10 Definitely Interesting, Possibly Helpful MLB Notes for September 1st
Start your FREE 7-Day Premium Trial Now!
This MLB season, I’ll work to uncover some interesting bits of information that might shed some light on players from that day’s slate of MLB games. This is not a picks column, nor is it a “fun facts” article – it’s something in between.
I hope you enjoy it, and I hope it helps you think about today’s MLB plays in a new way as you build your DFS lineups. Here are 10 MLB notes for Friday, September 1st.
With the NFL season just around the corner, I’ll be shifting my focus to football, which means that this will be the last 10 Notes for this MLB season. I wanted to give a big thanks to everyone who has read the article this season and left feedback (whether positive or negative). It really means a lot, and while I’ll miss the baseball articles, I’m really excited to try my best to put out a good football article each week. I’m not done playing baseball DFS, though, so I’ll still tweet out interesting nuggets whenever I find them (@joshuabcole), so give me a follow if you haven’t already! With that, here’s this week’s article.
1. 9, 8, 14, 9, 7, 11, 9, 8, 10, 11, 10. Those are the strikeout totals Clayton Kershaw has posted in games against the Padres since 2014. In 10 starts, he’s got a 1.13 ERA, a .132/.185/.202 against this team. Kershaw has absolutely destroyed San Diego over the years, and while the Padres’ personnel has changed, the larger point is that this has been a poor hitting cub for a while, and Kershaw is as automatic as it gets against poor hitting clubs. But…there’s a pretty big fly in the ointment here, that being Kershaw’s “loose pitch limit” of 75 pitches (per RotoWorld). With a 16-game lead over the second-place Diamondbacks in the NL West, the Dodgers have absolutely no reason to push their ace. And there’s a second fly in the ointment (at this point, we should probably just get some new ointment): Kershaw isn’t discounted whatsoever. On a strong day for mid-range pitching, there’s just nothing that warrants paying full price for fresh-off-the-disabled-list Kershaw.
2. Kevin Gausman (as I’ve mentioned before in this column) has some insane catcher splits this year, and they’re getting even more pronounced. Since July 2nd, Gausman has started four games with Welington Castillo behind the plate and seven games with Caleb Joseph as his catcher. With Joseph, he’s been elite, with an ERA of 0.73 (just 4 ER in 49.1 IP). With Castillo…not so much, as his ERA balloons to 12.12 (22 ER in 16.1 IP). With a righty on the mound for Toronto, it’s likely that Joseph draws the start, and if that’s the case, Gausman is an elite play against a Blue Jays team that has a .310 wOBA against righties this year. That mark is tied for 25th in MLB…with the Phillies. Vegas seems to like Gausman, as well, as he’s installed as a solid -165 favorite at time of writing.
3. Jimmy Nelson has gotten to an 0-2 count 242 times this year (after just 183 such counts in all of 2016); only Chris Sale (253) has more 0-2 counts this year. Nelson has clearly made significant changes to his approach this year, and the results are following, as evidenced by his 18 games of six or more strikeouts. Prior to this season, he’d had just 23 games of 6+ strikeouts in his entire career. On Friday, he finds himself in a difficult matchup against the Nationals (particularly with the return of Trea Turner, given Nelson’s inability to control the running game), who rank in the top eight in MLB in wOBA, ISO, and wRC+. However, the matchup is baked into his price, as Nelson is reasonable across the industry. He makes for an interesting tournament play who could see reduced ownership due to the less-than-ideal matchup.
4. Blake Snell is one of five pitchers in MLB (min. 46 IP) with a strikeout rate above 22.0% and a sub-27.0% hard hit rate since July 18th; the others are Gerrit Cole, Charlie Morton, Luis Severino, and Chris Sale. Snell has always had elite stuff, and with his walks down to 7.9% over this recent stretch, Snell seems to be learning how to command his pitches, which is translating to success. The real selling point here, though, is the matchup; since the All-Star break, the White Sox have a 23.6% strikeout rate (fourth-highest in MLB) and just a 5.3% walk rate (third-lowest) against lefties. This is a team that whiffs a ton and has very little patience at the plate, which sets up nicely for a high-upside yet somewhat erratic pitcher like Snell. He may still be a bit too risky for cash games, but as long as ownership doesn’t get too high, Snell in this matchup is the definition of an elite tournament play.
5. Since June 23rd, only one pitcher in MLB has a strikeout rate above 26.0% and a ground ball rate above 56.0%: it’s Cincinnati rookie Luis Castillo. Since Castillo made his debut back in late June, he’s been surprisingly safe, allowing more than three earned runs in just two of 13 games while fanning six or more in nine of 13 starts. On Friday, he gets a massive park upgrade as the Reds travel to PNC Park. And while the strikeout upside is a bit capped against the Pirates (18.8% K rate vs. RHP this year, second-best in MLB), Castillo did fan nine Pirates in seven innings in his last start on August 26th. It sounds odd to say that a rookie pitcher for the Reds, of all teams, is safe enough for cash games, but there’s a high likelihood that Castillo throws a quality start here with decent strikeouts mixed in.
6. Giancarlo Stanton has a .528 ISO since the All-Star break; the .152-point gap between Stanton and second-place J.D. Martinez (.376) is roughly the same gap that exists between Martinez and Francisco Lindor (.225), the 51st-ranked player in ISO since the break. Maybe that’s just a fancy way of saying something everybody already knows, that Stanton has been the closest thing to peak Barry Bonds that we’ve seen in a while, but even so, it just feels like playing Stanton every day is the right move. Nick Pivetta is a reverse splits righty who has gotten shelled by righties this year (.423 wOBA, 44.9% hard hits), and with so much interesting mid-range pitching (Gausman, Snell, Castillo, Nelson, Lamet, Gray, Clevinger), paying up for Stanton is surprisingly easy in tournaments, and possibly even in cash games.
7. Paul Goldschmidt is one of three players in MLB with a .240+ ISO and .330+ average against ground ball pitchers (Anthony Rizzo, Corey Dickerson are the others). His 1.035 OPS is fourth-best in MLB (trailing Rizzo, Stanton, Encarnacion). And now he gets to go to Coors Field. While Kyle Freeland has been pretty good at limiting the damage at Coors (3.30 ERA in 73.2 IP at Coors this year), he’ll have a difficult time navigating through the righties in the middle of Arizona’s lineup (Goldschmidt, Martinez, Pollock). And as with Stanton, Goldschmidt is actually playable in all formats given the quality of mid-range pitching available on Friday.
8. Since 2014, Gerrit Cole has allowed 78 stolen bases, tied with Tyson Ross for fourth-most in MLB; only Jon Lester, Jake Arrieta, and Ubaldo Jimenez have allowed more. This sets up nicely for Billy Hamilton, who has always been a better hitter from the left side of the plate, and who has shown no fear on the base paths against Cole (or ever, really); in two of his last three games against Cole, Hamilton has reached base, stolen second, and stolen third…all before the first inning had ended.
9. Only one player in MLB has a .380 ISO and 45.0%+ hard hits against lefties in 2017, and it’s not Giancarlo Stanton, or Aaron Judge, or Nolan Arenado. It’s Justin Upton, the newest Los Angeles Angel of Anaheim, who is underpriced at DraftKings at just $4,100 and FanDuel at $3,300. Assuming he’s in the lineup on Friday, Upton will face Texas lefty Cole Hamels, who just hasn’t been the same pitcher against right-handed batters this year. After having a strikeout rate above 24.0% against righties in each of the past three seasons, that rate has plummeted to 14.8% this year. Despite Hamels’ name value, he’s a pitcher worth targeting with righties, even in cash games, and Upton is an elite play on Friday.
10. Eddie Rosario has had a breakout season in 2017, and it all starts with his improved plate discipline. Last year, his 25.7% strikeout rate would’ve been 14th-highest of 146 qualified hitters if he had the innings to qualify. This year, he’s reduced his strikeouts over seven percentage points, to 18.6%, which is 92nd-highest among qualified hitters. Even better, he’s improved his power along the way (.152 ISO in 2016, .211 ISO in 2017). With nine home runs in the month of August, Rosario has been hot, and on Friday he finds himself in a winnable matchup with the platoon advantage against Royals righty Jason Hammel.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Thanks for reading! Stats from this article were pulled from RotoGrinders’ Daily Research Console, FanGraphs, Baseball Savant, and Baseball Reference.
Check back for “10 Notes” NFL articles throughout this football season, and feel free to drop a comment below if you want to leave any feedback or keep the discussion going!
Follow Josh Cole on Twitter, where I post interesting stats whenever I dig them up!