thinks that that's the way that I can find my confidence, or just feel more comfortable trying to get right, I'll pitch in whatever role that he wants me to."

— Anthony DiComo (@AnthonyDiComo) July 6, 2019

For now, it’s been a rough 2019 for the consensus top two closers taken in drafts this preseason.

Just when it seemed safe to trust Ian Kennedy, he struggled during a blown save in Washington. Kennedy allowed three hits leading to two earned runs and a walk with a strikeout on Friday. He notched nine straight saves prior to this meltdown and entered riding a six game scoreless streak. Kennedy should bounce back and remains safe in the closer role with Kansas City. Brian Flynn gets his second win navigating around a hit and two walks for a scoreless 10th inning and Wily Peralta closed out his second save giving up a hit in a scoreless 11th inning. It’s Peralta’s first save since April 13th this year. Jonny Venters absorbs the loss for the Nationals ceding three hits and three runs (one earned) with a walk while striking out one. Fernando Rodney worked for the third straight game giving up a hit with two strikeouts.

A frustrating night for fantasy owners of Brewers and Pirates closers. Josh Hader gets his fourth hold working 1.1 scoreless innings walking one and striking out one. Hader did not return for the ninth inning with Milwaukee ahead by five runs despite only throwing 23 pitches. Instead, the Brewers turned to Deolis Guerra who only recorded two outs while coughing up four hits leading to four earned runs including a three-run home run by Josh Bell. Junior Guerra replaced him but allowed the game tying home run to Jung-Ho Kang. This Guerra received his third win despite his fifth blown save when the Brewers rallied in the top of the 10th against Pirates closer, Felipe Vazquez. After retiring Tyler Saladino, Vazquez served up three straight singles to Orlando Arcia, Manny Pina and Lorenzo Cain resulting in the eventual winning run. It’s the first loss of the season for Vazquez.

Two days removed from a diving tag play to get Kevin Kiermaier out, Mychal Givens did not receive the save chance last night in Toronto. Instead, Paul Fry locked down his second save with a clean ninth striking out one. It’s Fry’s first save since March 31st against the Yankees on the road. There’s no word about an injury to Givens so he should get the next chance if one presents itself, but with him representing one of the Orioles few trade chips, he will be handled with care.

With Diego Castillo not slated to return until after the All-Star break, and Jose Alvarado struggling since his return from the restricted list, it’s fallen upon Emilio Pagan to anchor the bullpen. However, he served up the tying run on a home run by Aaron Hicks last night leading to an eventual loss in extra innings. It’s Pagan’s fourth blown save this year. He did work two innings giving up two hits, one earned run and struck out two. Colin Poche, an arm of intrigue going forward, fired a scoreless 10th inning allowing a hit with a strikeout. Ryne Stanek gets collared with his second loss yielding to home runs, four hits and four earned runs in the top of the 11th. This benefited David Hale, who gets his second win working 2.1 scoreless innings scattering three hits and a walk with two strikeouts. Aroldis Chapman notched his 24th save walking one and striking out one in two-thirds of an inning.

Quick Hits: Boston welcomed back Heath Hembree to the bullpen. He served up a home run to John Hicks but finished the ninth with two strikeouts. Hembree entered this appearance only giving up one earned run in his previous 17.1 innings. Matt Barnes fired a clean eighth with two strikeouts and Ryan Brasier gets his seventh hold working 1.2 innings allowing two hits and striking out one…Adam Morgan gets his third win retiring the only two batters he faced prior to the Phillies rally versus Diaz highlighted above. Hector Neris walked one in a scoreless ninth in a non-save outing…Luke Jackson nets his fourth win giving up a hit with two strikeouts in a scoreless top of the ninth preceding a Braves rally….Save number 12 for Hansel Robles. He fired a clean ninth with a strikeout. It’s his first save since June 18th and his sixth in a row…Kirby Yates keeps adding to his breakout season. He recorded his first five out save retiring all five Dodgers he faced, two via strikeout. Yates has converted 28 of 29 save chances in the first half, snapped a three game losing streak for the Padres and ended the Dodgers streak of five straight come from behind wins at home.

It’s a tenuous time of year for fantasy owners. Amidst all the buy low and sell high noise, one needs to take stock of trends along with the standings. For instance, representing one of the top two picks at the position, Blake Treinen seems a bit off compared to last year. He recorded his 13th save last night, but needed to work around a hit and two walks. Through four innings this month, Treinen’s walked five batters with only two strikeouts. Overall, his 3.16 ERA accompanies a 4.79 xFIP with a drop in ground ball percentage by over 12 percentage points while his walk rate continues to rise sitting at 12.7 percent, his highest rate over his career. It could be mechanics or a hangover from usage last year, but it needs to be monitored. Read the rest of this entry »

With the countdown of games left winding down and the stakes getting higher, there are actually some intriguing pitchers to be found on waivers in the vast majority of leagues. But is there any enough reward to balance the risk with any of the widely-available ones who are scheduled to start Friday?

Here are the eight most-available starters or primary pitchers from Friday’s slate. I have been using a 25 percent ownership rate on Fantrax as a cutoff point for inclusion in these reports, but I extended it by a percentage point, just so I could write about Ian Kennedy.
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Everyone loves value, and paying down at pitcher is quite popular — even in writer/expert leagues. Waiting on pitchers puts some extra pressure on hitting on value plays to offset the lack of a “true” ace. That’s not to say the following pitchers will perform like fantasy aces, but they do appear poised to outperform their draft positions — some by a significant amount, in my opinion. Each of the five pitchers highlighted below is being selected outside of the top-50 starting pitchers in NFBC drafts, just one is being selected inside the top-200 picks on average, and three of the five are being selected, on average, outside of the top-250 players.

*NFBC ADP data current as of March 10th. Read the rest of this entry »

He did once. Can he again?

Ian Kennedy has been one of the least valuable starting pitchers of 2015, a fact probably unsurprising to San Diego residents and his fantasy owners. Of all pitchers who have thrown at least 60 innings and generated negative wins above replacement (WAR), his ratio of strikeouts to walks (3.18 K/BB) and xFIP (3.83) rise to the top of an admittedly short list.

Still, his rate of strikeouts per nine innings (8.31 K/9) ranks 36th among all starters, and his walks-per-nine (2.62 BB/9) is nothing to sneeze at, either. It’s easy to see why fantasy owners hold out hope: his adequacy in preventing baserunners points to reasons why his 4.58 ERA is, perhaps, too high.

Unfortunately, Kennedy is a fly ball machine who has (almost) never enjoyed the friendly confines of a pitcher’s park. Per ESPN’s Park Factors, Kennedy’s home parks have mostly benefited hitters:

Read the rest of this entry »

It’s time for our Depth Chart Discussions to begin. In an effort to suss out every team, we’ve divided them into four parts (infield, outfield, bullpen, and rotation) and will begin breaking them down for you over the next few weeks. You can find them gathered here.

We all know how valuable a pitcher in Petco Park can be, even if they aren’t on the high end of the talent spectrum. Thankfully for us in 2015, the Padres staff will have some of that upper-end talent paired with a far more capable offense to support it. It is incredible how much one addition can make a difference for a club as the rotation looks so much more formidable now with their latest signing. Here is how the top four stack up:

Read the rest of this entry »

The San Diego Padres have probably created more buzz than any other Major League Baseball team this offseason. New GM A.J. Preller added to his club a few position players who are pretty good in fantasy baseball terms – a couple of them really good, a couple of them who could be (but could also not be). The change in home venue for each doesn’t really affect his projection on offense negatively, either. The new guys all used to play in pretty pitcher-friendly yards.

A cool fantasy baseball thing related to the new guys’ pitcher-friendly yard, Petco Park, is that it has long helped its team to be a sort of fantasy goldmine. When fantasy baseball players search for pitching sleepers and fliers, they usually check San Diego’s roster for youngsters, retreads, and anyone else the Friars might give a shot that year. Petco Park has always had good park factors for hurlers, and the club’s coaching staffs (latest edition led by manager Bud Black and pitching coach Darren Balsley) have good reputations, too.

Now, :-(. The source of the Padres’ newfound buzz will make the cool fantasy baseball thing less cool. Perhaps a lot less.

Read the rest of this entry »

Woof! That’s all there is to say about my preseason bold predictions as a whole. The idea was to take players at each position that I had ranked just outside starter territory in 12-team leagues who I thought could beat my ranking. Let’s break them down one by one.

Catcher – Josmil Pinto will be a top ten fantasy catcher.

The biggest problem with my Pinto projection was that I projected him for 450 PA. Pinto didn’t come close to that, finishing with just 194 PA because the Twins gave Kurt Suzuki 502 PA. The one thing my projection did get right was Pinto’s power as he hit 12 home runs in limited work. Had he maintained that pace and received the 450 PA I projected, he would have hit 16 home runs, which would have easily surpassed the 12 I projected. Pinto’s power would make him interesting if he could get regular playing time, but Suzuki is signed through 2016 in Minnesota. Read the rest of this entry »

Last Wednesday I took a look at the pitchers who have generated the most weak contact this year. Today I want to take a look at the other side of the coin and examine the guys getting hit the hardest. Let me start by saying I haven’t updated the data since I calculated it last Tuesday. Calculating the relevant data takes a whole lot of time, and I doubt it’s changed all that much after one turn through the rotation.

The reason the data takes so long to calculate is because I’m calculating sOPS+ for batted balls. You could find each pitcher’s sOPS+ on their b-ref page, but that takes walks into consideration, and walks obviously have nothing to do with batted ball quality. I have taken each pitcher’s sOPS+ for each specific batted ball type, factored in how often a pitcher generates each batted ball type and calculated their sOPS+ just on balls that are put into play.

If you’re unfamiliar with sOPS+, it is just the OPS allowed by each pitcher relative to league average. It’s similar to wRC+ or ERA-. In this case, numbers below 100 are better than average while those above 100 are worse.

The idea is that this is supposed to tell us more about the quality of the hits a pitcher is giving up. In this way the stat is much more relevant than something like BABIP because BABIP gives all hits equal weight. I like this stat for the same reason Michael Salfino likes ISO allowed. BABIP includes singles, which are the most common outcome and doesn’t even consider home runs. But sOPS+ considers all hit types and weights them. This means sOPS+ is much more likely to tell us if a pitcher has been ‘lucky’ than BABIP is. If you see a pitcher whose ERA is much lower than ERA estimators, sOPS+ will give you a much better indication of whether the pitcher is due to regress than BABIP will.

That said, here are the qualified starters with the worst sOPS+ so far this year. Read the rest of this entry »