MLB Daily Notes - April 5th
New resources available today for paid subs! I whipped up a script to calculate fantasy points scored for hitters and pitchers. For every qualified player, it will show you how many fantasy points they have scored and the rate of scoring as well (per PA for hitters, per GS and per IP for pitchers). The scoring system I used is DraftKings scoring, which is pretty close to what you’ll find in standard points leagues.
The ownership is there as well so that should help us locate some players to potentially pick up throughout the year.
If you didn’t get the e-mail with your access being added to the Google sheet, you’ll find the links to the sheets (updated every morning) below the paywall.
Here’s your league stats update:
The Tigers, Nationals, and Twins are now the only teams in the league without a steal. The Phillies, Mets, Nationals, and Blue Jays have all been held below four homers so far - just goes to show how weird stuff can be when you’re looking at a single week of data!
Kenta Maeda might have been overshadowed by Sandy Alcantara’s CGSO, but he was the pitcher of the day with 17 whiffs on 79 pitches, sheesh! The man is back!
Nobody could touch the slide boy, and he wasn’t even beating around the bush with it - he put it in the zone 41% of the time. He left with an injury, but the report now is that he is, and I quote, “fine”.
I picked that guy up for $1 in the RotoBaller expert league! Give me the crown! Except the rest of my team is garbage.
As long as the Pirates are within like five games of .500 I am going to be a huge fan of theirs, and that is the case right now, so let me show you what the man Roansy did last night:
I watched the game and noticed how many sliders he was throwing. That was something we wanted to see from him and Brubaker (RIP) this year since they both have these great sliders but bad fastballs. Last year, Roansy used the slider just 34% of the time and threw the four-seamer 49% of the time, so this was a big change.
Maybe the Pirates have noticed the newer trend in the league of letting starts throw their breaking balls more often and have come into 2023 with that new approach. I think that could help Contreras, and he pitched pretty well last night despite only getting three punchboys.
Luis Castillo tamed the Angels’ lineup and now has a sweet 22.1% SwStr% on his 77 four-seamers thrown. That is an impossible number to sustain, but with anything above 13% or so, it’s going to be an awesome year in Seattle for Castillo.
Bit of a disappointment for Wesneski last night with just the 10.3% SwStr% and a bad box score result. He’s one of these guys to watch early on so we’ll show you his arsenal breakdown:
Remember the first week of last season when Owen Miller was going nuts and a lot of people rushed out to get him and then he was completely terrible for the rest of the year?
I think that guy this year might be Brian Anderson, although in Anderson’s case we have seen him be a pretty decent hitter in the past - he’s just not able to stay healthy. Going from Miami to Milwaukee is a great ballpark shift, and again the main issue with him has just been health.
Hitting a barrel is not something just anybody can do, and Anderson has done that six times on 37 swings.
Here are his career Statcast numbers:
You can see some quite good barrel rates there, so yeah maybe there is something here. I would add him where I have a need - it’s nice that he plays 3B and OF.
Another change from yesterday is that I added a bunch of stuff onto the prop betting sheet. We now show lines and projections for strikeouts, total bases, homers, steals, and RBI.
Comparing the line to a projection isn’t apples to apples, and somebody sent me some #math to try to do it better - so that may be updated soon to do it in a smarter way. I’ll explain it when/if it’s changed.
There is just so, so much to get into every day and I can’t possibly cover even 1% of it in these notes, so I would encourage you all to spend time in the main dashboard where everything lives.
If you missed it, I did tutorial videos before the season to show everybody how to best use the dashboard, you can find those here.
I realized that the Magic Formula Qualifiers for pitchers was extremely, extremely broken. Another classic case of me having not updated the “2022” to “2023”. You guys have gotta tell me this stuff! It’s fixed now.
I also changed the “new max launch velo” thing to ignore the hitters that didn’t play last year. Now it will only check that for hitters with at least 100 batted balls since 2022. There are no results today, but the results will be more interesting/meaningful when they do pop up as we move forward.
And now onto the report, STILL 100% ABOVE THE PAYWALL! But become a paid subdaddy today because it’s not for long!
Whiffs Leaders - Yesterday
1. Kenta Maeda (MIN): 17 Whiffs (79 Pitches)
2. Luis Castillo (SEA): 17 Whiffs (99 Pitches)
3. Framber Valdez (HOU): 16 Whiffs (103 Pitches)
4. Steven Matz (STL): 15 Whiffs (94 Pitches)
5. Sandy Alcantara (MIA): 15 Whiffs (100 Pitches)
6. Domingo German (NYY): 15 Whiffs (75 Pitches)
7. Max Scherzer (NYM): 14 Whiffs (95 Pitches)
8. Kris Bubic (KC): 14 Whiffs (88 Pitches)
9. Dylan Dodd (ATL): 12 Whiffs (73 Pitches)
10. JP Sears (OAK): 12 Whiffs (98 Pitches)
CSW% Leaders - Yesterday
1. Kenta Maeda (MIN): 21.5 SwStr%, 39.2 CSW%
2. Domingo German (NYY): 20.0 SwStr%, 38.7 CSW%
3. Steven Matz (STL): 16.0 SwStr%, 35.1 CSW%
4. Framber Valdez (HOU): 15.5 SwStr%, 34.0 CSW%
5. Zac Gallen (AZ): 9.3 SwStr%, 33.7 CSW%
6. Kyle Gibson (BAL): 11.4 SwStr%, 33.0 CSW%
7. Jaime Barria (LAA): 16.1 SwStr%, 32.1 CSW%
8. Dylan Dodd (ATL): 16.4 SwStr%, 31.5 CSW%
9. Nick Pivetta (BOS): 8.0 SwStr%, 31.0 CSW%
10. Chad Kuhl (WSH): 13.6 SwStr%, 30.9 CSW%
Top Pitcher JA Scores - Yesterday
1. Kenta Maeda - 5.0 IP - 78.75 JA Points
2. Shane Bieber - 6.33 IP - 61.5 JA Points
3. Framber Valdez - 6.33 IP - 61.0 JA Points
4. Sandy Alcantara - 9.0 IP - 54.0 JA Points
5. Domingo German - 4.67 IP - 53.75 JA Points
6. Luis Castillo - 5.67 IP - 53.25 JA Points
7. Julio Urias - 5.67 IP - 47.0 JA Points
8. JP Sears - 4.33 IP - 42.75 JA Points
9. Dylan Dodd - 4.67 IP - 41.75 JA Points
10. Kris Bubic - 4.67 IP - 38.0 JA Points
Pitcher JA Scores - Season
1. Blake Snell (SD) - 1.0 GS - 84.81 JA Points
2. Nick Lodolo (CIN) - 1.0 GS - 83.25 JA Points
3. Zack Wheeler (PHI) - 1.0 GS - 68.65 JA Points
4. Brandon Woodruff (MIL) - 1.0 GS - 63.33 JA Points
5. Logan Webb (SF) - 1.0 GS - 62.29 JA Points
6. Gerrit Cole (NYY) - 1.0 GS - 60.0 JA Points
7. Dylan Cease (CWS) - 1.0 GS - 59.8 JA Points
8. Marcus Stroman (CHC) - 1.0 GS - 53.54 JA Points
9. Luis Castillo (SEA) - 2.0 GS - 53.04 JA Points
10. Shane McClanahan (TB) - 1.0 GS - 50.83 JA Points
Velo Changes - Yesterday
Jose Suarez's SL velo (26 pitches) UP 3.2mph to 84.9
Kris Bubic's CH velo (21 pitches) UP 2.8mph to 83.5
Yusei Kikuchi's CH velo (17 pitches) UP 2.6mph to 89.6
Nick Pivetta's CU velo (21 pitches) UP 2.2mph to 79.4
Domingo German's CU velo (30 pitches) UP 2.2mph to 83.2
Kris Bubic's CU velo (23 pitches) UP 2.0mph to 81.4
Yusei Kikuchi's SL velo (25 pitches) UP 1.9mph to 88.4
Hayden Wesneski's SI velo (16 pitches) UP 1.7mph to 93.7
Dane Dunning's SL velo (16 pitches) UP 1.7mph to 80.4
Kyle Gibson's ST velo (18 pitches) UP 1.6mph to 82.7
Kris Bubic's FF velo (35 pitches) UP 1.6mph to 93.5
Framber Valdez's CH velo (23 pitches) UP 1.5mph to 90.3
Andrew Heaney's SL velo (32 pitches) DOWN -1.7mph to 81.7
Luis Castillo's SI velo (19 pitches) DOWN -1.8mph to 94.9
Roansy Contreras's CU velo (11 pitches) DOWN -1.9mph to 77.0
Luis Castillo's SL velo (15 pitches) DOWN -2.3mph to 84.2
Luis Castillo's FF velo (47 pitches) DOWN -2.3mph to 94.8
Zac Gallen's FC velo (14 pitches) DOWN -2.4mph to 87.5
Josh Fleming's CU velo (24 pitches) DOWN -2.5mph to 77.0
Matt Manning's SL velo (24 pitches) DOWN -3.8mph to 79.9
Pitch Mix Changes - Yesterday
Andrew Heaney's SL usage (46.4%) up 14.0 points
Dane Dunning's FC usage (30.6%) up 18.7 points
Framber Valdez's CH usage (22.3%) up 12.9 points
Hayden Wesneski's FC usage (31.2%) up 13.4 points
Jose Suarez's SL usage (33.8%) up 13.7 points
Josh Fleming's CU usage (33.8%) up 20.9 points
Josh Winckowski's SL usage (39.2%) up 11.1 points
Julio Urias's SV usage (26.3%) up 24.6 points
Kyle Gibson's ST usage (20.5%) up 19.8 points
Luis Castillo's FF usage (47.5%) up 15.2 points
Matt Strahm's FF usage (50.8%) up 11.8 points
Nick Pivetta's FF usage (62.7%) up 10.5 points
Roansy Contreras's SL usage (48.7%) up 14.5 points
Shane Bieber's SL usage (53.9%) up 24.5 points
Yu Darvish's FF usage (41.4%) up 10.3 points
Yusei Kikuchi's CH usage (25.4%) up 11.3 points
CSW% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Luis Castillo - 40 TBF, 32.6% CSW%
Framber Valdez - 50 TBF, 32.4% CSW%
Zac Gallen - 48 TBF, 30.9% CSW%
Kyle Gibson - 46 TBF, 29.9% CSW%
Shane Bieber - 46 TBF, 29.5% CSW%
Max Scherzer - 47 TBF, 29.0% CSW%
Luis Garcia - 39 TBF, 26.6% CSW%
Julio Urias - 42 TBF, 26.5% CSW%
Sandy Alcantara - 53 TBF, 26.0% CSW%
German Marquez - 45 TBF, 25.8% CSW%
K% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Luis Castillo - 40 TBF, 30.0% K%
Julio Urias - 42 TBF, 26.2% K%
Framber Valdez - 50 TBF, 26.0% K%
Shane Bieber - 46 TBF, 21.7% K%
Luis Garcia - 39 TBF, 20.5% K%
German Marquez - 45 TBF, 20.0% K%
Zac Gallen - 48 TBF, 18.8% K%
Kyle Gibson - 46 TBF, 17.4% K%
Max Scherzer - 47 TBF, 17.0% K%
Sandy Alcantara - 53 TBF, 13.2% K%
K-BB% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Julio Urias - 42 TBF, 26.2% K-BB%
Luis Castillo - 40 TBF, 25.0% K-BB%
Framber Valdez - 50 TBF, 24.0% K-BB%
Shane Bieber - 46 TBF, 19.6% K-BB%
German Marquez - 45 TBF, 15.6% K-BB%
Kyle Gibson - 46 TBF, 15.2% K-BB%
Zac Gallen - 48 TBF, 10.4% K-BB%
Max Scherzer - 47 TBF, 8.5% K-BB%
Luis Garcia - 39 TBF, 7.7% K-BB%
Sandy Alcantara - 53 TBF, 3.8% K-BB%
GB% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Framber Valdez - 50 TBF, 62.9% GB%
Sandy Alcantara - 53 TBF, 51.2% GB%
German Marquez - 45 TBF, 50.0% GB%
Julio Urias - 42 TBF, 50.0% GB%
Shane Bieber - 46 TBF, 48.6% GB%
Luis Garcia - 39 TBF, 48.0% GB%
Luis Castillo - 40 TBF, 46.2% GB%
Kyle Gibson - 46 TBF, 41.7% GB%
Zac Gallen - 48 TBF, 31.4% GB%
Max Scherzer - 47 TBF, 25.7% GB%
Magic Formula Qualifiers - Pitchers - Last 3 Weeks
Brandon Woodruff - 22 TBF, 36.4 K%, 4.5 BB%, 53.8% GB%
Dylan Cease - 22 TBF, 45.5 K%, 0.0 BB%, 45.5% GB%
Logan Gilbert - 23 TBF, 30.4 K%, 4.3 BB%, 66.7% GB%
Luis Castillo - 40 TBF, 30.0 K%, 5.0 BB%, 46.2% GB%
Seth Lugo - 25 TBF, 28.0 K%, 0.0 BB%, 55.6% GB%
Shane McClanahan - 22 TBF, 27.3 K%, 4.5 BB%, 60.0% GB%
Steven Matz - 25 TBF, 28.0 K%, 4.0 BB%, 47.1% GB%
Zack Wheeler - 22 TBF, 31.8 K%, 4.5 BB%, 57.1% GB%
Multiple Barrels
Brandon Lowe (TB) 5 PA, 13 Swings, 2 Barrels, 0 HR
Brian Anderson (MIL) 4 PA, 10 Swings, 3 Barrels, 2 HR
Bryan Reynolds (PIT) 4 PA, 5 Swings, 2 Barrels, 1 HR
D.J. LeMahieu (NYY) 4 PA, 6 Swings, 3 Barrels, 1 HR
Jose Siri (TB) 4 PA, 4 Swings, 2 Barrels, 1 HR
Ryan Mountcastle (BAL) 5 PA, 7 Swings, 2 Barrels, 1 HR
Spencer Torkelson (DET) 4 PA, 7 Swings, 2 Barrels, 1 HR
Teoscar Hernandez (SEA) 4 PA, 14 Swings, 2 Barrels, 2 HR
Wander Franco (TB) 5 PA, 6 Swings, 2 Barrels, 0 HR
New Max Launch Velos
None