We’ve looked at hitters the last couple weeks so lets turn our attention from the box to the mound. Specifically, let’s look at what makes a good points league pitcher and hopefully identify some guys to target. In my preseason strategy piece I discussed the value in prioritizing innings eaters over strikeout kings. Now that we’re a couple months into the season, lets see if that was a valid strategy.
So let’s start by checking in on the top 10 pitchers using ESPN standard points scoring.
Shohei Ohtani – 230 Congrats if you drafted him but for our purposes we aren’t going to focus on him. He’s a fantasy cheat code and should absolutely be in the mix to go number one overall in points leagues next season.
Gerrit Cole – 228 He’s been everything the Yankees and fantasy players could want.
Trevor Bauer – 221 Love him or hate him, you can’t deny that he’s been great for fantasy.
Kevin Gausman – 218 I’d say he’s far outperformed his expectations going into the season. He’s already more than halfway to his preseason projection. Hes got a pitcher friendly park so let the good times roll.
Tyler Glasnow – 213 Hard not to love the strikeouts.
Brandon Woodruff – 205 Corbin Burnes stole the spotlight with his start to the season but he trails Woodruff by 56 points.
John Means – 205 The no hitter isn’t the only thing boosting his numbers. He’s been excellent all year and I think we can call him an ace.
Yu Darvish – 200 He was my preseason Cy Young pick and so far he’s justifying my faith.
Shane Bieber – 199 Meet your strikeout leader. You love to see that for fantasy.
Max Scherzer – 194 With only a single negative point outing this season, he’s been everything you want week to week
Julio Urias – 194 He’s been excellent but I always worry that the Dodgers will roll out roll out a six man rotation at the worst possible time.
Ten is an arbitrary number and I almost went with the top 8 because they all have more points than the top scoring hitter, Vladimir Guerrero Jr with 198. But ten seemed like a nice round number and I picked it before I checked how many points the top bat had so here we are. Anyhoo, besides being among the top scorers, what else do they have in common? For starters, all boast well over a strikeout an inning. That’s great, but if we just looked at strikeouts, there are some names missing. Same goes for ERA. Jacob deGrom has 0.80 ERA but that’s only managed to net him 179 points. Not shabby by any means, in fact that’s more points that Ronald Acuna Jr. However, he does lag behind the top pitchers. You’re hardly mad about his performance but he was billed as the top pitcher going into the season. So why are these guys the top 10? They all rack up strikeouts and limit runs, but what puts them ahead of a guy many consider the best pitcher in the game? The answer is innings. Everyone in the top 10 has logged at least 60 frames so far compared to only 45 for deGrom.
Now, there are some guys who have hit the 60 inning mark that don’t find themselves in the top 10. Chris Bassitt (179), Zack Wheeler (192), Aaron Civale (173), Zack Greinke (125), Aaron Nola (141), Sandy Alcantara (132), Zach Eflin (115), and Kyle Gibson (153) have all hit that admittedly arbitrary mark. Despite logging at least as many frames as the top dogs they find themselves looking up at them in the points standings. In some cases we’re not talking about a big difference in points, remember the back end of the top 10 is approaching 200 points. Greinke checks in quite a bit off that pace, as do Alcantara, Eflin and Gibson. So clearly innings aren’t everything; however, all are still having fine seasons. When you consider where these guys were drafted, they are actually doing quite well and represent good draft day value. Obviously, your league requires you to start more than one pitcher so not all of them can be top 10 guys. Realistically, the top 100 pitchers have value and it can go far beyond that in deeper leagues.
Unfortunately, examining the top 10 pitchers as well as the guys who have logged the most innings hasn’t really told us anything new. Turns out a good real life pitcher is pretty good for fantasy as well. Who knew? I say that in jest, because… c’mon. But it does reinforce the value of innings for points leagues. Strikeouts are sexy and they give you that sweet sweet upside, but innings are how your rack up the points. It’s better to get 7 innings with only 4 Ks than 5 with 8 Ks and 3 free passes. For those of you keeping score at home the first guy gets you 25 and the second only puts up 20.
So we’ve looked at the top pitchers and what makes them the best, but how do we apply that going forward? It’s great that they’re stacking points but that doesn’t help you bolster your pitching staff since they are all on rosters already. If they aren’t grab them immediately.
Let’s find some pitchers to target who are logging innings.
German Marquez is putting up innings. Making half his starts in Coors is rough, but don’t forget that means half his starts aren’t in Coors, and that’s a plus.
Jon Gray What, are Rockies pitchers cured or something? Honestly, yes. Coors is great for offense but it is brutal for whoever is on the mound. That hasn’t stopped him from posting solid numbers.
Tyler Anderson his overall numbers don’t jump out at you but he’s still put up 56 innings with roughly a K per. The upside is capped due to the lack of strikeouts but he’s widely available and you should snap him up.
Mike Foltynewicz is giving up too many runs and doesn’t rack up the Ks. But he’s still making it into the sixth inning and he was a pretty good pitcher a couple years ago so there is potential for more.
Steven Matz does have K upside, but needs to get the ERA under control. He’s put 120 points so far so grab him if he’s available to see if there’s more.
Nick Pivetta Are you ready to be hurt again? Pivetta has bounced back nicely and offers some pretty enticing upside.
Madison Bumgarner may not be the ace he used to be but there’s still value here.
Jordan Montgomery will likely be inconsistent for the rest of the season but as long as the Yankees keep mashing he has win potential. I don’t usually like to chase wins but I can’t resist here.
As always drop your comments below or hit me up on Twitter @deltaxi1842
