It’s time to look at some arms, and the bat of Dansby Swanson. On the hill, Spencer Turnbull, Tyler Mahle, Jordan Lyles and Max Fried starred. At the opposite end of the success train, Eduardo Rodriguez and Yu Darvish are fighting it. Matt Harvey always is. Right in the middle, as always, is Julio Teheran.
TURNING HEADS – SPENCER TURNBULL
Spencer Turnbull allowed three runs (and a homer) with five strikeouts his first outing. In his second trip to the hill he produced an even better outing against the Royals (3 R, 2 ER, 10 Ks in 6 IP). That effort was just the fifth start of his big-league career, and after earning a starting gig this spring, his outing today was pretty impressive.
Turnbull entered the year as the 21st ranked prospect in the Tigers’ organization according to Baseball America. He owns a four-pitch mix with a 93 mph heater and a solid slider. As you can see in this video clip, he’s got a bit of Justin Verlander in his follow through and leg action though he comes more over the top than Spencer. Please, don’t think I’m comparing the two, I’m not. I’m just drawing a parallel on their look. The lack of over the top arm slot from Turnbull though, can at times lead to some run with his pitches, i.e. he doesn’t always hit his spots and that can lead to some walks (his career minor league work has led to 3.5 walks per nine). Turnbull’s curveball and changeup are both looked at as barely league average offerings.
Add everything up and Turnbull will need to rely more on his feel for pitching, than turning just to his stuff. He profiles as a 4th or 5th starter in the bigs, but he’s off to a decent start and certainly is in the streaming starter discussion in mixed leagues.
TEHERAN DOING TEHERAN THINGS
As he often does, there was a point in his last start that Julio Teheran looked like he was in trouble (six of the first eight batted balls had an exit velocity of at least 98 mph). In the end though, the Cubs pushed just one run across the late as Julio stuck out seven batters over five innings. It’s been two starts, but here’s a quick rundown.
1 – He has a 12.60 K/9 mark in both his outings, his swinging strike rate is away up at 14.8 percent (after last years career best 11.2 mark) and his velocity is up a mph from last year.
2 – He has walked five batters in 10 innings due in large part to falling behind as his first pitch strike rate is 53.5 percent (the mark has been over 60 percent each of the last three years).
In the end, he is what he is, which is a solid innings eater to round out a rotation in a mixed league.
HARVEY IS HORRIBLE
Matt Harvey… just move on.
FRIED ON FIRE
Max Fried took a perfect game into the sixth inning Thursday eventually settling for six shutout innings against the Cubs while allowing one hit. In 26 big league outings over three years, 10 starts, Fried owns a 2.94 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, 9.49 strikeouts per nine and 4.54 walks per nine. He hasn’t developed as expected, and the significant struggles with the walk have curtailed his ascent to big league relevance. As good as he looked Thursday, you need be realize that Kevin Gausman and Mike Foltynewicz are both nearly ready to return, so a best-case scenario would seem to be one more outing in the rotation for Fried unless the Braves decide to remove fellow youngster Kyle Wright from the rotation. Even if Fried grabs the role in the short run, note that (A) the Braves have about 37 young arms that could make starts this season that will be pushing for work, (B) Fried generated just seven swinging strikes despite his masterful performance and (C) he threw his fastball/curveball 88 percent of the time Thursday, and that overreliance on just two pitches likely wouldn’t work in the long run if he’s working out of the rotation and not the bullpen.
It was a great outing, but as you can tell, I think there are also legitimate concerns.
DARVISH DOODIE
Yu Darvish is 0-1 with an 8.10 ERA, 2.70 WHIP and 11 walks over 6.2 innings in his two starts. To say he’s been a disaster is an understatement. He simply cannot find the strike zone. Dontrelle Willis thinks he’s nibbling early and falling behind in counts forcing him to come in to the batter. Remarkably, Yu threw 11 of 28 fastballs for strikes in his outing Thursday. Don’t get nuts and drop him, but at this point he belongs on your bench until he relocates the strike zone.
I’M STILL NOT SEEING IT
Everyone continually, and I mean every year, sings the praise of Eduardo Rodriguez. Every year I look at him, do a write up on him, and come to the inevitable conclusion that folks are simply too high on the lefty. Here is a quote from that article. “I’m still in the camp that suggest his value is more about the “B” on his hat and the belief that his game will jump to the next level, if the data doesn’t suggest that the likelihood of that is high.” In his first start he allowed six runs, five earned, over 4.1 innings against the Mariners. In his second start things were even worst as Athletics got to him for six runs, all earned, over 3.2 innings. As should be clear, I just don’t see it, and never have.
LYLES HAS NICE FIRST OUTING
Jordan Lyles threw five shutout innings against the Reds Thursday, his first outing of the year after sitting out some time with right side discomfort. Some thoughts. (1) The Reds aren’t hitting jack right now with a .231 wOBA, second worst in baseball. (2) The Pirates have young options that could put lots of pressure on Lyles, guys like Nick Kingham, Mitch Keller and Steven Brault. (3) Despite looking sharp, Lyles doesn’t have dominant stuff. “Lyles had a professional outing,” Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said. “His fastball was good. We are happy with what we saw. A clean outing here at PNC. The curveball and change-up were there as well.” (4) The last time Lyles made 11 starts in a big-league season was 2014. Since then, from 2015-19, Lyles numbers are, frankly, less than appealing. Over 270 innings he’s gone 10-19 with a 5.53 ERA, a 6.77 K/9, 3.33 BB/9 with a 1.50 WHIP. It’s hard to envision Lyles holding onto the 5th spot in the Pirates rotation, let alone being a useable fantasy piece.
MAHLE MAULS PIRATES
Tyler Mahle threw six shutout innings at the Pirates Thursday in a no-decision as he fills the vacated rotation spot of Alex Wood (back). Once Wood is ready to return, likely later in the month or early in May, it almost certainly means that Mahle will move to the bullpen or perhaps even head back to the minors. Mahle made 23 starts last season for the Reds and failed to be a league average arm with a 7-9 record, 4.98 ERA and 1.59 WHIP. He has a mere 9.3 percent swinging strike rate in his career, and that 4.17 BB/9 rate has saddled him with a disheartening 2.02 K/BB ratio. Add to the mix his 1.43 homer per nine rate and there is nothing to see here. He had a good outing. Give him credit. Move on.
SWANSON SWATTING
Dansby Swanson has come out of the gates blazing with a .353/.478/.765 slash line. his walk rate has exploded in the early going which is very heartening. Still, even with the success, he’s still just a tenth above last seasons hard-hit ball rate and it’s not like his current 2.33 GB/FB ratio is remotely ideal. It’s a good start for the Braves shortstop, but note that he’s hit eighth in every game, and even at peak form he’s unlikely to appreciably improve upon his counting numbers from last season. Swanson is a streaming option for folks that lost Trea Turner or something like that, more so than being a weekly starter the rest of the season for your fantasy squad.
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.
