Regression has become a misused word in the fantasy space.
It’s important to identify things that are unsustainable in sports. Hot starts that will cool, cold starts that will fade away. But we can’t simply yell out “Regression!” and drop the mic. We need to figure out, what level will things regress to?
Advertisement
Said another way, regression is a great way to start the conversation. It’s not the end of the conversation.
With that all in mind, today we’ll look at some of the hot starters in MLB through a couple of weeks. All of these players will regress over the balance of the year, because nobody ends a season with a .400 average or a perfect ERA. But let’s try to intelligently guess how real these starts are, and how we might approach these players moving forward.
Andy Pages, OF, Dodgers
Pages had a good year last season, if not a full breakout. His .272/.313/.461 slash worked out to a 115 OPS+, an above-average offensive player. Alas, Pages ran out of hits in the playoffs, mired in a 4-for-42 October slump. He had nine strikeouts against zero walks in October.
Advertisement
Pages has been everywhere for two weeks, rocking a .452 average and hitting three homers. Improved plate discipline tells a lot of the story. Pages was in the 18th percentile for chase rate last year, but it’s bumped to 43% this year. And when he’s making contact, loud things happen. His expected average is a juicy .322, his expected slugging a robust .533. We know that fortunate .533 BABIP is going to disappear, but Pages is a bonafide hitter.
Pages has a solidified spot in the deep Los Angeles batting order, moving up to fifth and sixth in recent games. His excellent defense also marks his regular spot. Pages had a March ADP in the 140s, but it’s just outside 100 for the past week or so, and I support that market trend. He should end the year with a plus average and 25-30 homers, and he’ll steal a base about every two weeks.
Chandler Simpson, OF, Rays
Tampa Bay has always been a knuckleball organization in MLB, a club that thinks differently. So I guess I wasn’t surprised to see Simpson batting between third and fifth in recent games, despite his lack of power. Simpson doesn’t have a homer in his 120-game career, and his career slugging is a puny .355. But Tampa Bay doesn’t mind thinking differently.
Advertisement
Simpson already had elite contact skills, but it’s been otherworldly this season — he’s cut the strikeouts down to 4.4%. He’s also nudged his walk rate up almost 50%. The pretty .405 average is obviously a result of favorable outcomes — a .425 BABIP waves hello. But it’s interesting to note that Simpson had a .295 expected average last year, and that’s also where he’s at today. If Simpson can give us the bankable average boost and mix in 40-plus steals, he’s a credible fantasy commodity, even without the power.
The tiebreaker for Simpson might come down to his batting slot. He opened the year hitting in the lower third more often than not, and his quick start earned him a promotion. He feels miscast as a No. 3 or No. 5 hitter, given his lack of power, but if he can simply stick in the top half of the Tampa Bay lineup somewhere, it will help his run production.
Yahoo’s market has stayed firm on Chandler, still viewing him as a Pick 190-type of player. I probably would have passed on that ticket a month ago, not wanting to tie to a limited-category player, but I’m a little more open-minded today, if the lineup promotion is real. You just need a specific type of roster build for a Chandler to make sense.
Advertisement
José Soriano, SP, Angels
It’s nice to see something work out for this organization every now and then. The Angels signed Albert Pujols, Josh Hamilton and Anthony Rendon to big contracts in the middle of their careers, and every deal went down as a bust. Pairing Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani looked like a dream scenario, but Trout’s been injury-riddled for several years, and the Angels never had a winning record while Trout and Ohtani were teammates. Now Ohtani is rewriting history with the big-brother Dodgers about 30 miles away, while the Angels are stuck with their non-contending club.
So let’s talk about a fun OC story, like Soriano’s first three starts (three wins, 0.45 ERA, 0.65 WHIP).
Soriano is one of those quirky pitchers who makes the radar gun pop but doesn’t strike out that many batters. Well, perhaps that’s a problem in the past. His strikeout rate has risen through three starts this year (a bump of 8.6%) and his walk rate has come down. And because Soriano’s best pitch is a power sinker, he’s still getting ground balls by the truckload.
Advertisement
Soriano never lacks for options, mixing a sinker, knuckle curve, slider and splitter in with his more traditional four-seam fastball. This year he’s been getting more swings out of the strike zone (a bump of almost 13%), which explains the strikeout jump. Throw in a big drop in walks and you have an outlier start that, while fortunate, comes in as mostly validated (2.60 FIP, 2.90 xERA). Pitcher breakouts can happen at any time, but there’s a reassuring nature when they’re tied to someone entering their age-27 season, as Soriano is.
Noah Cameron, SP, Royals
I don’t want this piece to be all validation stories, so I’ll reluctantly throw some cold water on Cameron. I say reluctantly because his surprise run last year (2.99 ERA, 1.099 WHIP over 24 starts) was welcome on several of my rosters, and I tried to reacquire him this spring, with mixed success.
Cameron’s first two starts have been dreamy — 1.69 ERA, 1.125 WHIP. His walk rate is down, his strikeout rate is up, for whatever we’ll make of a sample size so small.
Advertisement
I just want to underscore that his xERA is still a robust 4.29. Cameron is a fly-ball pitcher and it’s obviously fortunate that he hasn’t been taken deep yet.
The schedule has also been friendly — Minnesota and Cleveland, unthreatening matchups. Divisional strength doesn’t have as much meaning these days, as MLB tweaked the schedule a few years back. The Royals will play their four division mates 13 times each, for a total of 52 games. The other 110 matchups come outside the soft landing pad, against better opponents.
Cameron had a fastball in the 92s last year; this year it tracks at 91.3 mph. At that speed, he needs to be precise with his location. Being left-handed helps somewhat. I still think Cameron can be a roster-worthy arm at the back of a mixed-league rotation, but I understand why every projection system still calls for an ERA over 4.00 moving forward.
Read the full article here
