Archive for Lucas Giolito

Having watched Gerrit Cole breeze through yet another postseason start in Sunday’s Game 5 of the World Series, I wanted to refresh my memory on how dominant he had been in the regular season. My go-to destination for such things is the Plate Discipline leaderboard right here on FanGraphs. This leaderboard tells me a large portion of what I need to know about how pitchers have performed — how well they’re missing bats by swinging strikes (SwStr%) or avoiding swings in the strike zone (Z-Swing%) and how they are limiting walks by throwing first-pitch strikes (F-Strike%) or getting out-of-zone chases (O-Swing%).

I sorted by SwStr%, and Cole was at the top. Unlike many pitchers who get a lot of swings and misses, he had a slightly lower-than-average Z-Swing%, and he was comfortably above-average at throwing first-pitch strikes and getting chases. He had a lot in common with the pitchers who ranked just behind him, but one of the names near the top of the leaderboard caught me off guard. It surprised me enough that I felt the need to tweet it out.
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I’m going to say something that hasn’t been said enough this off-season.

There is a lot of starting pitcher depth this year.

That may be a bit of a surprise given the constant emphasis on getting aces early or leaving the first seven or eight rounds with three starters, but with every mock and real draft I’ve done, I’ve found myself with quality arms left on my queue in the final rounds.

You’re targeting most of these names already, maybe even all of them. At the very least, these ten arms should serve as a reminder that you do not need to chase elite arms early as there are plenty fewer impact bats left in the late rounds than quality arms.

I’ll be using Fantasy Pros’ aggregate ADP to gather the names past pick #400 and despite their price of “free” in standard leagues, these pitchers deserve heavy consideration in the final rounds.

Merrill Kelly (Arizona Diamondbacks, ADP #409) – This cheap price for Kelly is expecting his floor, while not embracing the possibility of his ceiling – a sub 3.70 ERA with a decent WHIP and a 20%+ strikeout rate. The Diamondbacks are going to let Kelly fly for as many innings as they can, especially when he has a lock on a rotation spot. It’s hard to find an arm with strikeout upside and a strong volume of frames without toxic ratios and I wouldn’t be surprised if the first person who owns Kelly retains him through the full year.

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It’s been a fun season covering discount starting pitcher options here at Rotographs, and in the final week I’ll be talking exclusively about streams through the rest of the week to consider to stream to pull ahead through the weekend, beginning with Friday, September 27th.

I’ll be keeping them under 30% owned per usual, with all numbers pulled from Fantasy Pros’ consolidated ownage metrics.

Jose Urena vs. New York Mets (Friday) – Urena’s ownership rates have climbed steadily over the past few weeks, and justifiably so as he’s allowed 1 ER or fewer in five of his last six starts, with the sole exception coming against the elite Red Sox lineup. He gets quite the opposite against the Mets this weekend and Urena can take advantage. His two-seamer that consistently bores inside to right-handers means plenty of weak contact, though those looking for strikeouts should look elsewhere – these six starts have tallied just 24 punchouts.

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Lucas Giolito did not have a good game on Wednesday night against the Yankees. We can cut him some slack for giving up six of his seven runs in the second inning, but still, allowing seven runs in five innings is not the best look.

But should we view it as a predictable outcome for a pitcher with a 6.23 ERA facing one of the majors’ top offenses? Or can we see it as an aberration? If we look at Giolito’s last six starts, his profile is different enough from the one he built in his first 17 starts of the season that we may need to judge his recent and future results differently. Yes, six starts — and the 36 innings they comprise — represent a small sample, but the changes have been dramatic enough that they merit a closer look.
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We had a brief glimpse of Lucas Giolito in 2016 as he started four and relieved in two games for the Nationals, accruing 21.1 innings of 6.75 ERA ball. We were looking forward to better times for the 6’6″ right-hander and after a trade to the Chicago White Sox during the 2016 off-season, Giolito held a 9.37 K/9, 4.13 BB/9, and 4.48 ERA in 24 starts in Triple-A. Tuesday night marked the return for 23-year-old Giolito and I for one was excited to see what he had morphed into during his time away from the majors. Let’s jump into the start and talk about what we saw.

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