This article is part of our Collette Calls series.
We cannot read everything that is out there online. The simple fact is that there is simply too much great information available on baseball and statistics, and it is both a blessing and a curse. I'm going to spend a lot of time reading while I'm laid up in my recliner after my shoulder surgery on July 10 since I will need a few days to recover. However, most weeks I simply lack the time to see everything out there, so I look for shortcuts to help me with targeting or avoiding pitchers.
Because I went heavy on offense in all my leagues, I have been chasing pitchers left and right to play matchups and get out of the holes I drafted. I've been first or second place in AL Tout Wars all season, but trading for Aaron Sanchez shortly before his recent injury and then losing Andrew Triggs has not helped me make up any ground on Mike Podhorzer while he has been without Mike Trout. It also sucks that Podhorzer is high money man in FAAB, as he'll get the best player who gets traded from the NL in the coming weeks.
I recently made a deal where I traded from my large surplus of speed in Cameron Maybin to acquire Alex Cobb, who has looked much like the Cobb of old the last few weeks. The decision came down between Cobb from Lawr Michaels or Jason Vargas from Chris Liss, but the changeup is coming
We cannot read everything that is out there online. The simple fact is that there is simply too much great information available on baseball and statistics, and it is both a blessing and a curse. I'm going to spend a lot of time reading while I'm laid up in my recliner after my shoulder surgery on July 10 since I will need a few days to recover. However, most weeks I simply lack the time to see everything out there, so I look for shortcuts to help me with targeting or avoiding pitchers.
Because I went heavy on offense in all my leagues, I have been chasing pitchers left and right to play matchups and get out of the holes I drafted. I've been first or second place in AL Tout Wars all season, but trading for Aaron Sanchez shortly before his recent injury and then losing Andrew Triggs has not helped me make up any ground on Mike Podhorzer while he has been without Mike Trout. It also sucks that Podhorzer is high money man in FAAB, as he'll get the best player who gets traded from the NL in the coming weeks.
I recently made a deal where I traded from my large surplus of speed in Cameron Maybin to acquire Alex Cobb, who has looked much like the Cobb of old the last few weeks. The decision came down between Cobb from Lawr Michaels or Jason Vargas from Chris Liss, but the changeup is coming back around for Cobb and the infield defense with Adeiny Hechevarria at shortstop is an upgrade from Tim Beckham.
Those things I can observe in watching games. For other things, I need quick lists and one of my favorite lists to look at for pitchers is the Barrel Leaderboard that @CaseyBoguslaw runs over at ROBaseball. If you want to learn more about "barrels," you can hear Casey talk about it on the short podcast below:
What I like about the site is that he provides a leaderboard for the pitchers best at avoiding barrels as well as the worst at avoiding hard contact, not only for the overall season, but also for the last 30 days. For example, we have seen Mike Fiers go on this recent run where he has suddenly stopped allowing homers after going through April and a good chunk of May handing them out like candy on Halloween. Looking at the last 30 days, Fiers is 14th on the leaderboard for barrel FIP as he continues this very serviceable run in all formats. That is quite the turnaround from someone who was barely rosterable in a 16-team AL league around Mothers Day. A few guys on that top-25 list for the last 30 days are interesting given their overall numbers this season:
Aaron Nola - Nola is 5-5 with a 4.13 ERA in 2017, allowing just over one home run per nine innings and striking out just less than a batter per inning. The last 30 days, he's ninth on the barrel FIP leaderboard and has won three of his last six starts with an ERA less than 4.00 and striking out nearly 10 batter per nine innings. Sure, he has allowed a home run in five of those six outings, but he also has strikeout totals of 6, 6, 6, 8 and 9 in his last five outings. He had only struck out as many as six once in his first six outings, so it appears as if he may be turning a corner and that may be due to him dialing back his fastballs and using more of his secondary stuff.
Hyun-Jin Ryu - Ryu is 3-6 with a 4.21 ERA. Despite good strikeout and walk rates, the home run has been an issue as he has allowed multiple homers in five of his outings in 2017. He has allowed seven in 26.2 June innings, but like Fiers earlier this season, that 2.4 HR/9 rate has only one direction to go, and that is down. Ryu could be had for a six pack of Nattie Bo (I'm in Baltimore now) and could turn a profit over the coming weeks as his strikeout and walk rates have been excellent around the long-ball charity.
Jose Quintana - Quintana is biding his time until the White Sox deal him next month. He is 4-8 on the season with a 4.37 ERA but has a career-high 24 percent strikeout rate coupled with a career-low 9 percent walk rate and 1.1 home run rate. He is 25th on the barrel FIP leaderboard over the last month and has gone 2-1 with a 1.78 ERA in that stretch. The win-loss record stinks, but he is turning his ratios around and a trade to a better offense (hello, Houston, New York?) could really give him a second half boost.
The bottom-25 list is the one I like to focus on as I decide when it is time to cut bait with someone or move a big name when the results could be getting worse in the near future. The last 30 days, a number of notable names are on that list, including Johnny Cueto, Dylan Bundy, David Price, Gerrit Cole and Jake Odorizzi.
Johnny Cueto - Cueto won his first start in six outings Friday against Pittsburgh, only because his team walloped Gerrit Cole. Cueto allowed 11 baserunners in five innings, of which three scored. It was the first time in June he did not allow a home run, allowing three or fewer earned runs in five of his six June starts. That is the stat I would use to move Cueto as we head into the All-Star break and let others see if he can become Johnny Be Good again.
Dylan Bundy - Bundy has been the brightest light of a terrible Orioles rotation, but that does not take much. He has won half of his 16 starts but has seen his strikeout rate drop four percentage points and his ERA is somehow 3.73 despite the shellacking he has taken lately. In five June outings, Bundy permitted 39 baserunners and seven home runs in 27.1 innings and has allowed at least one home run in 10 consecutive outings. The contact is getting louder, but his 8-6, 3.73 numbers are still tradable as he heads out today to face Tampa Bay today to kick off July.
David Price - Price is seven starts into the season after a late start, but just one of the seven starts is the type of outing owners hoped to get from him. He has allowed a lot of hard contact, mainly due to the fact he is really leaning on his fastball so far. Jeff Sullivan did a great job of explaining this at Fangraphs. Maybe he doesn't have faith in his arm to hold up on the heavy use of the breaking balls, but the fastballs are frequent and so is the hard contact. Many figured Price would not pitch in 2017 after the arm scare in March, so we should be happy he is even out there throwing at this point. That said, you are likely stuck with him if you still have him because of the risk and lack of quality production.
Gerrit Cole - The aforementioned Cole continues to be a major disappointment in 2017. He was blasted by the lowly Giants offense Friday and wrapped up June with a 6.17 ERA despite winning four of his six starts. June was feast or famine for the fireballing righty as he held Colorado, St. Louis and Milwaukee to one run but then allowed seven to each of San Francisco, Miami and New York. Over his last eight starts, he is 4-3 with a 6.65 ERA with 74 baserunners allowed in 44.2 innings with 11 home runs. It is weird to say he is not rosterable in 12-team mixed leagues, but he simply is not at this point unless you have a bench.
Jake Odorizzi - Odorizzi has allowed home run in 12 consecutive outings. That is hard to do. By strikeout rate, he has been the same Odorizzi as in the past, but his walks are up a bit and his home runs are WAY UP as he is allowing 2.1 per nine innings, up from 1.4 last year. Those issues were exacerbated in June as he walked 3.9 per nine innings and allowed eight home runs in just 25.2 June innings. His issue comes around his inability to command his pitches as he must hit his spots both up and down, but he has simply struggled to do so, which leaves his average fastball and breaking ball in very hittable locations for opposing batters.
We're in the final scoring period before the All-Star break, which is my favorite time of year to sit down and re-assess where my teams are and what I need to quickly to do fix them down the stretch. I know I need pitching help, so working through these lists is what is helping me claw my way out of the hole some of my earlier pitching speculations have cost me.
