Daily Pitcher Breakdown: Monday, August 8th

by Doug Thorburn (DougThorburn) Last Updated 2016-08-09 02:48:39

Welcome to the Daily Pitcher Breakdown, where we study the blueprints for each day’s matchups and dive into the details of each pitcher’s unique profile. We’ll lay all the cards on the table and let the strength of each hand determine whether we want to commit our chips. For each player, we consider opponents, splits, stuff, mechanics, and recent performance.

LEGEND

Stats Shown in Red Are BELOW AVERAGE
Stats Shown in Yellow are AVERAGE
Stats Shown in Green Are ABOVE AVERAGE
Stats Shown in Blue Are ELITE

View descriptions of stats below and Legend FAQ

Daily Pitcher Chart

Pitcher	TM	OPP	IP	ERA	SIERA	WHIP	GEM%	K%	BB%	HR/9	G/F
Odorizzi	TBR	TOR	300.2	3.50	3.95	1.17	36.8%	21.9%	6.7%	1.08	0.89
Dickey	TOR	TBR	352.2	4.13	4.74	1.24	47.6%	15.4%	7.5%	1.30	1.18
Cueto	SFG	MIA	367	3.14	3.70	1.10	76.2%	21.4%	5.2%	0.76	1.36
Fernandez	MIA	SFG	196.1	2.89	2.62	1.11	75.0%	34.2%	6.7%	0.64	1.34
Whalen	ATL	MIL
Davies	MIL	ATL	145	3.60	4.19	1.19		19.1%	7.4%	0.87	1.62
McHugh	HOU	MIN	325.1	4.20	3.90	1.35	42.9%	21.0%	6.3%	1.00	1.24
Duffey	MIN	HOU	153.2	5.04	4.01	1.44		19.3%	6.4%	1.29	1.66
Wacha	STL	CIN	307.2	3.77	4.09	1.29	53.3%	19.8%	7.5%	0.91	1.51
Hamels	TEX	COL	352.2	3.34	3.67	1.21	58.8%	24.0%	8.0%	1.00	1.54
Anderson	COL	TEX	61	3.25	3.53	1.26		20.6%	4.7%	0.74	2.22
Gausman	BAL	OAK	222.2	4.16	3.73	1.27	37.5%	22.3%	6.0%	1.50	1.21
Graveman	OAK	BAL	236.2	4.26	4.54	1.42		14.7%	7.2%	1.18	1.78
Fulmer	DET	SEA	104	2.42	3.97	1.08		21.0%	7.4%	0.87	1.74
Iwakuma	SEA	DET	267.1	3.77	3.92	1.18	60.0%	19.6%	4.9%	1.28	1.25
Eflin	PHI	LAD	60.1	4.77	5.20	1.24		12.2%	5.9%	1.34	0.94
Urias	LAD	PHI	43.1	4.98	3.74	1.57		26.4%	9.3%	1.04	1.31

ALL-IN:

The aces that are worth pushing all of the chips into the middle of the table.

Jose Fernandez MIA (vs. SF) – Fern had a couple of less-than-dominant outings against the Cardinals and the Cubs, facing two of baseball’s best offenses in his last two starts. He tossed a baseline quality start against the Cubs in his last turn and got roughed up for five earnies over five frames against the Cards, but the struck out 17 batters across 11.0 innings in the two games, averaging more than 15 points on DraftKings in the two games. The Giants are hardly a gimme but still offer a nice reprieve after facing the rulers of the NL Central. The last time that Fern struck out fewer than seven batters in a ballgame was back in April, and though he hasn’t done it in five starts, Fern was the master of allowing zero or one runs over the first half of the season, doing so in 10 of his first 15 starts. He’s also only had one double-digit strikeout game in his last six, meaning that he’s due for a big K count after whiffing 11 or more hitters in six of those first 15 games.

RAISE:

The value plays, next-tier players that can compete with the aces on any given gameday but who probably won’t cost an arm and a glove.

Johnny Cueto SF (at MIA) – Cueto is closer to Fernandez than to Fulmer on today’s rankings, but he gets caught in the trap of a tier-based ranking system to end up in the Raise section of today’s slate. Facing Fern only takes away from the odds of his earning the fantasy points for a Win, but Cueto has the in-game staying power to factor into the decision and makeup for the difficult opponent. Cueto’s in the middle of a bit of a rough patch, but things aren’t as dire as they might seem. In his last start, Cueto blanked the Phillies for 6.1 innings before serving up back-to-back solo homers, before being chased in the eighth when a walk and a pair of singles (sandwiched around a productive groundout) plated two more runs to make the final line look uglier than his performance really was (he had 10 strikeouts in the game). Cueto might have been a victim of circumstance in his last start, but he now allowed four runs or more in four of his last seven turns, with one of the exceptions on the positive side of that ledger was a 5.0-inning tilt against the Nats two starts ago, in which he gave up three runs and 10 baserunners with just three Ks on the game.

Michael Fulmer DET (at SEA) – The young right-hander has become a bastion of low-scoring innings, resulting in a ridiculous 1.48 ERA over his last 13 starts and 84.2 innings pitched. He has only 66 strikeouts in that time (7.0 K/9, 20.2 percent), but with a weird tendency to spike big totals. In those last 13 starts, he has had three different games with eight or more strikeouts, including two turns with 10-plus, but in all 10 of the other starts he struck out five or fewer hitters, including the last five turns in a row. The Tigers have kept him on a low pitch count, as Fulmer has exceeded 100 pitches just three times in 17 starts this season and has topped out at a modest 106 throws in a game. Fulmer is more likely to earn his points via scoreless frames than big strikeout totals, but his profile suggests a safe option with a 20-percent chance of spiking a big K count.

Kevin Gausman BAL (at OAK) – Gausman will likely set a career-high in innings pitched (at the major league level) in tonight’s bout with the A’s, so long as he lasts more than three innings. He has thrown nearly the same number of innings in each season over the last three years (113.1 in 2014, 112.1 in ‘15, 110.1 this year), but his vulnerability to home runs has been getting more pronounced each season, including this year’s 20 bombs allowed for 1.6 HR/9. Over his last six games alone he has given up eight home runs. That said, his K rate is also up 0.8-percent and his walk rate is down by half that margin, and over the course of his career Gausman has been a somewhat useful pitcher, if one that had yet to figure things out. Two starts ago, he was giving up six runs in a three-inning disaster start in Toronto, a game that masks the fact that he has thrown quality starts in five of his last seven games, with six of his last seven turns having featured 6-to-7 strikeouts apiece.

Pitcher Advanced Stats and Stats Against

Pitcher	wOBA vs L	ERA vs L	wOBA vs R	ERA vs R	AVG	OPS	BABIP	FIP	AVG-A	Pit/G	Strk%
Odorizzi	0.266	2.76	0.328	4.31	0.258	0.779	0.275	3.74	0.233	0.00	21.9%
Dickey	0.313	3.85	0.326	4.37	0.242	0.707	0.260	4.80	0.245	0.00	15.4%
Cueto	0.273	2.54	0.292	3.65	0.262	0.704	0.284	3.25	0.235	0.00	21.4%
Fernandez	0.319	3.28	0.222	2.56	0.263	0.736	0.336	2.21	0.224	0.01	34.2%
Whalen					0.252	0.709
Davies	0.300	2.57	0.289	4.48	0.252	0.678	0.275	3.82	0.237	0.01	19.1%
McHugh	0.310	4.26	0.337	4.15	0.247	0.715	0.328	3.70	0.273	0.00	21.0%
Duffey	0.316	3.46	0.381	6.66	0.248	0.744	0.333	4.23	0.287	0.00	19.3%
Reed			0.408	6.55	0.236	0.682	0.367	6.10	0.328	0.00	19.5%
Wacha	0.284	3.34	0.322	4.11	0.247	0.707	0.294	3.78	0.249	0.00	19.8%
Hamels	0.269	1.97	0.304	3.73	0.259	0.719	0.288	3.72	0.233	0.00	24.0%
Anderson	0.253	1.00	0.335	4.19	0.262	0.745	0.328	3.13	0.271	0.02	20.6%
Gausman	0.280	2.85	0.369	5.53	0.250	0.705	0.300	4.24	0.258	0.01	22.3%
Graveman	0.346	3.81	0.322	4.70	0.262	0.770	0.302	4.62	0.277	0.00	14.7%
Fulmer	0.272	1.80	0.285	3.00	0.249	0.739	0.250	3.75	0.212	0.01	21.0%
Iwakuma	0.318	3.62	0.299	3.90	0.269	0.749	0.286	4.02	0.253	0.00	19.6%
Eflin	0.345	6.26	0.305	3.55	0.248	0.734	0.258	4.83	0.252	0.00	12.2%
Urias	0.302	4.50	0.364	5.17	0.253	0.679	0.378	3.52	0.286	0.00	26.4%

CALL:

Long-shot plays that could hit it big but carry considerable risk of blow-up.

Michael Wacha STL (vs. CIN) – It’s been nearly two months since Wacha’s last scoreless start and he has given up multiple runs in all but three of his 22 starts this season. He hasn’t exceeded four strikeouts in any of his last four starts, and has topped a half-dozen Ks in only five of his turns, capping at nine strikeouts in an a single game. On the bright side, he also hasn’t given up more than three earnies in any of his 10 starts since early June, It’s also worth noting that the Cards have limited Wacha’s pitch count throughout the campaign, and that has been especially true over the past half-dozen starts, fakking at 101 pitches or under in his last seven turns. This is SP2 material.

Cole Hamels TEX (at COL) – Hamels gets tasked with braving the Coors Field gauntlet, something that he thought was left behind with his batting gloves when leaving the National League. It might seem crazy to have an AL pitcher in an interleague matchup at altitude rank this high in the standings, but of course Hamels is no stranger to Coors. Hamels has actually had no problem with the thin air during his career, compiling a 3.21 ERA in Denver with a 61:14 K:BB in 70.0 innings, and perhaps most remarkably, just 59 hits allowed through those 70 frames. All the laws of regression and stats would indicate that Hamels is headed for a tough time against the Rox this evening, but he matches up well platoon-wise with the left-handed bats of the Rox and is in a great position to sig expectation.

Hisashi Iwakuma SEA (vs. DET) – Playing Iwakuma is rolling the dice, as he has traded off between excellent starts and hopeless efforts. Importantly, he has allowed just three homers in his last seven starts combined, an important side note for a pitcher who gave up 17 bombs over his first 15 starts of the season. Iwakuma has yet to walk more than three batters in any start of 2016, The problems are the hits and runs allowed. His most recent stretch has been absolutely brutal, having faced Boston, Toronto and the Cubs over his last three turns, and yet he fared quite well, Even with J.D. Martinez back in the lineup, the White Sox can’t match the firepower of lefty. His last start was the most impressive of all, as Syndergaard blanked the Red Sox over the 7.0 frames

Jake Odorizzi TB (at TOR) – Rostering Odorizzi is a dicey proposition, given his season-long track record of short outings and modest contributions, but all of a sudden he’s a force to be reckoned with. The right-hander hasn’t allowed a run over his past three starts, throwing 20.2 scoreless frames over the span, though even at his best the K-count has been a yawner at 5-to-6 whiffs per game. To lend some perspective, he only had two blank starts over the first 20 games of his 2016 campaign entering start no. 21. But has since shut down the offense of the A’s, Yankees and Royals.

Julio Urias LAD (vs. PHI) – If Urias were on the pitch count of a typical major leaguer, or even one that was just slightly trimmed, then I might be more optimistic about the right-hander’s value tonight. But this is a pitcher who has gone 77 pitches or fewer in each of his last three games, failing to go more than 4.0 innings in a contest, and in his last start the Dodgers spared him some sacrificing of the stats when they pulled the plug after 3.0 frames, bouncing Urias from the start with just three full innings and 51 pitches under his belt. The Dodgers let Urias climb into the role of a typical big-league starter, and though all indications are that Urias has some learnin’ to do before being ready for prime time. Urias gave up a homer in his last start, his first following a five-start streak of at least one homer allowed.

Collin McHugh HOU (at MIN)

R.A. Dickey TOR (vs. TB)

Zach Davies MIL (vs. ATL)

Kendall Graveman OAK (vs. BAL)

Rob Whalen ATL (at MIL)