Tap the Rockies for Gray or Freeland?

We’ve entered an era where we can no longer just completely ignore Rockies starting pitchers. OK, if you’re in a 10-team league, you needn’t give them a ton of attention, but anything beyond that probably has at least a couple of their guys rostered as spot starters. Perhaps most surprising is the fact that their perceived best has been their outright worst with Jon Gray posting a 5.68 ERA and 1.48 WHIP in 65 innings, though his base skills are also the best of the bunch with a 20% K-BB rate (he’s best among their SPs in both components, too). Yet the less-heralded Kyle Freeland has performed much better across the board (3.48 ERA, 1.23 WHIP) and remains much more available across the main fantasy outlets.

Should we chase Gray’s gaudy skills or settle for the staid workhorse-like profile of Freeland?

Gray

• Home: 6.45 ERA, 1.59 WHIP, 29% K, 8% BB, .404 BABIP, 3.35 FIP in 37.7 IP
• Road: 4.61 ERA, 1.32 WHIP, 23% K, 5% BB, .342 BABIP, 2.86 FIP in 27.3 IP

Gray got off to a terrible start with 7.09 ERA in five starts with only two at home (and one of those was against the Padres), but then he allowed just a single run in his next 20 innings with 25 strikeouts and 3 walks. Two of those three starts were at home (though another was against SD). He has completely melted down over his last four starts with a 9.33 ERA in 18.3 innings. His 27 Ks in that span show that strikeouts alone can’t save you when facing an obscene .509 BABIP. Three of those starts were at home, but the other was at San Francisco where he allowed nine hits in just 3.7 innings.

His .376 BABIP can’t just be washed away as bad luck when he has a career .337 mark and plays in the most BABIP-friendly park in existence. This season has been particularly frustrating for Gray because he has his best K-BB rate and worst ERA, but otherwise it’s pretty much the same old story. He has consistently put up skills that deserve a better fate, but his situation is such that he has to survive at home and be perfect on the road, a tough task for any pitcher. Last year he netted a sub-.300 BABIP at home which gave him some wiggle room, but he wasted it with his two 5+ ER starts both coming on the road.

I’m only holding Gray in leagues where I can reserve him. If I have no choice but to start him, he’s likely gone. I wouldn’t follow the advanced metrics like FIP and SIERA that see a low-to-mid 3.00s arm because I don’t think they properly account for his environment. Instead, I’d operate with something like a 3.75 as the upside and a 4.30ish expectation.

Freeland

• Home: 2.19 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 22% K, 8% BB, .265 BABIP, 4.14 FIP in 24.7 IP
• Road: 4.15 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, 20% K, 7% BB, .292 BABIP, 3.91 FIP in 47.7 IP

Freeland was actually the impetus for this piece and then I decided to bring Gray along for the ride to see if maybe Freeland had cut the gap. He’s two outs shy of eight straight quality starts (5.3 IP/3 ER on May 29th), posting a 2.58 ERA and 1.11 WHIP in 52.3 innings. The schedule has been nice with five road starts and the home ones were SD, MIL, and SF. He’s only faced one good offense at home (ATL on April 8th) and he stood tall against them with a 6 IP/3 ER outing that included five strikeouts.

Freeland is a former top 10 overall pick, who had some runs of success during his 156-inning rookie campaign en route to a 4.10 ERA, but never had the skills to get much attention with a 6% K-BB rate. His 54% groundball rate was nice, but if I’m taking on a 16% strikeout then I need groundballs coming in north of 60% to offset. He’s given back some of the grounders this year at 48%, but the strikeout rate is a far more palatable 21% this year. His cutter has done the heavy lifting there with a 48% strikeout rate and 30% chase rate, up from 13% and 23% last year.

He sits 91-93 from the left side with his four-seamer and sinker and both are key to his success, netting a very nice 6.9 pitch value, tying him with Jacob deGrom’s heater. Freeland doesn’t dazzle with any single standout skill or pitch, but the sum of his parts looks like a quality arm worthy of more fantasy attention than most of us probably thought he’d have coming into the season.

I don’t see his 3.48 ERA holding as the schedule will eventually lean back toward some home starts and push that .283 BABIP, putting him back up around the low-4.00s. In the end, Freeland has definitely carved out some fantasy value, but it’s not enough to push him ahead of Gray for me. Even if Freeland holds a 25-point advantage in ERA, Gray’s strikeouts will easily cover the difference.

Perhaps the bigger question is whether you want to bother with either given the volatility. I think Nick Pollack said it well in the PitcherList slack re: Gray specifically –