(NFBC Rank: 60; DC Rank: 32)
Pirates’ starter Joe Musgrove turned in a solid 2018 season after being traded from the Astros in the Gerrit Cole deal. Battling some injuries, Musgrove managed just 19 starts, but did throw 115 innings, posting a 4.06 ERA with a pedestrian 20.6 percent strikeouts percentage and minuscule 4.7 percent walk rate. He was shut down late in the season with an abdominal injury, but is on track to be ready for the start of the season in 2019.
There’s a lot that excites me about the 26-year old Musgrove, including a very strong finish to the season before going down with injury on September 17th. Musgrove, like Shane Bieber who I wrote about previously, absolutely fills up the strike zone, which is a great place to start as a pitcher. Musgrove finished the season with an incredible 68.3 percent first pitch strike percentage and a 50.9 percent Zone percentage (percentage of pitches inside the strike zone). The whiffs are where he was lacking for most of the season. Prior to August 12th (hurrah arbitrary end points!) Musgrove had delivered just a single start all season with a swinging strike rate north of 13 percent. In the seven starts to conclude his season, Musgrove exceeded that number in six of his last seven starts, including eclipsing the 17 percent mark in three starts.
It’s difficult to point to one exact tangible change Musgrove made that lead to his semi-breakout in his last seven starts (he did throw more changeups, his best pitch). But the point here is Musgrove clearly has the arsenal to be an ace. Featuring five solid pitches that he throws at minimum 13 percent of the time each, Musgrove’s arsenal of 4-seam, 2-seam, cutter, slider, changeup is one of the more well-rounded arsenals in the entire sport. In terms of movement and velocity, there aren’t really any true standout pitches, but they are all above average and Musgrove can throw them all for strikes in any count. The changeup has great action to it and generates a huge amount of whiffs, and Musgrove increasing that usage as the season progressed helped increase his whiff percentage and strikeout percentage.
Musgrove is still a young pitcher developing his stuff and, more importantly for him, refining his pitch sequencing and pitch type percentages. Pitchers typically develop later than position players, and especially for a player like Musgrove, having this many quality pitches at this young of an age is an impressive feat and perhaps he’s focused more on pitch development than pitch sequencing over the years. Near pick 215 in NFBC ADP, there is essentially no risk to selecting Joe Musgrove. Even if he’s unable to improve on last year’s numbers, he’s a solid value pick there. If he makes the leap I know he’s capable of, you could easily be looking at a top-25 starter (and frankly, upside for even more). These are the types of selections we want to make where we can’t really be burned but can pay big dividends. Save some room for Joe Musgrove in the middle/late rounds of your drafts.
