Three Starting Pitchers Who Gained Stuff and Command

Last week, we covered starting pitchers who lost stuff and command. This week we will examine three starting pitchers who have gained stuff and command. We’ll look at what contributed to the gains to determine if we should buy, sell or hold.

Emerson Hancock, SP, Mariners

Before the season, Emerson Hancock was on the outside of the Mariners’ rotation looking in. However, after winning a job in camp, he has impressed. After posting a single-digit K-BB% in his previous three seasons, Hancock has a career high 20.3% K-BB% this season. He elicits more whiffs (10.8% swinging-strike rate), more than a full point above his career average, thanks to gains across the board.

Improved Stuff

Hancock’s Stuff+ used to grade below average, but has jumped 12 points to 102 this season. A new cutter and curveball both grade out well, but Hancock’s sweeping slider headlines increase. One note on this change: sliders and sweepers are combined under the slider Stuff+ section on FanGraphs. Hancock was throwing a slider and a sweeper in 2025, but he is mainly tossing sweepers this year. 

The sweeper now has a 124 Stuff+, up from 104 on the sweeper/slider last year. The sweeper added more than one inch of both vertical and horizontal movement and he is going to it more often vs. righties (30.3% up from 6.9% on the sweeper and 16.9% on the slider last year). With more sweepers this season to righties, Hancock dropped usage on his sinker (which has a 95 Stuff+) by 12 percentage points (34.3%). 

And that sweeper is a nightmare for right-handed hitters (.144 wOBA, .122 xwOBA). Hancock consistently throws his sweeper low and away from right-handed hitters and they are not able to do anything with it. Interestingly, Hancock’s sweeper only elicits a 13.3% swinging-strike rate against righties, which indicates it’s more of a pitch to generate weak contact than whiffs.

On the other side of the plate, Hancock has increased his cutter usage to 17.2% against left-handed hitters, after using it sparingly in 2024 and not at all in 2025. That cutter is better, too, dropping three more inches with about 1.5 additional inches of glove-side movement in 2026 compared to 2024. The cutter has turned into his best weapon vs. lefties. Like the sweeper, it induces weak contact, with a .132 wOBA (.227 xwOBA) allowed against left-handed hitters.

Improved Command

Hancock’s command improved this season per Location+, primarily via the four-seam (121) and sinker (117). He has been locating the sinker better by throwing it over two inches lower and in a more consistent horizontal location against lefties, as seen in the heatmaps below. 

He has been generating a 62.2% groundball rate from the sinker after 50.7% last season. Last season, Hancock’s sinker was crushed by left-handed hitters (.443 wOBA, .460 xwOBA), which might explain why he is using it less. But the improved locations have helped lead to  better, though still not great, results (.326 wOBA, .415 xwOBA).

Like Hancock’s sinker, he has been commanding the four-seamer better this season. Last season, Hancock was throwing his four-seamer too much in the heart of the zone.

The improved location has been helped by a change in mechanics. Hancock has been throwing from a lower arm angle (12 degrees), six degrees lower than last season. That makes Hancock’s four-seam unique because it theoretically has a flatter attack angle with his lower arm slot, making it harder to square up.

Overall, Hancock commands his two fastballs (sinker and four-seamer) better, with the sweeping slider being a weapon for weak contact against right-handed hitters. The lower arm angle seems to help Hancock command both fastballs better. After Hancock was a below-average pitcher in his previous three seasons (162 innings), he has shown us that growth can take time. Don’t write players off, especially coming from a strong organization for pitching like the Mariners. If you are lucky enough to have Hancock, he’s a hold. If not, it might be a good idea to try to buy, especially if his manager is still skeptical.

Gavin Williams, SP, Guardians

I was worried about Gavin Williams before the season, since he has historically  struggled with command and control (career 36% ball rate). But that has improved this year (32% ball rate) at the same time that he has increased his swinging-strike rate to 13.6%. That has led to a career-best K-BB% (21.1%), backed up by his Stuff+ (105) and Location+ (103) both improving by 4-5 points.  Maybe I should’ve trusted Williams’ stuff enough to wait on command improvements.

Always a strong pitch, Williams’s curveball has climbed to a 113 Stuff+ after going from 87, to 104, to 109 the last three years. Interestingly, the curveball’s movement profile hasn’t changed much from 2025, though it continues to flash above-average downward and horizontal movement.

The curve has been lights out against right-handed hitters (.112 wOBA, .094 xwOBA), though less effective against lefties this season. Williams’s curveball allows a .317 wOBA (.319 xwOBA) against lefties in 2026, up from a .146 wOBA (.220 xwOBA) in 2025. The heat maps below show that his curveball is sitting more middle of the plate at a similar height vs. left-handed hitters this year.

He seems to be hanging the curveball sometimes to left-handed hitters and left-handed hitters crush those heart-of-the-zone hangers (.411 wOBA, .446 xwOBA). The curveball locations in the heart of the zone might be fluky –  it’s a small percentage of his pitches – and the breaking pitch continues to cause opposing hitters to chase 42.5% of the time.

The curve and slider (which also has a 113 Stuff+) give Williams two near-elite pitches. But he now has a third above-average weapon: his four-seamer, long hovering around average, has jumped 5 points to a 104 Stuff+. Williams’s four-seam relies more on arm-side run (4.2 inches above the league average) than induced vertical break (14.6 inches).

Though his arm-side run is near-elite, and 7 feet of extension (92nd percentile) should help generate weak contact, both right- (.361 wOBA, .381 xwOBA) and left-handed hitters (.302 wOBA, .387 xwOBA) continue to do damage against his four-seamer. This is a scenario where Williams struggles to command the four-seamer, given his career-low 89 Location+ this season. He throws that pitch up in the zone, but when it sits middle of the plate and isn’t high enough, it gets hit hard.

The arm-side run is near-elite, and 7 feet of extension (92nd percentile) should help generate weak contact, but opposing right- (.361 wOBA, .381 xwOBA) and left-handed hitters (.302 wOBA, .387 xwOBA) continue to do damage against his four-seamer. This seems to be because Williams struggles to command the four-seamer, given his career-low 89 Location+ this season. 

Speaking of command, Williams has been locating his two worst pitches by Stuff+ significantly better this season. The sinker (96 Stuff+, 116 Location+) and cutter (78 Stuff+, 119 Location+) grade out well overall (115 and 110 Pitching+, respectively) thanks to those locations.  Unfortunately, Williams’s cutter might not be super relevant because left-handed hitters crush them (.458 wOBA, .379 xwOBA) this season.

The sinker seems like the more notable of the two. Williams is throwing his sinker more often against right-handed hitters (28.2%), up from 12% in 2025. It’s worth mentioning that the sinker is a newer pitch for Williams, added last season.

Williams is throwing his sinker higher in the zone (3.4 inches more) and nearly three inches (2.9 inches) more inside to right-handed hitters. Though we think of sinkers as pitches to generate groundballs, some pitchers find success with high sinkers, since that can be unconventional. Williams throws a sinker with plenty of arm-side run, higher in the zone, and toward the inside corner to right-handed hitters to induce weak contact. It’s been somewhat of a mixed bag from a results standpoint, allowing a .279 wOBA and a .399 xwOBA to righties, supported by a 98.5 mph average exit velocity this season.

The ERA estimators said Williams was fortunate last season with his 3.06 ERA. But this is what it looks like when a pitcher’s skills, stuff, and command improve, leading to better outcomes and aligning with expected metrics. I’m regretting my concerns from before the season, and itching to buy high if possible. 

Roki Sasaki, SP, Dodgers

It probably wasn’t fair to make judgments about Roki Sasaki after a right shoulder impingement caused him to miss most of 2025. We’re finally seeing above-average stuff from Sasaki, with a massive jump to a 104 overall Stuff+ from 91. Sasaki’s three primary pitches all increased increased in Stuff+, with a notable 22-point increase on the splitter (123 Stuff+). He also started mixing in a forkball with a whopping 137 Stuff+.

Sasaki’s splitter forkball (85.2 mph) is softer than his splitter (90.2 mph) and features just a 599 RPM spin rate, almost like a knuckleball (for context, Matt Waldron’s knuckleball is around 300). Since we don’t have a massive database for forkballs, it’s hard to compare Sasaki’s forkball (40-42 inches of drop and over three inches of  arm-side fade) to any other pitch. 

One would think the splitter and forkball could be hard to command, however Sasaki’s splitter (105 Location+) and forkball (105 Location+) lead his arsenal from a command standpoint. Those high-end command grades for his two best pitches have led to a significant increase in his overall Location+ (99) this season. Sasaki is throwing his forkball over five inches higher in the zone (5.3 inches) and over 1.5 inches closer to the middle of the plate, as seen in the heatmaps below.

Sasaki has also had an 11 point gain (to 104) in the Stuff+ on his slider, but it is the 18-point jump in Location+ (to 100) that stands out. It appears the models didn’t like the sweeper he threw last year and are higher on the gyro-like slider he’s throwing this season. Sasaki throws his slider over four mph harder with plenty of downward movement (38-39 inches). The slider has been leading his arsenal with a 18.8% swinging-strike rate and it’s a filthy pitch against right-handed hitters (.161 wOBA, .153 xwOBA).

We can’t overlook Sasaki’s better four-seamer command in recent games, with a 118 Location+ in his four most recent outings, up from 83 last year and 93 for 2026 overall. He is locating his four-seamer better in the upper parts of the zone this season, as seen below.

Unfortunately, opposing hitters – both lefties (.395 wOBA, .454 xwOBA) and righties (.478 wOBA, .470 xwOBA) – still crush the heater, especially if he leaves it in the heart of the zone. If the heater continues to be hit hard, we should see him lower its usage in favor of his non-fastballs.

I like Sasaki’s changes this season, though the results haven’t quite translated consistently. I’m kicking myself for cutting Sasaki in a 12-team rotisserie league with daily moves, though he might be more of a keeper or dynasty-league buy with long-term thoughts in mind. A pitcher with strong stuff while improving command is someone to chase.