Archive for Jose Berrios

If you’re noting a greater sense of urgency in this week’s Two Good Starts, Two Bad Starts, that’s because it features a pair of pitchers set to make their next starts in mere hours upon publication of this piece. Many owners will have likely been anticipating Kevin Gausman’s Tuesday night start, as he is among the most-added pitchers in ESPN and CBS leagues. After a mediocre Braves debut back on Aug. 4, Gausman responded with two much better starts. While that may have been reason enough to pick him up, is it reason enough to start him right away?

Fantasy owners have not been holding Jose Berrios‘ two-game slump against him, as the vast majority of his owners (at least in CBS and Fantrax leagues) have him active — quite likely for his scheduled two-start week. An analysis into his recent starts will help us to see if that looks like the right call.
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Strikeouts are up again this season, but there’s another trend affecting pitchers that has received less attention. As we approach the six-week mark of the 2018 campaign, pitchers are notably wilder than they have been in a long time.

For each season between 2011 and 2016, the average Zone% for the major leagues hovered between 44.2 and 44,8 percent. Last season, pitchers were less wild than they had been since 2010, locating in the strike zone at a 45.0 percent rate. So far this year, pitchers are wanting to have much less to do with the strike zone, as their collective Zone% has dropped to 43.4 percent.

Subpar control is not an early-season thing. Last March and April, pitchers combined for a 44.8 percent Zone% and in the previous March/April, pitchers were practically trolling hitters into swinging, posting a 47.3 percent Zone%. Another thing that mark from 2016 shows is that there is still plenty of time for Zone% to regress to its norm this season.
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This is my fifth year of Bold Predictions, and I find them to be no less of a headache today than I did back in 2014, when I boldly predicted 20+ homers for Jon Singleton, and a top-40 fantasy outfielder season for Abraham Almonte. That said, I think I’m pretty close to the Bold Predictions Sweet Spot of 30% correct this year, as these are all varying degrees of “unlikely but not outrageous.” Also, I had more fun with these than I usually do, so that has to count for something. I’m sure I’ll hear from all the die-hard Whit Merrifield zealots in the comments section regardless.

Here we go!

1. Eugenio Suarez is a top-10 third baseman

Fresh off signing a 7-year, $66 million contract extension with the Reds, the 26-year-old Suarez has a lot to prove this year. I’m quite confident that Cincinnati’s front office will feel very good about that deal, and so will his fantasy owners. The good news started last year, when Suarez massively increased his walk rate for the second year in a row — from 4.3% BB in 2015, to 8.1% in 2016, to 13.3% in 2017 — while also recording a career-best 23.3% strikeout rate.

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