This article is part of our Collette Calls series.
Last week, we looked at a number of second half surging and fading hitters. This week, let's look at similar types of pitchers who have at least 50 innings pitched in the second half. We'll start with the one that has most recently changed teams.
Justin Verlander: (4.73 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, 21% K rate in the 1st half; 2.33 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, 30% K rate in the 2nd half) - Verlander has made 11 starts in the second half, winning six, while also running a streak of 10 consecutive starts with at least six strikeouts. He has allowed fewer than three earned runs in eight of those 11 outings. In the first half of the season, most everything was in good shape except for the 11 percent walk rate. Couple that with a .261 opponents' batting average and that is a lot of baserunners, so even a 72 percent strand rate is not going to prevent enough damage. He has cut that walk rate in half in the second half and his opponents' batting average has fallen 71 points down to .190. He's done that by getting more from his fastball and dialing it back a bit with slider, but still primarily using those two pitches. His ol' number one has him pitching like a No. 1 again. He is using the repertoire of a reliever to have a lot of success as a starter, and with good reason: he has had the best fastball in the league in
Justin Verlander: (4.73 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, 21% K rate in the 1st half; 2.33 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, 30% K rate in the 2nd half) - Verlander has made 11 starts in the second half, winning six, while also running a streak of 10 consecutive starts with at least six strikeouts. He has allowed fewer than three earned runs in eight of those 11 outings. In the first half of the season, most everything was in good shape except for the 11 percent walk rate. Couple that with a .261 opponents' batting average and that is a lot of baserunners, so even a 72 percent strand rate is not going to prevent enough damage. He has cut that walk rate in half in the second half and his opponents' batting average has fallen 71 points down to .190. He's done that by getting more from his fastball and dialing it back a bit with slider, but still primarily using those two pitches. His ol' number one has him pitching like a No. 1 again. He is using the repertoire of a reliever to have a lot of success as a starter, and with good reason: he has had the best fastball in the league in
Last week, we looked at a number of second half surging and fading hitters. This week, let's look at similar types of pitchers who have at least 50 innings pitched in the second half. We'll start with the one that has most recently changed teams.
Justin Verlander: (4.73 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, 21% K rate in the 1st half; 2.33 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, 30% K rate in the 2nd half) - Verlander has made 11 starts in the second half, winning six, while also running a streak of 10 consecutive starts with at least six strikeouts. He has allowed fewer than three earned runs in eight of those 11 outings. In the first half of the season, most everything was in good shape except for the 11 percent walk rate. Couple that with a .261 opponents' batting average and that is a lot of baserunners, so even a 72 percent strand rate is not going to prevent enough damage. He has cut that walk rate in half in the second half and his opponents' batting average has fallen 71 points down to .190. He's done that by getting more from his fastball and dialing it back a bit with slider, but still primarily using those two pitches. His ol' number one has him pitching like a No. 1 again. He is using the repertoire of a reliever to have a lot of success as a starter, and with good reason: he has had the best fastball in the league in the second half. There seems to be a pattern year over year where Verlander's draft day value jumps or drops two rounds or $5, but coming off this second half and the move to Houston should see him back up there for 2018 drafts.
Zach Davies: (4.90 ERA, 1.46 WHIP, 15% K rate in the 1st half; 2.25 ERA, 1.17 WHIP, 17% K rate in the 2nd half) – Note that his strikeout rate is still below league-average for starting pitchers, but that's about the only undesirable part of his production in the second half. He has bumped up the strikeouts, dropped the walks a bit, but has also don a much better job of reducing home runs. His first half HR/9 of 1.4 has dropped to 0.3 and he continues to strand runners at the same rate (74 percent) as he did in the first half. He's still fringy to use in a 12-team mixed league because of the lack of strikeouts, but Davies has turned around a bad first half to help many owners down the stretch and give him a better standing in 2018 drafts.
Lance Lynn: (3.61 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 22% K rate in the 1st half; 1.95 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 16% K rate in the 2nd half) – That's odd; a pitcher whose striking out fewer batters, allowing more to reach base, but has significantly lowered his ERA. When that happens, there are a few metrics to look at: HR/FB, HR/9, and LOB%.
Lynn, like Verlander, has been leaning on his fastball because he is getting excellent results from it. Lynn's fastball has only been outdone by Verlander and (shockingly) Andrew Cashner. Lynn has thrown his heater 82% of the time in the second half, which is up a few percentage points over the first half. His velocity is the same, but you would have been wise to target Lynn in the first half just on simple regression from his home run issues as he was fully making his way back from his surgery. He will be a free agent after this season coming off a span in which he has thrown at least 175 innings in five of the past six seasons. He will need to get better with his breaking ball or in his continual pursuit of an offspeed pitch to get the strikeouts back up next season.
Luis Severino: (3.54 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, 26% in the 1st half; 2.07 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 33% K rate in the 2nd half) – Let's be real; this guy has been shoving it nearly all season. I only bring him up because he has taken his already solid ERA and improved it even more in a season where many are struggling to keep their ERA below 4.00. Severino has pitched his way into the top five rounds in standard mixed league drafts with his strikeouts and his ratios. The one final hurdle for him is going to be working on the times through the order penalty as his ERA by time through the order this year: 2.57, 2.35, 3.99. We've gone from people wondering if he would be a reliever or a starter to now wondering if he gets taken as a top ten starting pitcher next year. Wow.
Kevin Gausman: (5.85 ERA, 1.76 WHIP, 18% K rate in the 1st half; 3.68 ERA, 1.32 WHIP, 26% K rate in the 2nd half) – Many of us had him pegged for a breakout year this year, and it has only been recently that he has begun to show trends of doing that. He has that decent second half ERA despite allowing 1.8 homers per nine over the second half as well as walking nine percent of the batters he has faced. There is certainly room for improvement and he has taken steps in that direction by cutting his ERA down over two full runs despite the issues with walks and homers. He has really picked up his strikeout game in the second half with the help of his splitter as he is throwing it 24 percent of the time lately rather than 15% as he did in the first half.
Chad Kuhl: (4.96 ERA, 1.48 WHIP, 19% K rate in the 1st half; 3.18 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, 23% K rate in the 2nd half) – Kuhl is worth mentioning for NL leagues because of the strikeout rate as well as his recent surge in velocity. His walk rate is below average, but he does keep the ball in the yard. The walks are problematic as he has walked at least five batters in five of his last nine starts, so if he can work on his consistency in the offseason, there could be another level here in 2018.
Tanner Roark: (5.27 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, 18% K rate in the 1st half; 3.19 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, 26% K rate in the 2nd half) – Roark's overall 4.48 ERA this season is much higher than his 2.83 ERA last year, but we knew that was unsustainable. He spent the first half allowing doubters to beat their chests and saying an 80 percent LOB% couldn't hold up, and it did not. Roark stranded just 64% of baserunners in the first half around the .275 batting average and the 1.2 homers per nine innings. He changed tunes in the second half jumping his strikeout rate the way he did, and his opponents' batting average fell from .275 to .206. He is still prone to the long ball, despite a strong grounball rate, but he does not complicate that problem with additional walks. He has gone heavy fastball in the second half while cutting back on his breaking ball usage. It should intrigue you that three of his four pitches have positive run values in the second half. Mark him down as a sleeper mixed target next year while folks focus on the high overall ERA and ignore what he is doing here down the stretch.
Jake Arrieta: (4.35 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 24% K rate in the 1st half; 1.98 ERA, 1.02 WHIP, 23% K rate in the 2nd half) – His 2017 looks a lot like his 2016, which makes his amazing 2015 season the outlier it truly was. Arrieta is a free agent after this season, and he is pitching like it down the stretch. He has held opponents to a .195 average in the second half and has stranded 84 percent of his baserunners. There is not much else that needs to be said here other than the season is 26 weeks long and not 13. If you were panicking early on and cut bait with Arrieta because the first half looked too much like his second half struggles in 2016, you have missed out on quite a bit of production in this second half.
Trevor Bauer: (5.24 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 27% K rate in the 1st half; 3.03 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 27% K rate in the 2nd half) – For him, it has been all about avoiding the implosions that often plague him. His first and second half walk rates, home run rates, opponents' batting average, and batting average on balls in play have been practically identical. What he has done in the second half is strand runners at an 87 percent rate. Sunday against a Baltimore team that loves to hunt fastballs, he pitched beautifully off his curveball and picked up his ninth win over his last 10 outings while Cleveland tries to go perfect in September. He had that horrendous implosion against Oakland to start the second half, Bauer is 9-0 with a 2.51 ERA and a 1.27 WHIP and only twice has he allowed three or more earned runs over those 10 starts. I'm always going to be a Bauer apologist because I enjoy watching him pitch when he is on his game (as he was tonight) and that is beginning to happen more frequently these days.
Dinelson Lamet: (5.93 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, & a 31% K rate in the 1st half; 3.16 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, & a 29% K rate in the 2nd half) – Lamet is 7-7 with a 4.32 ERA on the season, but that ERA damage came in June and early July where he had back to back starts allowing seven earned runs and then had back to back five earned run outing in starts just before and after the All-Star break. Since then, he has permitted more than two earned runs just once. He has since gone 4-3 with a 2.55 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP. The 25 year old isn't pitching like the rookie he is these days as he is getting better with every start. He was another guy that should have been targeted based off his terrible first half numbers of a 56 percent LOB rate and a 2.2 HR/9 rate. The lowly Padres were going to let him pitch and those numbers had to get better, and they have. The lack of run support and the walks suppress his fantasy value a bit, but this is a pitcher you should be looking to roster in 2018 drafts.
Sean Manaea: (3.76 ERA, 1.21 WHIP, 24% K rate in the 1st half; 5.40 ERA, 1.68 WHIP, 14% K rate in the 2nd half) – I want to wrap up with a guy heading in the wrong direction. Manaea was very impressive in the first half of the season, but he looks anything but these days. His 2017 workload is right at where he was in 2016, so it does not appear to be a workload problem. In 2016, Manaea was awful in the first half and fantastic down the stretch. This year, that script has been flipped. He has also lost velocity as time goes on:
Justin Verlander: (4.73 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, 21% K rate in the 1st half; 2.33 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, 30% K rate in the 2nd half) - Verlander has made 11 starts in the second half, winning six, while also running a streak of 10 consecutive starts with at least six strikeouts. He has allowed fewer than three earned runs in eight of those 11 outings. In the first half of the season, most everything was in good shape except for the 11 percent walk rate. Couple that with a .261 opponents' batting average and that is a lot of baserunners, so even a 72 percent strand rate is not going to prevent enough damage. He has cut that walk rate in half in the second half and his opponents' batting average has fallen 71 points down to .190. He's done that by getting more from his fastball and dialing it back a bit with slider, but still primarily using those two pitches. His ol' number one has him pitching like a No. 1 again. He is using the repertoire of a reliever to have a lot of success as a starter, and with good reason: he has had the best fastball in the league in the second half. There seems to be a pattern year over year where Verlander's draft day value jumps or drops two rounds or $5, but coming off this second half and the move to Houston should see him back up there for 2018 drafts.
Zach Davies: (4.90 ERA, 1.46 WHIP, 15% K rate in the 1st half; 2.25 ERA, 1.17 WHIP, 17% K rate in the 2nd half) – Note that his strikeout rate is still below league-average for starting pitchers, but that's about the only undesirable part of his production in the second half. He has bumped up the strikeouts, dropped the walks a bit, but has also don a much better job of reducing home runs. His first half HR/9 of 1.4 has dropped to 0.3 and he continues to strand runners at the same rate (74 percent) as he did in the first half. He's still fringy to use in a 12-team mixed league because of the lack of strikeouts, but Davies has turned around a bad first half to help many owners down the stretch and give him a better standing in 2018 drafts.
Lance Lynn: (3.61 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 22% K rate in the 1st half; 1.95 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 16% K rate in the 2nd half) – That's odd; a pitcher whose striking out fewer batters, allowing more to reach base, but has significantly lowered his ERA. When that happens, there are a few metrics to look at: HR/FB, HR/9, and LOB%.
| SPLIT | HR/FB | HR/9 | LOB% |
| 1st Half | 18% | 1.8 | 80% |
| 2nd Half | 6% | 0.5 | 86% |
Lynn, like Verlander, has been leaning on his fastball because he is getting excellent results from it. Lynn's fastball has only been outdone by Verlander and (shockingly) Andrew Cashner. Lynn has thrown his heater 82% of the time in the second half, which is up a few percentage points over the first half. His velocity is the same, but you would have been wise to target Lynn in the first half just on simple regression from his home run issues as he was fully making his way back from his surgery. He will be a free agent after this season coming off a span in which he has thrown at least 175 innings in five of the past six seasons. He will need to get better with his breaking ball or in his continual pursuit of an offspeed pitch to get the strikeouts back up next season.
Luis Severino: (3.54 ERA, 1.08 WHIP, 26% in the 1st half; 2.07 ERA, 1.00 WHIP, 33% K rate in the 2nd half) – Let's be real; this guy has been shoving it nearly all season. I only bring him up because he has taken his already solid ERA and improved it even more in a season where many are struggling to keep their ERA below 4.00. Severino has pitched his way into the top five rounds in standard mixed league drafts with his strikeouts and his ratios. The one final hurdle for him is going to be working on the times through the order penalty as his ERA by time through the order this year: 2.57, 2.35, 3.99. We've gone from people wondering if he would be a reliever or a starter to now wondering if he gets taken as a top ten starting pitcher next year. Wow.
Kevin Gausman: (5.85 ERA, 1.76 WHIP, 18% K rate in the 1st half; 3.68 ERA, 1.32 WHIP, 26% K rate in the 2nd half) – Many of us had him pegged for a breakout year this year, and it has only been recently that he has begun to show trends of doing that. He has that decent second half ERA despite allowing 1.8 homers per nine over the second half as well as walking nine percent of the batters he has faced. There is certainly room for improvement and he has taken steps in that direction by cutting his ERA down over two full runs despite the issues with walks and homers. He has really picked up his strikeout game in the second half with the help of his splitter as he is throwing it 24 percent of the time lately rather than 15% as he did in the first half.
Chad Kuhl: (4.96 ERA, 1.48 WHIP, 19% K rate in the 1st half; 3.18 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, 23% K rate in the 2nd half) – Kuhl is worth mentioning for NL leagues because of the strikeout rate as well as his recent surge in velocity. His walk rate is below average, but he does keep the ball in the yard. The walks are problematic as he has walked at least five batters in five of his last nine starts, so if he can work on his consistency in the offseason, there could be another level here in 2018.
Tanner Roark: (5.27 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, 18% K rate in the 1st half; 3.19 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, 26% K rate in the 2nd half) – Roark's overall 4.48 ERA this season is much higher than his 2.83 ERA last year, but we knew that was unsustainable. He spent the first half allowing doubters to beat their chests and saying an 80 percent LOB% couldn't hold up, and it did not. Roark stranded just 64% of baserunners in the first half around the .275 batting average and the 1.2 homers per nine innings. He changed tunes in the second half jumping his strikeout rate the way he did, and his opponents' batting average fell from .275 to .206. He is still prone to the long ball, despite a strong grounball rate, but he does not complicate that problem with additional walks. He has gone heavy fastball in the second half while cutting back on his breaking ball usage. It should intrigue you that three of his four pitches have positive run values in the second half. Mark him down as a sleeper mixed target next year while folks focus on the high overall ERA and ignore what he is doing here down the stretch.
Jake Arrieta: (4.35 ERA, 1.30 WHIP, 24% K rate in the 1st half; 1.98 ERA, 1.02 WHIP, 23% K rate in the 2nd half) – His 2017 looks a lot like his 2016, which makes his amazing 2015 season the outlier it truly was. Arrieta is a free agent after this season, and he is pitching like it down the stretch. He has held opponents to a .195 average in the second half and has stranded 84 percent of his baserunners. There is not much else that needs to be said here other than the season is 26 weeks long and not 13. If you were panicking early on and cut bait with Arrieta because the first half looked too much like his second half struggles in 2016, you have missed out on quite a bit of production in this second half.
Trevor Bauer: (5.24 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 27% K rate in the 1st half; 3.03 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 27% K rate in the 2nd half) – For him, it has been all about avoiding the implosions that often plague him. His first and second half walk rates, home run rates, opponents' batting average, and batting average on balls in play have been practically identical. What he has done in the second half is strand runners at an 87 percent rate. Sunday against a Baltimore team that loves to hunt fastballs, he pitched beautifully off his curveball and picked up his ninth win over his last 10 outings while Cleveland tries to go perfect in September. He had that horrendous implosion against Oakland to start the second half, Bauer is 9-0 with a 2.51 ERA and a 1.27 WHIP and only twice has he allowed three or more earned runs over those 10 starts. I'm always going to be a Bauer apologist because I enjoy watching him pitch when he is on his game (as he was tonight) and that is beginning to happen more frequently these days.
Dinelson Lamet: (5.93 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, & a 31% K rate in the 1st half; 3.16 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, & a 29% K rate in the 2nd half) – Lamet is 7-7 with a 4.32 ERA on the season, but that ERA damage came in June and early July where he had back to back starts allowing seven earned runs and then had back to back five earned run outing in starts just before and after the All-Star break. Since then, he has permitted more than two earned runs just once. He has since gone 4-3 with a 2.55 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP. The 25 year old isn't pitching like the rookie he is these days as he is getting better with every start. He was another guy that should have been targeted based off his terrible first half numbers of a 56 percent LOB rate and a 2.2 HR/9 rate. The lowly Padres were going to let him pitch and those numbers had to get better, and they have. The lack of run support and the walks suppress his fantasy value a bit, but this is a pitcher you should be looking to roster in 2018 drafts.
Sean Manaea: (3.76 ERA, 1.21 WHIP, 24% K rate in the 1st half; 5.40 ERA, 1.68 WHIP, 14% K rate in the 2nd half) – I want to wrap up with a guy heading in the wrong direction. Manaea was very impressive in the first half of the season, but he looks anything but these days. His 2017 workload is right at where he was in 2016, so it does not appear to be a workload problem. In 2016, Manaea was awful in the first half and fantastic down the stretch. This year, that script has been flipped. He has also lost velocity as time goes on:
He has 10 wins for a meddling Oakland club, but strikeouts are the only other redeeming quality he has and even those are slipping away down the stretch as he has struck out fewer than four batters in all but three of his second half starts. I'm as nervous about his 2018 potential as I am excited about Lamet's.
