MLB Daily Notes - June 17th
A daily automated report of what happened yesterday in Major League Baseball, along with other recent trends and further analysis.
I was back yesterday, but I’m so back today. Back in the basement at my normal desk with no kids around, it’s a beautiful morning. I was thinking last night about how much I have to look forward to in life. So many years ahead to see my three kids grow, and who knows, maybe even have more kids or adopt some - the doors are all open! It’s so exciting to just think about all the stuff down the line that will happen when you have a strong family and children, you can never really be down about the future in this situation.
But not only that, even this Substack. The subscriptions have nearly doubled since one year ago, and that got me thinking about what things could possibly look like in five years. Certainly I won’t be able to double it every year, there’s a hard cap out there somewhere and growth I’m sure is always much more rapid in the first few years of a venture, but even at 10-20% annual growth, it projects out very interestingly. I might actually be able to make this a full time thing, or at least a more full-time thing. I don’t think I want to ever only do this, but maybe in a few years this can be the main source of income to support my family and I can grab another job using my skills in Christian ministry or some other venture that does more good for the world rather than just keeping a stock price up. We’ll see, man. I’m really fortunate and blessed and very happy and excited about the future - and thank you for everyone who subscribes and especially thank you for those of you who have reached out privately to encourage me, those messages mean a lot. I might even start giving away free months of membership to those people who compliment me.
Pitcher Review
I begin this section with an apology. The two-start week for Joey Estes boned me and I’m sure a good number of readers. He gave up sixteen hits and nine earned runs in just 7.2 innings, a total disaster.
These were his worst two starts of the year by SwStr (7.3% and 7.7%) and Strike% (45.8% and 46.2%). He was extremely hittable and the hitters took advantage (five barrels, four homers, a near .414 BABIP and .437 xwOBA in these two starts).
The lesson to be learned is be careful who you’re putting out there. The numbers did look enticing prior to these two starts, I certainly stand by that (12.7% SwStr%, 52% Strike%, 29.7% Ball% prior to last week), but it was on a 408 pitch sample where the strikeout rate was low even with the good numbers. Sample size is everything, and it appears that Estes’ will look worse and worse as the sample grows.
What I don’t want to do is close the door here. If he goes out there this week and throws a perfect game I still want to be able to take the victory lap. So, as sole owner and operator of these pages on the Internet, I would like to reserve the right to edit these section in the past and pretend I never abandoned my boy Joey These.
Jordan Montgomery
The Diamondbacks finally got some of their investment back as J-Mont went out there and set season-bests in just about everything
5 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 7 K, 2 BB, 21.4% SwStr%, 46.4% Strike%
The pitch mix from yesterday:
Still lacking sinker velo, but the changeup came back yesterday and was incredible with 10 whiffs on 22 pitches and a 59% Strike%. The 46% Strike% overall does not match the elite SwStr% of 21.4%,
It’s good to see Montgomery get the monkey off his back and have a good start, but we can’t just immediately forget about how he’s been overall this year (4.83 SIERA, 15.4% K%, 8.3% BB%).
Bailey Ober
A few different people asked me if they can cut Bailey Ober last week, and I told them all no - and Ober showed up nicely yesterday.
6.1 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 8 K, 2 BB, 17.7% SwStr%, 51% Strike%.
I’ve cleaned up the P Logs tab of the main dashboard a bit this morning, it’s a pretty good resource to see the start-by-start advanced data. Here’s a look at it:
The season Strike% in bold at the top there is pretty nice at 49.2%, and if we take out his first three starts it’s up at 49.7%, a really competitive mark. His season has been marked by bad starts. He’s given up eight, five, and six earned runs in three individual starts to bloat the ERA. His SIERA is now 3.81, a full run better than his 4.81 ERA.
Some of the people that have approached me are in very shallow leagues where Ober is legitimately their worst pitcher and there are enticing guys on waivers, and in those cases it makes some sense to ditch Ober for some upside guys like some of these rookies, but in most cases I’m just going to keep Ober. He’s proven to be able to have very good starts against Major League lineups, and there’s something to be said for that kind of known commodity.
Dylan Cease
There it was - we were kind of waiting for this.
3.2 IP, 7 H, 7 ER, 5 K, 3 BB, 13.3% SwStr%, 43.3% Strike%
The SwStr% still wasn’t bad, but it was much lower than usualy fo rhim, and that 42.2% Ball% was his worst effort of the yaer. The command which has been there all year went away. He gave up four line drives and seven fly balls for a .548 xwOBA and .455 BABIP. All I can say is that you should have been ready for this, and you should continue to start him every time without any questions.
Tylor Megill
Another solid start from Megill, but again an abbreviated one.
5 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 5 K, 2 BB, 52.2% Strike%, 13% SwStr%, 31.5% Ball%
That brings his season SwStr% to 13.8% and lowered the Ball% to 37.3%, still above the league average but moving in the right direction (34.5% two starts ago, 31.5% last night). He now has a 27.8% K% and 9.8% BB%, and that’s an 18% K-BB% which is in the range we want. He needs to be more efficient, but that should happen soon if these ball rate improvements stick. I like him, I think he should be owned in all 12-team leagues or deeper.
Chris Paddack
2.1 IP, 5 H, 5 ER, 0 K, 1 BB, 4.3% SwStr%
He started his two-start week really well but it ended absolutely terribly. No strikeouts and two whiffs on 46 pitches before he got taken out. Every time he does something to make me talk positively about him it’s immediately followed by disaster, and this time the disaster wasn’t just about BABIP.
The velo came down, but was still above his prior:
I guess we should just erase Paddack from our memories, don’t stream him anymore in standard/shallow leagues - he cannot be trusted.
I believe Scott White used to talk about the “Circle of Trust” with SPs, and I liked that. I wonder if he still does. The Cirlce of Trust pitchers are guys you feel very confident about giving you good season-long results, and guys that you will not hesitate on after bad starts. Paddack is certainly nowhere near that, obviously, but I might start using that thought process and terminology because it’s pretty useful.
Drew Thorpe
This was the worst start of the day and one of the worst of the season.
3.1 IP, 6 H, 7 ER, 0 K, 5 BB, 2 whiffs, 3.3% SwStr%, 28.3% Strike%
Just no command of anything and his season Strike% is now 39%, a disastrous number.
No idea if the White Sox will keep him in the rotation, they certainly don’t have anybody better to take his spot, but you can drop him in standard fantasy leagues. It could turn around certainly, we’re talking about a young prospect kid with three MLB starts under his belt, but I’d much rather use a roster spot on a more proven asset like Megill or one of those types.
Hitter Review
Royce Lewis hit two more homers but it took him two games to do it! He now has a .390/.447/.951 line with seven homers in 47 PAs. That’s a 1.398 OPS with a 22% Brl% and 13% K%, just silly stuff. Here’s a dumb leaderboard - OPS leaders filtered to a 30 PA minimum.
How about Steven Kwan sitting there. He’s missed a good chunk of the year but still a 1.000 OPS in 196 PAs - what? I would not have thought that was remotely possible for this guy. He’s hit four homers with a 2% Brl% and a .376 xwOBA. He’s getting to this xwOBA with launch angle rather than launch velocity. And that takes us to a good baseball data lesson.
You can generate a successful batted ball in both of those ways. You can hit a ball very hard, and that will work most of the time, or you can hit a ball at the proper launch angle, and that will also work most of the time. An 80mph line drive is still a very good outcome, because it will often go over the infield but not fly far enough to be caught by an outfielder, and that is what you call a base hit.
Kwan’s average launch angle is 12 degrees. Batted balls hit at 12 degrees have an .803 batting average.
The PROBLEM here is that you can get to a 12 degree AVERAGE without ever hitting a ball at 12 degrees, right? You can pop one up at 36 degrees for an out, and then pound in the ground for an easy out at -12 degrees, and the average of those numbers is 12 degrees, but you didn’t hit either ball anywhere near 12 degrees.
So if you’re looking for hitters actually hitting balls consistently around 10-15 degrees, you should really be looking at more than average LA. There’s a couple ways to do that, you could look at guys around a 12 degree average and then sort by standard deviation to see the guys most consistently around that average. This is only possible on my dashboard, so shout out to me.
Alternatively we could code up a calculation to see what percent of each hitter’s batted balls are between 10 and 15 degrees. Code for the Python bros:
Results for the masses:
So we see Kwan there. He’s hitting 13.5% of his batted balls in the range where you expect an .800 batting average.
The other thing to note is that exit velocity doesn’t matter that much at this range. In fact, high EV could be bad in this range because it will carry the ball out to an outfielder rather than falling quickly after going over the infield. As far as slugging percentage goes, that’s not really true because a harder hit ball is more likely to get through the gap and result in extra bases, but if you’re strictly talking about batting average, 10-15 degrees is great regardless of EV.
So I started writing about Royce Lewis and ended up with that. I really love these Launch Angle histograms which you can find on the “LA Analysis” tab of the main dashboard.
Here’s Kwan, where you can see a lot of those weakly hit balls between 10 and 30:
Here’s Royce:
And here’s the best hitter in the league, Shohei Ohtani, probably the gold standard as far the histogram goes:
A bunch of red and a bunch of high bars between 10 and 30, that’s how you do it.
Let’s take a quick look at June homer leaders.
8 HRs: Santander
6 HRs: DeJong, Candelario, Ramos, Judge
5 HRs: Alvarez, Hernandez, Ohtani, Mountcastle, Gorman, Walker, Vaughn
The names of note there are Santander who has been awesome with a 1.074 OPS and 21% Brl%. But he’s owned in your fantasy league and there’s not much to do with him.
Most interesting to me is DeJong, who has been all over the place the last several years. Since 2021 he has been with the White Sox, Giants, Cardinals, and Blue Jays and has a .645 MLB OPS.
He’s not a good Major League hitter, I think it’s pretty foolish to buy into this at all. His season OPS is .768 with a 31.4% K%, but hey he’s been good looking back with these 14 homers.
I wouldn’t bother with him unless you’re totally desperate, there’s a reason this guy hasn’t been able to find an organization to keep him, and he’s 30 years old with a strikeout problem.
Andrew Vaughn, on the other hand, could be potentially really figuring it out. Vaughn is newly 26 years old and has an illustrious history as a hitter in college and in the minor leagues, and overall he’s been a competent Major League hitter since 2021 with a .728 OPS and a homer every 31 PAs. This year he’s at a .679 OPS with nine homers, but that’s after starting the year absolutely horrifically. Since May began he’s slashed .265/.311/.497 with nine homers and a 19% K%, a pretty darn solid bat for a deeper fantasy league. And he has a 1.059 OPS in June.
Reader Question
Closers and catchers. Not as valuable positions in fantasy but can still make a difference. - Rob
Yeah this was/is a good question. They are often over-looked and I personally almost never talk about closers here. The reason for that is that the data is always in really small samples and they don’t make nearly as big of an impact on the fantasy game as starters, so I keep my analysis there. But in a standard roto league, closers own 100% of on category (saves) and make a slight dent on three others as well (wins, ERA, WHIP). Their impact on the ratios is overstated and exaggerated by most, and I’ve made that point several times. But you need to get saves to win a league, and it’s very much useful to pay attention to the news and see which guys step in to potential closers roles.
I have a resource that updates every morning with the current bullpen situations, and there’s a tab on there for the current closers (as listed by Roster Resource):
I could even code up an automated tweet that identifies and tweets out when one of those listed closers changes… I think someone else had that done awhile ago but I don’t know if that bot survived all of the Twitter rules changes. I’ll put it on my list to do.
Catchers are cool too, they are just much harder to project and draft. The draft went pretty well this year with the top two guys drafted being the top two producers so far, that is William Contreras and Adley Rutschman. The problem is that my advice, and most others, was to wait on catcher because there were so many enticing names later - and very few of those have worked out. The people profiting did the opposite of my advice and took from the top three or four.
The catcher landscape changes a bunch every year, but probably the best advice I can give right now is draft based on playing time. Let’s look at plate appearance leaders at the position:
Contreras 315
Rutschman 299
Perez 278
Smith 257
Raleigh 257
Yainer Diaz 240
Jeffers 237
Heim 237
Langeliers 234
Garver 234
You’ve lost 80 plate appearances in 2.5 months by going with a late catcher rather than one of the top two, and that matters a great deal. That’s not to say that it’s suddenly an obvious good idea to take a catcher first or second, but it should factor into the equation more than maybe it does - and it’s something hopefully I’ll remember to study and focus on in draft prep next year.
And that’s it, another day of it taking until 11am to get these notes done, and I’ve done very little real life work to boot. But this was a fun one, thanks for reading!
Pitcher Reports
Algo SP Ranks - Yesterday
1. Logan Gilbert
2. Tyler Glasnow
3. Jordan Montgomery
4. Kutter Crawford
5. Bailey Ober
6. Ronel Blanco
7. Zach Eflin
8. Tylor Megill
9. Mitchell Parker
10. Dane Dunning
11. Corbin Burnes
12. Dakota Hudson
13. Brady Singer
14. Zack Wheeler
15. Dylan Cease
16. Miles Mikolas
17. Colin Rea
18. Frankie Montas
19. Ben Lively
20. Jameson Taillon
21. Kenta Maeda
22. Josh Fleming
23. Joey Estes
24. Jose Berrios
25. Marcus Stroman
26. Hurston Waldrep
27. Jesus Luzardo
28. JP Sears
29. Drew Thorpe
Fantasy Points Leaders - Yesterday
1. Logan Gilbert (vs. TEX): 38.8 Points
2. Tyler Glasnow (vs. KC): 35.35 Points
3. Ronel Blanco (vs. DET): 33.95 Points
4. Bailey Ober (vs. OAK): 27.44 Points
5. Kutter Crawford (vs. NYY): 27.1 Points
6. Jordan Montgomery (vs. CWS): 25.65 Points
7. Miles Mikolas (vs. CHC): 23.84 Points
8. Colin Rea (vs. CIN): 22.5 Points
9. Corbin Burnes (vs. PHI): 22.1 Points
10. Mitchell Parker (vs. MIA): 19.9 Points
Whiffs Leaders - Yesterday
1. Logan Gilbert (SEA): 21 Whiffs (101 Pitches)
2. Jordan Montgomery (ARI): 18 Whiffs (84 Pitches)
3. Bailey Ober (MIN): 17 Whiffs (96 Pitches)
4. Kutter Crawford (BOS): 16 Whiffs (84 Pitches)
5. Ronel Blanco (HOU): 15 Whiffs (94 Pitches)
6. Tyler Glasnow (LAD): 15 Whiffs (85 Pitches)
7. Zach Eflin (TB): 15 Whiffs (87 Pitches)
8. Zack Wheeler (PHI): 12 Whiffs (91 Pitches)
9. Dylan Cease (SD): 12 Whiffs (90 Pitches)
10. Tylor Megill (NYM): 12 Whiffs (92 Pitches)
Strike% Leaders - Yesterday
1. Dane Dunning (TEX): 58.2 Strike%, 31.6 Ball%
2. Kutter Crawford (BOS): 57.1 Strike%, 29.8 Ball%
3. Tyler Glasnow (LAD): 56.5 Strike%, 27.1 Ball%
4. Logan Gilbert (SEA): 54.5 Strike%, 28.7 Ball%
5. Ronel Blanco (HOU): 54.3 Strike%, 30.9 Ball%
6. Tylor Megill (NYM): 52.2 Strike%, 31.5 Ball%
7. Mitchell Parker (WSH): 51.8 Strike%, 23.5 Ball%
8. Bailey Ober (MIN): 51.0 Strike%, 33.3 Ball%
9. Zach Eflin (TB): 49.4 Strike%, 31.0 Ball%
10. Colin Rea (MIL): 47.8 Strike%, 34.8 Ball%
11. Ben Lively (CLE): 47.7 Strike%, 37.5 Ball%
12. Brady Singer (KC): 46.7 Strike%, 33.3 Ball%
13. Jordan Montgomery (ARI): 46.4 Strike%, 39.3 Ball%
14. Louie Varland (MIN): 46.3 Strike%, 27.8 Ball%
15. Miles Mikolas (STL): 46.2 Strike%, 34.1 Ball%
Pitches/Out (POUT) Leaders - Yesterday
1. Tyler Glasnow: 85 Pitches, 21 Outs, 4.05 POUT
2. Louie Varland: 54 Pitches, 13 Outs, 4.15 POUT
3. Logan Gilbert: 101 Pitches, 24 Outs, 4.21 POUT
4. Josh Fleming: 52 Pitches, 12 Outs, 4.33 POUT
5. Ronel Blanco: 94 Pitches, 21 Outs, 4.48 POUT
6. Kutter Crawford: 84 Pitches, 18 Outs, 4.67 POUT
7. Mitchell Parker: 85 Pitches, 18 Outs, 4.72 POUT
8. Miles Mikolas: 91 Pitches, 19 Outs, 4.79 POUT
9. Brady Singer: 90 Pitches, 18 Outs, 5.0 POUT
10. Colin Rea: 92 Pitches, 18 Outs, 5.11 POUT
Velo Changes - Yesterday
Chad Kuhl's SL velo (11 pitches) UP 2.0mph to 87.5
Chad Kuhl's SI velo (20 pitches) UP 1.5mph to 95.6
Ronel Blanco's SL velo (26 pitches) DOWN -1.5mph to 85.8
Louie Varland's FC velo (21 pitches) DOWN -1.5mph to 87.9
Jose Berrios's CH velo (20 pitches) DOWN -1.5mph to 82.7
Jordan Montgomery's SI velo (31 pitches) DOWN -1.5mph to 91.5
Marcus Stroman's SI velo (36 pitches) DOWN -1.6mph to 89.4
Dakota Hudson's SI velo (25 pitches) DOWN -1.6mph to 89.4
Zach Eflin's FC velo (23 pitches) DOWN -1.6mph to 86.6
Jameson Taillon's FC velo (15 pitches) DOWN -2.0mph to 86.1
Marcus Stroman's SV velo (11 pitches) DOWN -2.1mph to 81.9
Dane Dunning's SL velo (25 pitches) DOWN -2.1mph to 79.7
Brady Singer's SL velo (39 pitches) DOWN -2.2mph to 81.4
JP Sears's ST velo (24 pitches) DOWN -2.2mph to 78.0
Marcus Stroman's FS velo (15 pitches) DOWN -2.6mph to 82.5
Jesus Luzardo's CH velo (33 pitches) DOWN -3.3mph to 84.4
Jesus Luzardo's SL velo (13 pitches) DOWN -3.9mph to 80.7
Jesus Luzardo's FF velo (30 pitches) DOWN -4.2mph to 92.1
Pitch Mix Changes - Yesterday
Ben Lively's SI usage (42.0%) up 15.3 points
Ben Lively's ST usage (20.5%) up 12.0 points
Brady Singer's FF usage (27.8%) up 23.4 points
Chad Kuhl's FC usage (18.0%) up 16.8 points
Colin Rea's ST usage (25.0%) up 11.4 points
Corbin Burnes's CU usage (30.9%) up 12.3 points
Drew Thorpe's FF usage (50.0%) up 13.3 points
JP Sears's SI usage (16.8%) up 13.3 points
Jesus Luzardo's CH usage (42.9%) up 21.3 points
Joey Estes's ST usage (24.6%) up 10.5 points
Josh Fleming's FC usage (34.6%) up 25.0 points
Kutter Crawford's ST usage (27.4%) up 13.7 points
Louie Varland's CU usage (25.9%) up 18.4 points
Mitchell Parker's FS usage (31.8%) up 13.4 points
Tyler Glasnow's SI usage (17.6%) up 15.2 points
Tylor Megill's FC usage (19.6%) up 16.3 points
Pitch Mix Changes - Last 3 Starts
Lance Lynn 4-Seam Fastball: +19.9%
Luis Severino Sinker: +19.6%
Tyler Glasnow 4-Seam Fastball: -16.2%
Hunter Brown 4-Seam Fastball: -16.2%
Albert Suarez 4-Seam Fastball: -15.9%
Yoshinobu Yamamoto 4-Seam Fastball: +14.7%
Carlos Carrasco 4-Seam Fastball: +14.4%
Ryan Pepiot Slider: -14.3%
Garrett Crochet 4-Seam Fastball: +14.1%
Garrett Crochet Slider: -13.9%
Ryan Feltner Slider: -13.7%
Cole Irvin 4-Seam Fastball: +13.4%
Hunter Brown Sinker: +13.2%
Lance Lynn Cutter: -13.0%
Jose Soriano Sinker: +12.9%
Erick Fedde Cutter: +12.4%
Jesus Luzardo Changeup: +12.2%
CSW% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Garrett Crochet - 74 TBF, 35.8% CSW%
Chris Sale - 76 TBF, 35.3% CSW%
Tyler Glasnow - 99 TBF, 34.4% CSW%
Nathan Eovaldi - 78 TBF, 34.1% CSW%
Kyle Gibson - 97 TBF, 33.6% CSW%
Tarik Skubal - 105 TBF, 33.4% CSW%
Hunter Brown - 95 TBF, 33.0% CSW%
Grayson Rodriguez - 102 TBF, 33.0% CSW%
Logan Gilbert - 103 TBF, 32.6% CSW%
Ronel Blanco - 91 TBF, 32.6% CSW%
K% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Garrett Crochet - 74 TBF, 41.9% K%
Tyler Glasnow - 99 TBF, 38.4% K%
Hunter Brown - 95 TBF, 33.7% K%
Michael King - 87 TBF, 32.2% K%
Freddy Peralta - 89 TBF, 30.3% K%
Ryan Pepiot - 93 TBF, 30.1% K%
MacKenzie Gore - 95 TBF, 29.5% K%
George Kirby - 95 TBF, 28.4% K%
Max Fried - 78 TBF, 28.2% K%
Kutter Crawford - 97 TBF, 27.8% K%
K-BB% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Garrett Crochet - 74 TBF, 35.1% K-BB%
Tyler Glasnow - 99 TBF, 30.3% K-BB%
Hunter Brown - 95 TBF, 28.4% K-BB%
Ryan Pepiot - 93 TBF, 25.8% K-BB%
Michael King - 87 TBF, 25.3% K-BB%
George Kirby - 95 TBF, 25.3% K-BB%
Logan Gilbert - 103 TBF, 25.2% K-BB%
MacKenzie Gore - 95 TBF, 23.2% K-BB%
Max Fried - 78 TBF, 23.1% K-BB%
Grayson Rodriguez - 102 TBF, 22.5% K-BB%
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