MLB Daily Notes - June 20th
A daily automated report of what happened yesterday in Major League Baseball, along with other recent trends and further analysis.
Pitcher Review
Tanner Bibee
6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 12 K, 1 BB, 21.5% SwStr%, 57% Strike%
In his last five starts he has an 18.1% SwStr% and a 32.6% Ball% with 43 strikeouts in 28 innings, it’s been a sick stretch. His 29.4% K% on the season is ninth-best in the league for pitchers with at least a dozen starts, and he’s paired it with a ery nice 6.2% BB%. That puts him seventh in K-BB%.
2024 K-BB% Leaders (12 GS minimum)
1. Flaherty 29.7%
2. Crochet 29.5%
3. Glasnow 27.8%
4. Sale 26.6%
5. Skubal 24.2%
6. S Gray 24.1%
7. Bibee 23.1%
8. Cease 22.6%
9. Peralta 22.5%
10. Ryan 22.3%
So he’s pitching like a top-ten fantasy starter. The interesting thing with Bibee is that the pitch modeling stuff hates his fastball. Before yesterday that pitch had a 95.8 Stuff+ and 102.7 Loc+ for a 99.3 Pitching+. HOWEVER, the pitch has good marks:
A 50% Strike% and 11.4% SwStr% on that four-seamer are both about league-average for a four-seamer. So I would say he has an average fastball, which still doesn’t make you think the guy can be a top-ten starter, but all of his other pitches are clearly spectacular. His slider has a 52% Strike%, which is the third-best mark in the league (Sale and Houck are above, Jared Jones is tied with him). His changeup is similarly great with a 51% Strike%, that is an absurd 11 points above league average for a changeup. Only Tarik Skubal’s changeup has a better strike rate than Bibee’s.
So he has an average fastball and two elite secondaries, and yeah that’ll play. You could probably sell high on him still though. I doubt he’s a top-ten SP moving forward, so if you could get that kind of return for him you might want to do that.
Garrett Crochet & Tarik Skubal
Putting these guys together really quick because they both had not great results yesterday but elite stuff under the hood, so no reason to sneeze at any of that.
Brayan Bello
6 IP, 7 H, 2 ER, 6 K, 2 BB, 13.6% SwStr%, 47.4% Strike%
Just a quick look at Bello’s season because we haven’t talked about him much. He has a bad 20.4% K% and 8.6% BB% and a 54.5% GB%. The SwStr% is bad at 11.1% and he has a bad 45.1% Strike%. So he’s been bad.
Like Bibee, he has a pretty good changeup/slider combo (not quite as good as Bibee, but good), the difference is that his fastball is a sinker with a 4.4% SwStr%. So that’s a really bad fastball and given that it’s a sinker and not a four-seamer, it’s unlikely to generate more whiffs moving forward. When he was having some fantasy success last year his ground ball rate was above 60%, so that’s fallen into the mid-50’s and he’s not improving anywhere else.
He seems like one of those guys that will always be a mix of good and bad and will be a better real-life pitcher than a fantasy guy.
Hunter Brown
6 IP, 7 H, 1 ER, 6 K, 0 BB
The good times kept going for Brown with his sixth straight quality start. The whiffs weren’t great at a 12.4% SwStr% and 48.3% Strike%, so he didn’t dominate the White Sox like you might have expected. I’ve been using May 5th as the pivot point for him because that’s when he added the sinker to the repertoire. Since then:
8 GS, 2.45 ERA, 1.05 WHIP, 28.2% K%, 1.05 WHIP
That puts him in the top 25 in ERA and K-BB%.
In June he’s piled on the velo, which is interesting to see.
Since that velo bump he has a 29.9% K% and 5.2% BB% with a 12.7% SwStr% and 49% Strike%. So the SwStr% doesn’t predict a 30% K%, so that will come down, but the command has been pretty good, he’s getting some ground balls, and he is throwing a bunch of different stuff at hitters.
The other thing to note is that these six straight quality starts have come against:
LAA, SEA, MIN, LAA, DET, CWS
So that’s about as easy of a stretch of matchups as you’ll find. It will be interesting to see how he does when some of these tougher matchups come around. I think it’s fair to say he’s nowhere near as bad as he was in April but also not nearly as good as he’s been in May and June. His next start looks like it’ll be against the Rockies at home, so the good times continue.
Mitch Keller & Hunter Greene
That was a beautiful pitcher’s duel yesterday as the Pirates got a 1-0 win.
Greene: 6.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 9 K, 0 BB
Keller: 7 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 7 K, 2 BB
Keller has given up just nine earned runs in his last eight starts (1.54 ERA). Greene has been really good a bunch of times lately, but he’s also had four starts this year with 4 or more earned runs allowed and overall the 26.6% K% is pretty discouraging given his history, but both of these guys are clear must-starts in fantasy.
Gerrit Cole & Bobby Miller
Cole was limited to four innings and 62 pitches. He posted just a 9.7% SwStr% and the velocity was down. That’s probably just a case of getting ramped up or easing into it, no reason to take any data from yesterday with much seriousness.
Miller threw 72 pitches and got into the seventh inning, but gave up five runs on six hits and walked three. His fastball velo was also down slightly from before the injury, but it averaged 97.5 which is still very high.
So you’re starting both of those guys next time out. Cole should pretty quickly build to 90+ pitches, but I can’t say the same about Miller.
Brandon Pfaadt
Another zero strikeout game for Pfaadt.
6.1 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 0 K, 4 BB, 0 SwStr%, 36.4% Strike%
That dropped his season SwStr% to 11.4% and the Strike% to 48%. So he’s looking mediocre now. There have only been seven instances all year long of a pitcher throwing 5+ innings with no strikeouts, and Pfaadt has now done it twice.
There have only been three outings this year with more than 50 pitches thrown and zero whiffs.
Soroka 4/25: 68 pitches
Sixto 5/31: 53 pitches
Pfaadt 6/19: 77 pitches
I like Pfaadt, I’ve liked Pfaadt, but I’m starting to think he’s just a weirdo and I no longer know what advice to give about him.
Cade Povich
4.2 IP, 1 H, 1 ER, 1 K, 5 BB, 4.3% SwStr%, 43.6% Strike%
Pretty bad start for Povich despite just the one hit and one run, but you see the five walks there and the ball rate was awful at 41.5%.
I’d cut the dude if you have him. 135 four-seamers now and it’s pretty clearly not going to work. I’m not hitting coach but it seems pretty clear what to do against Povich - let the curveball land where it will and swing at the fastball when you see it.
So that made me wonder - is that what’s already happening? The 53% Strike% on the curveball is great but the 12.9% SwStr% isn’t as great, so that would suggest a bunch of called strikes. So I added swing rates to the arsenals tab on the main dashboard and now we can get some insight into that.
The league average swing rate at a curveball is 42%. So far, Povich’s curveball has gotten swung on 42% of the time. So that’s right on the mark, so never mind.
While we’re here, let’s look at the highest and lowest swing rates against individual pitches. Using 200 pitches thrown minimum, the highest swing rates are against:
Logan Webb Changeup 60.3%
George Kirby 4-Seam 60.2%
Shota Imanaga Splitter 59.9%
Tarik Skubal Chnageup 59.9%
Bryan Woo 4-Seam 59.8%
And the lowest:
Trevor Rogers Slider 32.7%
Matt Waldron Sweeper 33.5%
Logan Webb Sinker 33.8%
Michael King Sinker 34.1%
Cooper Criswell Sinker 34.6%
I don’t think these numbers are really useful. Low swing rates are probably mostly about the pitch never being in the strike zone, and vice versa. But whatever, now you know something useless that you didn’t know a few seconds ago.
Hitter Review
Steven Kwan
The Kwan season has quietly been one of the weirdest things we’ve seen in recent memory. Only four hitters this year have 200+ PAs and an OPS above 1.
Judge 1.122
Soto 1.018
Kwan 1.010
Ohtani 1.002
One of those names is not like the others. The way to get to a high OPS is with extra base hits and walks. Judge, Soto, and Ohtani do a lot of both of those things. Kwan - not so much.
He has a pretty average walk rate of 8.8% and he’s hit just five homers. He has 56 singles, 10 doubles, and two triples added on to those five homers.
His SLG last year was .370, and this year it’s sitting at .554 and he’s already matched his homer total from a year ago. There’s no reason to believe in the five homers with a 2% Brl%. He doesn’t hit the ball hard, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see him fall short of hitting five more homers the rest of the year.
What he’s doing amazing well is not striking out (7% K%) and hitting balls at the optimal launch angle. We talked about this a few days ago actually. According to savant’s definition of launch angle sweet spot, he’s in the 97th percentile. He is just up there hitting line drives at an incredible rate. If we look at line drives per AB rate, he’s crushing the field:
Kwan 31.5%
Bailey 29.6%
Winn 27.9%
Urshela 27.7%
Arraez 27.5%
Betts 27.2%
J Turner 26.7%
Bichette 25.7%
Sheets 25.6%
W Perez 25.3%
Hitting line drives is certainly a skill, and given that Kwan has this skill along with an elite contact rate, he’s very likely to put up a super high batting average. His .343 xBA leads baseball. Interestingly enough, it was just .282 last year when he hit only .268.
Batting average is a finicky thing and you can never really trust it, but Kwan does everything that goes into a high batting average extremely well.
But I highly, highly doubt he’s even a .900 OPS guy starting today. He’s just nothing like the rest of the hitters above a .900 OPS with the 2.3% Brl% and lower walk rate.
I’d be trying to move Kwan pretty hard right now if you can find someone that buys into him. I think he’ll be a good fantasy asset with the batting average and some steals and runs, but he’s nowhere near as good as he’s shown and there’s probably someone in your league that will overpay for him.
I’ve gotta run now, have a good one out there!
Pitcher Reports
Algo SP Ranks - Yesterday
1. Garrett Crochet
2. Tanner Bibee
3. Joe Ryan
4. Kyle Hendricks
5. Tarik Skubal
6. Freddy Peralta
7. Andrew Heaney
8. Cole Ragans
9. Hunter Greene
10. Mitch Keller
11. Brayan Bello
12. Bryan Woo
13. Hunter Brown
14. Sean Manaea
15. Tyler Anderson
16. Ryan Feltner
17. Yonny Chirinos
18. Ranger Suarez
19. Patrick Corbin
20. Reynaldo Lopez
21. Gerrit Cole
22. Kevin Gausman
23. Bobby Miller
24. Taj Bradley
25. Matt Waldron
26. Cade Povich
27. Luis Medina
28. Brandon Pfaadt
Fantasy Points Leaders - Yesterday
1. Tanner Bibee (vs. SEA): 39.1 Points
2. Hunter Greene (vs. PIT): 31.04 Points
3. Freddy Peralta (vs. LAA): 30.5 Points
4. Kyle Hendricks (vs. SF): 28.96 Points
5. Mitch Keller (vs. CIN): 27.35 Points
6. Matt Waldron (vs. PHI): 25.55 Points
7. Hunter Brown (vs. CWS): 23.3 Points
8. Reynaldo Lopez (vs. DET): 22.45 Points
9. Andrew Heaney (vs. NYM): 21.9 Points
10. Brayan Bello (vs. TOR): 20.1 Points
Whiffs Leaders - Yesterday
1. Tanner Bibee (CLE): 20 Whiffs (93 Pitches)
2. Joe Ryan (MIN): 19 Whiffs (94 Pitches)
3. Garrett Crochet (CWS): 19 Whiffs (85 Pitches)
4. Tarik Skubal (DET): 19 Whiffs (83 Pitches)
5. Freddy Peralta (MIL): 18 Whiffs (101 Pitches)
6. Cole Ragans (KC): 17 Whiffs (102 Pitches)
7. Hunter Greene (CIN): 17 Whiffs (106 Pitches)
8. Andrew Heaney (TEX): 15 Whiffs (89 Pitches)
9. Mason Englert (DET): 14 Whiffs (53 Pitches)
10. Kyle Hendricks (CHC): 14 Whiffs (75 Pitches)
Strike% Leaders - Yesterday
1. Bryan Woo (SEA): 57.8 Strike%, 18.8 Ball%
2. Tanner Bibee (CLE): 57.0 Strike%, 33.3 Ball%
3. Kyle Hendricks (CHC): 54.7 Strike%, 30.7 Ball%
4. Garrett Crochet (CWS): 52.9 Strike%, 25.9 Ball%
5. Hunter Greene (CIN): 52.8 Strike%, 35.8 Ball%
6. Mason Englert (DET): 52.8 Strike%, 28.3 Ball%
7. Mitch Keller (PIT): 51.8 Strike%, 28.9 Ball%
8. Tarik Skubal (DET): 51.8 Strike%, 33.7 Ball%
9. Yonny Chirinos (MIA): 51.7 Strike%, 28.7 Ball%
10. Joe Ryan (MIN): 51.1 Strike%, 29.8 Ball%
11. Ranger Suarez (PHI): 51.1 Strike%, 28.7 Ball%
12. Sean Manaea (NYM): 50.5 Strike%, 35.8 Ball%
13. Gerrit Cole (NYY): 50.0 Strike%, 33.9 Ball%
14. Andrew Heaney (TEX): 49.4 Strike%, 36.0 Ball%
15. Cole Ragans (KC): 49.0 Strike%, 36.3 Ball%
Pitches/Out (POUT) Leaders - Yesterday
1. Mitch Keller: 83 Pitches, 21 Outs, 3.95 POUT
2. Bobby Miller: 79 Pitches, 19 Outs, 4.16 POUT
3. Brandon Pfaadt: 77 Pitches, 18 Outs, 4.28 POUT
4. Kyle Hendricks: 75 Pitches, 17 Outs, 4.41 POUT
5. Tyler Anderson: 99 Pitches, 21 Outs, 4.71 POUT
6. Brayan Bello: 88 Pitches, 18 Outs, 4.89 POUT
7. Hunter Brown: 89 Pitches, 18 Outs, 4.94 POUT
8. Andrew Heaney: 89 Pitches, 18 Outs, 4.94 POUT
9. Matt Waldron: 104 Pitches, 21 Outs, 4.95 POUT
10. Garrett Crochet: 85 Pitches, 17 Outs, 5.0 POUT
Velo Changes - Yesterday
Tanner Bibee's CU velo (20 pitches) UP 3.1mph to 82.2
Joe Ryan's FS velo (22 pitches) UP 3.0mph to 88.4
Sean Manaea's SL velo (21 pitches) UP 2.3mph to 85.5
Brayan Bello's CH velo (24 pitches) UP 1.9mph to 88.5
Brandon Pfaadt's ST velo (17 pitches) UP 1.8mph to 85.9
Taj Bradley's FC velo (21 pitches) UP 1.8mph to 91.2
Mason Englert's CH velo (11 pitches) UP 1.8mph to 86.1
Joe Ryan's FF velo (51 pitches) UP 1.7mph to 94.5
Tarik Skubal's CH velo (24 pitches) UP 1.6mph to 86.7
Brayan Bello's SI velo (39 pitches) UP 1.5mph to 96.7
Reynaldo Lopez's FF velo (60 pitches) DOWN -1.5mph to 95.4
Gerrit Cole's FF velo (28 pitches) DOWN -1.5mph to 95.1
Bobby Miller's CH velo (24 pitches) DOWN -1.9mph to 85.9
Ranger Suarez's CH velo (18 pitches) DOWN -2.4mph to 79.6
Reynaldo Lopez's SL velo (20 pitches) DOWN -3.6mph to 82.8
Yonny Chirinos's SL velo (26 pitches) DOWN -4.2mph to 84.3
Pitch Mix Changes - Yesterday
Andrew Heaney's SL usage (43.2%) up 17.6 points
Bobby Miller's FF usage (49.4%) up 19.1 points
Bobby Miller's CH usage (30.4%) up 13.5 points
Brandon Pfaadt's SI usage (41.6%) up 26.9 points
Garrett Crochet's FC usage (45.9%) up 24.3 points
Gerrit Cole's FC usage (21.0%) up 14.0 points
Hunter Brown's SI usage (22.5%) up 18.7 points
Hunter Brown's FC usage (21.3%) up 15.6 points
Hunter Greene's FS usage (16.0%) up 12.4 points
Kevin Gausman's FF usage (61.9%) up 10.9 points
Kyle Hendricks's CU usage (17.3%) up 12.1 points
Mason Englert's SL usage (49.1%) up 15.3 points
Mitch Keller's CU usage (24.1%) up 15.7 points
Sean Manaea's FC usage (25.3%) up 20.1 points
Taj Bradley's FS usage (32.7%) up 23.9 points
Tanner Bibee's CU usage (21.5%) up 12.8 points
Yonny Chirinos's FF usage (19.5%) up 17.0 points
Pitch Mix Changes - Last 3 Starts
Erik Miller Changeup: +19.6%
Lance Lynn 4-Seam Fastball: +19.5%
Luis Severino Sinker: +17.8%
Tyler Glasnow 4-Seam Fastball: -16.2%
Hunter Brown Sinker: +15.8%
Lance Lynn Cutter: -15.7%
Walker Buehler 4-Seam Fastball: -14.8%
Yoshinobu Yamamoto 4-Seam Fastball: +14.7%
Carlos Carrasco 4-Seam Fastball: +14.4%
Hunter Brown 4-Seam Fastball: -14.4%
Ryan Pepiot Slider: -14.3%
Erik Miller Slider: -14.0%
Cole Irvin 4-Seam Fastball: +13.4%
Tobias Myers 4-Seam Fastball: +12.6%
Reynaldo Lopez Slider: -12.5%
Paul Skenes Curveball: +12.5%
Garrett Crochet Slider: -12.5%
Bryan Woo 4-Seam Fastball: +12.4%
Erick Fedde Cutter: +12.4%
Jesus Luzardo Changeup: +12.2%
Walker Buehler Cutter: +12.1%
CSW% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Tyler Glasnow - 74 TBF, 36.7% CSW%
Chris Sale - 76 TBF, 35.3% CSW%
Yusei Kikuchi - 87 TBF, 34.2% CSW%
Garrett Crochet - 101 TBF, 34.1% CSW%
Tanner Bibee - 91 TBF, 33.6% CSW%
Kyle Gibson - 75 TBF, 33.6% CSW%
Kutter Crawford - 72 TBF, 33.2% CSW%
Logan Gilbert - 103 TBF, 32.6% CSW%
Ronel Blanco - 91 TBF, 32.6% CSW%
Paul Skenes - 70 TBF, 32.2% CSW%
K% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Tanner Bibee - 91 TBF, 40.7% K%
Tyler Glasnow - 74 TBF, 40.5% K%
Garrett Crochet - 101 TBF, 38.6% K%
Paul Skenes - 70 TBF, 32.9% K%
Reynaldo Lopez - 91 TBF, 31.9% K%
Kutter Crawford - 72 TBF, 30.6% K%
Sean Manaea - 86 TBF, 30.2% K%
Hunter Brown - 97 TBF, 29.9% K%
Max Fried - 74 TBF, 29.7% K%
Michael King - 92 TBF, 29.3% K%
K-BB% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Tanner Bibee - 91 TBF, 36.3% K-BB%
Tyler Glasnow - 74 TBF, 35.1% K-BB%
Garrett Crochet - 101 TBF, 32.7% K-BB%
Paul Skenes - 70 TBF, 30.0% K-BB%
Reynaldo Lopez - 91 TBF, 26.4% K-BB%
Shota Imanaga - 71 TBF, 25.4% K-BB%
Logan Gilbert - 103 TBF, 25.2% K-BB%
Kutter Crawford - 72 TBF, 25.0% K-BB%
Ryan Pepiot - 72 TBF, 25.0% K-BB%
Hunter Brown - 97 TBF, 24.7% K-BB%
GB% Leaders - Last 3 Weeks
Tyler Glasnow - 74 TBF, 62.5% GB%
Logan Webb - 104 TBF, 60.5% GB%
Erick Fedde - 101 TBF, 59.2% GB%
Jose Soriano - 77 TBF, 57.1% GB%
David Peterson - 76 TBF, 56.9% GB%
Brayan Bello - 105 TBF, 55.4% GB%
George Kirby - 71 TBF, 55.1% GB%
Jordan Hicks - 85 TBF, 54.5% GB%
Chris Sale - 76 TBF, 54.0% GB%
Framber Valdez - 100 TBF, 53.5% GB%
Magic Formula Qualifiers - Pitchers - Last 3 Weeks
Chris Sale - 76 TBF, 27.6 K%, 5.3 BB%, 54.0% GB%
Hunter Brown - 97 TBF, 29.9 K%, 5.2 BB%, 51.6% GB%
Kutter Crawford - 72 TBF, 30.6 K%, 5.6 BB%, 50.0% GB%
Kyle Bradish - 57 TBF, 33.3 K%, 7.0 BB%, 61.8% GB%
Nathan Eovaldi - 64 TBF, 28.1 K%, 7.8 BB%, 46.3% GB%
Tyler Glasnow - 74 TBF, 40.5 K%, 5.4 BB%, 62.5% GB%
Become a paid sub today to get the rest of the daily notes. It’s just $9/month and you get absolutely everything that I do here. Check out the about page here for more. 10% of your subscription goes to charitable organizations such as Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian humanitarian aid organization.