The Braves sure seem to have a never-ending supply of power arms to turn to in the rotation. It also seems like all of those arms are 25 years of age or much younger. Sean Newcomb will turn 26 in June, but he is still one of those young arms the club hopes to build around for years to come. Newcomb misses bats, but he also misses the strike zone a bit too frequently. Will he be able to smooth out the concerns and take the proverbial next step in the coming season?
25 years old
Bats/Throws: Left/Left
Height/Weight: 6’5”, 255 lbs.
Position: Starting Pitcher
THE NUMBERS
|
|
Level |
IP |
W-L |
ERA |
WHIP |
K/9 |
BB/9 |
HR/9 |
GB/FB |
|
2014 |
RK, A |
14.2 |
0-1 |
6.14 |
1.50 |
11.00 |
3.70 |
1.20 |
|
|
2015 |
A, AA |
136 |
9-3 |
2.38 |
1.27 |
11.10 |
5.00 |
0.30 |
|
|
2016 |
AA |
140 |
8-7 |
3.86 |
1.31 |
9.80 |
4.60 |
0.30 |
|
|
2017 |
AAA |
57.2 |
3-3 |
2.97 |
1.35 |
11.50 |
5.00 |
0.50 |
|
|
|
Minors |
348.1 |
20-14 |
3.23 |
1.31 |
10.60 |
4.80 |
0.40 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
2017 |
MLB |
100 |
4-9 |
4.32 |
1.57 |
9.72 |
5.13 |
0.90 |
1.32 |
|
2018 |
MLB |
164 |
12-9 |
3.90 |
1.33 |
8.78 |
4.45 |
0.99 |
1.20 |
|
Career |
|
264 |
16-18 |
4.06 |
1.42 |
9.14 |
4.70 |
0.95 |
1.25 |
|
|
Baseball America |
Baseball Prospectus |
MLB.com |
|
2015 |
70th |
|
67th |
|
2016 |
24th |
32nd |
21st |
|
2017 |
78th |
44th |
80th |
THE SKILLS
Likely many young arms, Newcomb has one pitch he can count on, one that isn’t bad, and one that is a work in progress.
Newcomb has thrown his heater 63 percent of the time in his young career, a relatively high number. After getting the pitch mashed as a rookie with a .373 wOBA, he cut things down in year two down to .318 as he lopped off 1.5 mph on the exit velocity in year two (87.3 mph).
Newcomb cut his curve usage in year two dropping it from 22 percent down to 14 percent of the pitches. That’s a bit odd given the results of the pitch. As a rookie he held batters to a .241 wOBA on the pitch and the mark dove to subterranean levels in year two at .160.
While cutting the curve, Newcomb increased his changeup rate from 11 to 19 percent. As his changeup rate exploded, he was trying to create separation from his heater, the results also improved as his wOBA dropped from .398 to .331.
Newcomb has a 9.14 K/9 rate for his career, an impressive number. Alas, he saw the rate drop nearly a full batter in year two at 8.78 after posting a mark of 9.72 as a rookie. He lost 1.1 percent in the swinging strikeout column in year two as well at 10.0 percent. That’s not good. He also generated a lower rate in year two in the following categories: O-Swing% (swings at pitches outside the strike zone), Z-Swing% (swings inside the strike zone) and Swing% (overall swings). Less swings across the board. Not saying he’s not a K per inning type, but that seems more like the penthouse for him than a nice room on the 8th floor.
Newcomb walked a monster 4.80 batters per nine as the minors, getting by on his stuff versus location. He joined the Braves in 2017 and the walk rate went up to 5.13 per nine. Things improved in year two, the number dropped to 4.45, but that’s still a horrible mark. In fact, that year two mark was so poor that it was the worst mark in the NL from an arm that qualified for the ERA title (only Lucas Giolito at 4.67 was worse). It really hasn’t mattered much who is at the dish either (more on that below). Newcomb has a 4.29 BB/9 rate in his career against lefties and the mark is 4.84 per nine against righties. OK, there is some difference, but the takeaway is that – he stinks no matter who is at the plate, when it comes to issuing freebies.
Let me speak truth to you. With a walk rate that high Newcomb will be hard pressed to improve his ratios from last season. Further, his already poor 59 percent first pitch strike rate as a rookie dropped to 53.9 percent last season, again, the second worst mark in baseball (Gio Gonzalez was just slightly worse at 53.8). He’s simply shown nothing that would lead to a rock-solid belief that he has a legitimate shot to significantly drop his walk rate, and that’s just not a good thing.
When we look at the batted ball we find a too high .327 BABIP in year one and a too low .273 mark in year two. Overall, the mark is just about right at .294.
In two seasons he has a 22.8 and 20.6 line drive rate. Overall his line drive rate is slightly elevated at 21.4 percent.
After posting a 1.32 GB/FB ratio as a rookie the mark dropped to 1.20 in year two (career 1.25).
After posting a 10.9 HR/FB ratio in year one the number inched upward to 11.2 percent in year two.
There’s a lot of smoothing out going on here to the point that when you look at his career numbers you find… a heck of a lot of league average kinda stuff.
Newcomb also saw his hard-hit ball rise substantially from his rookie season. He was still just below the league average in ‘18, but after posting an impressive 27 percent rate as a rookie the mark jumped to 35 percent in year two.
Let’s talk about the split game.
There have been some interesting things going on with Newcomb, admitting that we’re talking about less than 265 overall innings, so it’s hardly like we have enough data to draw ironclad positions on all the situations listed.
|
|
AVG |
OBP |
SLG |
wOBA |
|
Home |
.262 |
.349 |
.429 |
.334 |
|
Away |
.203 |
.316 |
.329 |
.290 |
|
vs. Left |
.222 |
.323 |
.408 |
.318 |
|
vs. Right |
.240 |
.338 |
.376 |
.313 |
The early returns suggest that he’s not very good at home while he’s quite effective on the road. His splits are close enough that you needn’t necessarily worry about how the opponent fills the lineup that day.
Finally, his left on base percentage for 264 innings is 75.0 percent. That’s a sustainable pace, but it’s also a few percentage points above the league average. If the mark dips just a bit, as it could, then his ERA could be in danger. We should note that though his career ERA is 4.06 that his career SIERA is 4.61 and his xFIP is 4.40. Just pointing it out.
PLAYING TIME
Newcomb will start every five games for the Braves. With all the folks dealing with arm issues this spring for the Braves, Newcomb has escaped the doctor’s office. Here are some innings pitched marks since Newcomb became a professional.
2014: 14.2 innings
2015: 136.0 innings
2016: 140.0 innings
2017: 157.2 innings
2018: 164.0 innings
There’s been a nice, steady progression of innings from Newcomb, and it would seem quite reasonable that he could reach 180-innings this season. Same time, with all the walks, and all the pitches out of the strike zone, the inning may not be his friend as he’s often not economical enough with his pitch count to go deep into games.
AVERAGE DRAFT POSITION DATA
As of this writing, here is the ADP data for Newcomb (since February 1st).
|
|
Overall |
Position Rank |
|
224.1 |
87th |
The Fantasy Guru Rankings can be found by clicking on the link.
CONCLUSION
The real issue with Newcomb is that if we pull back and compare his first season to his second, it really doesn’t seem like he showed any appreciable growth, across the board, in his second season. In fact, his performance pulled back a wee bit so stagnant would be the best way to describe the second-year effort. When you consider that he just doesn’t come close to throwing enough strikes, and that his walk rate is impossibly high, you have to come to the conclusion that a breakout in year three would take steps that simple aren’t in evidence at the moment. Pretty close to being just a guy with some strikeouts in mixed leagues.
10-Team Mixed: He’s really not rosterable if you’ve built your pitching staff properly. Maybe the last guy on your staff, but nothing more.
12/15-Team Mixed: Everyone is searching for strikeouts, and Sean should at least give you a league average number there, if not slightly higher. The rest of his game is moderate, I’ll trust that you read the above, so don’t reach for the lefty of the Braves.
NL-Only League: He is on a good team giving him a shot at W’s given that he should take the ball 30 times, but there is danger that it’s 30 starts with ratios scrapping by the league average, so dip your toe cautiously into the proverbial pool.
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.
