At times in his career, Chris Archer has dominated the opponent and produced copious levels of fantasy success. Always a strikeout arm, Archer and his slider seems to dominate opponents frequently. However, he’s also been homer prone at times, and worse yet, he suffers bouts of ineffectiveness that can stretch on for long periods of time. A fantasy disappointment going on three years, Archer is coming off the worst season of his career. Can the 30 year old rebound, after offseason surgery, in his first full season in the National League?
30 years old
Bats/Throws: Right/Right
Height/Weight: 6’2”, 195 lbs.
Position: Starting Pitcher
THE NUMBERS
|
|
IP |
W-L |
ERA |
WHIP |
K/9 |
BB/9 |
HR/9 |
GB/FB |
|
2012 |
29.1 |
1-3 |
4.60 |
1.23 |
11.05 |
3.99 |
0.92 |
1.15 |
|
2013 |
128.2 |
9-7 |
3.22 |
1.13 |
7.06 |
2.66 |
1.05 |
1.38 |
|
2014 |
194.2 |
10-9 |
3.33 |
1.28 |
8.00 |
3.33 |
0.55 |
1.50 |
|
2015 |
212 |
12-13 |
3.23 |
1.14 |
10.70 |
2.80 |
0.81 |
1.36 |
|
2016 |
201.1 |
9-19 |
4.02 |
1.24 |
10.42 |
3.00 |
1.34 |
1.38 |
|
2017 |
201 |
10-12 |
4.07 |
1.26 |
11.15 |
2.69 |
1.21 |
1.17 |
|
2018 |
148.1 |
6-8 |
4.31 |
1.38 |
9.83 |
2.97 |
1.12 |
1.38 |
|
Career |
162 |
10-13 |
3.72 |
1.24 |
9.73 |
2.95 |
1.01 |
1.35 |
THE SKILLS
Archer is in the same boat as Michael Pineda and Robbie Ray. That is, he has two impressive pitches, but only two. When he’s ahead in the count and he can get batters to chase, he’s in great shape. When he falls behind and becomes predictable, he gets mashed. When he was ahead in the count 0-1 last season batters had a .598 OPS. When he fell behind 1-0 batters had a .927 OPS. Look at that. When he throws strike one, he’s a superstar. When he falls behind throwing a ball on the first pitch, every batter that faces him posts a HOF level OPS. The difference is astounding.
There’s also the fact that, since he really throws only two pitches, that the more times he works through a lineup the better read the opponent gets on his arsenal allowing them to have success. Let’s take a look at his times through the lineup numbers for his career.
|
|
AVG |
OBP |
SLG |
|
1st PA |
.221 |
.290 |
.341 |
|
2nd PA |
.246 |
.301 |
.382 |
|
3rd PA |
.249 |
.313 |
.403 |
|
4th PA |
.329 |
.383 |
.644 |
Trying to add to that two-pitch arsenal, he’s picked up a changeup. The last three years he’s thrown his changeup about 10 percent of the time, still a very small number compared to his 48 percent fastball rate and 42 percent slider rate. Let’s take a look at the effectiveness of the pitches.
|
OPSA |
2016 |
2017 |
2018 |
|
Fastball |
.900 |
.882 |
.903 |
|
Slider |
.557 |
.604 |
.659 |
|
Changeup |
.664 |
.782 |
.765 |
Clearly his fastball is getting smashed (see above). As noted, he’s working on the changeup, but it’s still a work in progress, and at this point there is very little reason to believe that he’s suddenly going to take off in that respect. He has tried to incorporate a curveball, and that could be a difference making pitch if he can harness the pitch, but it’s imprudent to be depending on that at the moment (he threw the pitch just 38 times last season). “It’s going to just help me overall be four-dimensional. For a long time, I was only two-dimensional,” Archer said. “Once I got here, guys encouraged me to use my whole arsenal. I did that at the end of last season and I did it today, and it feels great.”
Let’s talk the slider.
Amongst pitchers who threw 140-innings last season, there were 88 such men, Archer’s 41.5 percent slider usage was third highest in baseball. He throws the pitch a ton. Archer’s velocity on the pitch was 88.0 mph which was 14th. The FanGraphs’s pitch value was 5.5, or 27th. The last four seasons, he has a swinging strike rate between 19.1 and 20.2 percent on the slider. He also has an elevated 44 percent swing rate at the pitch when it’s thrown out of the strike zone the last three years (44.1 to 44.7 percent). Alas, because of the predictability of the pitch, and what happens if it “rolls” instead of sharply breaks, his HR/FB rate on the pitch has been between 17.2 and 22.2 percent.
Let’s talk about his overall game.
Archer has posted an ERA above four in 3-straight years. In each of those three years his xFIP has been below 3.60. In each of those three years his SIERA has been below 3.75. He’s constantly underperforming despite…
The last four seasons, Archer has a K/9 of at least 9.83. That said, the mark was 10.42 or higher in 3-straight seasons before dipping last year. Though the strikeout mark went down, it’s fair to point out that his 13.1 swinging strike rate last season was the second-best mark of his career and pretty much right on his average the previous three years. He’s easily a strikeout an inning arm, and then some.
Archer has a first pitch strike rate of at least 62 percent in 3-of-4 seasons. The league average last season was 60.6 percent, so you can tell he’s getting ahead in the count more than the average rate. That’s been pretty much reflected in his 2.86 BB/9 rate the last four seasons (the league average last season was 3.25 per nine).
Archer has a solid 1.35 GB/FB ratio for his career. The mark has been between 1.36 and 1.38 in 3-of-4 seasons. We know who he is here.
The issue isn’t the hit split, the issue is the home run. In each of the last two seasons he’s posted an identical 14.1 HR/FB ratio, and the mark was 16.3 percent in 2016. The result has been a HR/9 rate of 1.34, 1.21 and 1.15 the last three years. As noted above, the biggest culprit has been the slider which, when not buried, has a propensity to be taken deep (17 percent or higher three straight years). The move to Pittsburgh should help with the homers, at least a little bit (see below).
Let’s talk batted ball a bit more.
Archer has a .301 career BABIP. From 2014-16 the mark was .296, .295 and .296. Alas, the last two seasons the number has exploded to .325 and .338. Given a hard-hit rate of 34 percent, those numbers don’t make a lot of sense. That said, the last two campaigns the number has grown to 39.4 percent. While you have to think the BABIP will pull back some, the elevated hard-hit rate suggests there is little chance it drops all the way down to his career mark without some other changes.
PLAYING TIME
He has made at least 32 starts in 4-of-5 outings only missing last season with 27 starts. That’s 190-innings in four of five seasons. He lost a little over a month with an abdomen issue last season. He had surgery to rectify the issue, and there was some thought that he may not be ready for Opening Day. At this point, it seems like that concern is gone, and he will be ready to go (as of this writing, he’s made two outings lasting five scoreless innings with a walk and eight strikeouts). He will start every five games for the Pirates.
AVERAGE DRAFT POSITION DATA
As of this writing, here is the ADP data for Archer (since February 1st).
|
|
Overall |
Position Rank |
|
134.6 |
47th |
The Fantasy Guru Rankings can be found by clicking on the link.
CONCLUSION
Archer continues to be more about the parts, than he is about the overall package. Blessed with an impressive slider, and swing and miss stuff, he continually seems to underperform his measurables. You can make the case for improvement in 2019. You can make the case for continual blah ratios. What we do know is that he appears to be healthy and that he’s always tossing out a strikeout or more per inning. The move to the NL should help, he pitches in a solid environment (Park Factors have PNC park as 25th in runs and 26th in homers), and there are those strikeouts. The rest? That’s the tipping point with Archer, and at this point, it seems like things could go either way.
10-Team Mixed: An ideal fourth starter who make a fine third starter as well with the likely strikeout contributions.
12-Team Mixed: Take him as your third. Plan for potentially league average ratios.
15-Team Mixed: He’s a wee bit of a stretch as a second here. Make sure to pair him with a Mikolas/Hendricks type if you roster him so you get the strikeouts with Archer, and the ratios with the other arm.
NL-Only League: Good ballpark, lots of punchouts, and until last season lots of innings. With his health situation rectified, he should get back to the 190+ innings thing, and with that bring ample value in an only league.
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday-Friday, 8-10 PM EDT on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). Follow Ray’s work on Twitter (@baseballguys) and be sure to listen to his podcast work too.
