Monday 9/15 MLB Thoughts & Analysis

Cubs @ Pirates

In his first start back from the IL, Jameson Taillon struck out two of 19 Braves, also walking two and allowing two runs. He’s thrown just 15.1 innings since the end of June, striking out nine of 61 batters.

Braxton Ashcraft is one of those protected young Pittsburgh pitchers, who’s last outing was three innings of relief (63 pitches) and last start lasted only three innings as well (71 pitches).

Braves @ Nationals

With just eight strikeouts and walks over his last four starts in total (88 batters), guess how many Cubs Spencer Strider struck out last time out? Yes, eight. He also walked three for his second straight start and still carries a career low 15.1 K-BB%. He’s still sitting at 95.6 mph (last start and on the season) and LHBs have a .358 wOBA (.350 xwOBA) against him that could hurt a bit more against the Nationals. With two more barrels against the Cubs, Strider has allowed 12.6% Barrels/BBE over his last 10 starts.

Mitchell Parker is coming off his second quality start in his last three and it went 7.2 innings, though he only struck out two of 28 Marlins with a 50% HardHit rate, which, coincidentally, is 0.8 points below his season hard hit rate. There are really no positives here. His 4.79 Bot ERA (93 Pitching+) is his only estimators below five. What he does have is a favorable matchup against the Braves.

Cutting right to the chase, the Braves and Strider are moderate road favorites here due mostly to name value. They have some small edges on Washington in Strider (nearly two-thirds of a run), but give back nearly half of that run on bullpen estimators over the last 30 days. Wasington has had a bad bullpen, but the Atlanta bullpen has been the worst in the league and the Nationals have a five point wRC+ edge vs L/RHP and if you want to use projected lineups, that five point wRC+ average remains.

WSH +130 (FD) 1u

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Blue Jays @ Rays

Is Ye Savage like in he’s a savage (38 K% AA 30 IP, 36.1 K% AAA 17.1 IP)? Or is it Yes Avage, like he’s average (projections averaging slightly above four with a 50 Future Value grade)? Yes, a 50 Future Value grade is strong for a prospect, but that’s only a league average expectation on a 20/80 scale. While the projections are what they are, the ones on his Fangraphs page range from mid-threes to somewhere around five. This kid (22 years-old) has just 98 professional innings since being drafted last year and  has only been going around three innings in recent minor league outings after throwing 93 innings in college last year.

Roster Resource is projecting Joe Boyle here, who would be on turn at AAA. He’s walked 12.8% of batters faced with 11.9% Barrels/BBE in 36.2 major league innings.

We’ve hit the main daily fantasy slate and it may be a blessing that neither site has Yesavage in their player pool yet, while Boyle would be the worst value on the board.

Orioles @ White Sox

Kyle Bradish has simply looked great in three starts, striking out 21 of 65 batters with four walks for a 26.2 K-BB% with a somewhat average contact profile. His 110 Pitching+ is best on the day with a 3.69 Bot ERA not far behind. He hasn’t reached 85 pitches yet, but still faced 27 batters in seven innings last time out.

Roster Resource is projecting Sean Burke here. His 4.35 ERA is below all estimators.

Keeping in mind Bradish’s potential workload issues and now top three price tag on this board, I don’t think the White Sox will be the team to give him any particular difficulties and still project him as the second best pitcher on the board and a top third of the board FanDuel value, while feeling his price tag is fairly accurate for this spot on DraftKings.

Yankees @ Twins

Carlos Rodon posted his fifth quality start with two runs or less last time out against the Tigers, in which he’s allowed just 22 hits over 36.2 innings, but with an 8.9 K-BB%. His velocity is down nearly a half mph during this span and while he did have a 32.1 HardHit% with just three barrels (3.6%) over his previous five starts, he did strikeout a seven game high six Tigers, but with a 47.1 HardHit%. If you’re a traditionalist, Rodon is having a great season (3.11 ERA) and even if you buy into the new Statcast numbers (3.29 xERA). His contact neutral estimators are just below four, while over the last month, he has a 4.54 SIERA and .307 xwOBA allowed.

SWR has allowed six runs (five earned) over 10 innings to the White Sox and Angels, but has struck out 13 of 42 batters too. I’m not going to get too wrapped up in a 16.9 K% against the Angels last time out, as they struck out around 134 times in a three game series in Seattle this weekend. SWR has the worst pitch modeling on the board, which is only slightly worse than his contact neutral estimators around five with only a 4.30 xERA with 11.7% Barrels/BBE and a 10.5 K-BB% suggesting he may be a useful fifth starter. For all the barrels, he only has a 17.5 LD% with a lot of infield flies (17).

A lot going on here. I think we get some runs. Even now, the Twins still have about an average offense against LHP (projected lineup avg 108 wRC+) and they’ve been hitting the ball well lately (128 wRC+ L7 days). On the other side, the Yankees are taking a strong offense against a weak pitcher, defense and bullpen. The only edges Minnesota has are base running and home field. Still, some of the edges are moderate enough (such as Rodon being a bit overvalued in the market) that it leads me towards projecting the Twins as a moderate, rather than large dog here.

MIN +162 (FD) 1u
Over 8.5 (-119) DK 1.19u

From a daily fantasy standpoint, Rodon is the number three overall pitcher on a weak board, but maybe too expensive for what he’s been producing lately.  

Reds @ Cardinals

Since joining the Reds, Zack Littell has a 4.5 ERA over seven starts with a 4.96 FIP and 4.16 xFIP. All eight of his home runs have left the park as a Red, while he’s only allowing 6.6% Barrels/BBE (10.1% on the year). You could say his 14.3 K-BB% with Cincinnati is an improvement on his season rate (13%), but it’s just 12.6% since his first start. As always, Littell’s value is in not walking anyone (4.2%). If he’s going to cut down on the barrels, he has a bit more value, but he’s still not going to miss a lot of bats (17.2 K%).

After throwing 5.1 impressive shutout innings against the A’s (1 BB, 7 K), Matthew Liberatore walked three Mariners, struck out one and allowed five runs in Seattle. That one sixth inning out against the A’s is the only one he’s recorded in 11 starts with just a 5.8 K-BB% and 11.4% Barrels/BBE over that span. Interestingly, one-third of his hard contact has come in barrels during this stretch.

I have Littell as a firmly middle of the board arm on Monday night, but that probably gives him some value for less than $8K. I have Liberatore ranked third or fourth worst, but for the second lowest price tag on DraftKings, you can almost, but not quite see it. The Reds have a 77 wRC+ vs LHP and 58 wRC+ over the last week (26.7 K%) and that includes the first two games in Sacramento.

Bullpen stats L30 days...

Rangers @ Astros

After three straight strong ones (though three walks in the last of those), Jack Leiter struggled against the Brewers, striking out just four of 22 batters, walking two, lasting 4.2 innings with three runs. With three 20+ K-BB% games prior, we can go all the way back as far as 13 starts now and find a 16.3 K-BB%. Still an 11.1 BB%, but useful. However, over his last six starts a 9% walk rate is nearly league average. The contact profile is also a bit wanting with 10.9% Barrels/BBE, but Leiter also did not allow a barrel in three straight starts until allowing three to the Brewers. The barrels also seem to come in bunches though with 32 of the 40 he’s allowed in just 12 of his 26 starts. The Astros are now up to around three LHBs in their lineup on average recently, but Leiter’s problem has been RHBs (.336 wOBA, .356 xwOBA).

Seven innings of shutout ball on three hits in Toronto is impressive, even if Jason Alexander only struck out three of 23 batters. Understandable against the Blue Jays, but Alexander has a 22.5 K% (16.5 K-BB%) over his last eight starts with only two starts with a double digit SwStr% (17.2% against Colorado skews the average). On the season, all estimators still exceed his 4.19 ERA with poor pitch modeling.

On a slate like this, I think we have to respect Leiter’s upside and keep him in our GPP pitcher pool. Alexander may only be interesting on FanDuel, where he has a decent QS shot for less than $8K against a somewhat depleted Texas lineup that keeps scoring just enough runs to win behind good pitching.

Giants @ Diamondbacks

Kai-Wei Teng struck out four (@NYM), four (WSH), none (SDP) and four (@SDP) in his first four outings. He’s struck out eight (@COL) and eight (@STL) in his last two.

First four: 8.7 SwStr%
Last two: 19.2 SwStr%.

You always have to be careful when an offense like the Rockies is a big part of the sample you’re evaluating, but it’s still impressive, as he’s spiked his slider usage (44.4%) at the expense of curves and changes, though both teams were predominately right-handed at the time (COL more so).

Before Zac Gallen’s start last Tuesday…

Zac Gallen hasn’t allowed a run in two straight starts, striking out 13 of 46 batters, but if you go back 12 starts now, Gallen has a 17.6 K-BB% with just 4.8% Barrels/BBE and a 3.42 ERA matching a 3.45 xFIP. I was skeptical that he was back at the start of this run and there were still a few bad outings to come (16 runs in 17 innings at one point early in this stretch), but with quality starts in five of six and continued solid peripherals, it’s time to stop denying.

Well, he went and blew that up against these same Giants, despite the park upgrade. Two barrels with a 52.4 HardHit% with three walks and strikeouts each led to five runs over 6.2 innings (27 BF). He threw just 15.5% curveballs (23.5% season) and 32% changeups (14.9% season). Going by pitch modeling, it seems to have been the right decision for the start and he did calm down after a three-run homer in the first, but the curve is the better graded pitch on the season.

He's not going to get you six innings and it’s a significant park downgrade in a marginal spot, but I’m interested enough in Weng with the top defensive catcher in the game and more swings and misses at the lowest price on the board on DraftKings. Gallen seems to be middling in every way on this slate.

Phillies @ Dodgers

Since a six start stretch with 24 runs over 35.1 innings with a total of 28 strikeouts, Ranger Saurez has allowed three runs over his last 30.2 innings (none in three of his last four starts) and just complied his third double digit strikeout start in those efforts. In his last seven starts, he has 45 strikeouts, 33 of them coming in three starts. His ground ball rate is down to 40.5% during this stretch, but either way, Suarez rarely allows a lot of hard contact (30.3% on the season) or barrels (5.5%). The three double digit strikeout efforts all game at home (Mets, Nationals, Mariners).

Yes, it was the Rockies, but Emmett Sheehan just completed his second seven inning effort with three hits or less and at least nine strikeouts in his last three starts last time out. He’s up to a 24.8 K-BB% over his last six starts, has a 17.1 SwStr% over his last seven outings (one behind an opener) and we’ll certainly take that, even the 14.1% Barrels/BBE that comes with it because barely more than 60% of batters were putting the ball in play (or homering).

I can’t pay the high price for Saurez in this spot, but Sheehan is my top pitcher on the board and for less than $9K on either site too, which obviously makes him one of my favorite values on either site as well.

Back in the afternoon with additional DFS notes.

Below, these last two graphics are pitch matchup ratings, explained here. It uses pitch frequencies and run values both for the pitcher and the opposing offense and then attempts to add in pitch modeling, which sometimes differs from actual results.