Stephen Strasburg: Number One Fantasy Pitcher?
The wait was well worth it. Stephen Strasburg finally pitched (mostly) a full season with the Washington Nationals, and proved the Tommy John surgery couldn’t stop the one-time best prospect in the game. While Strasburg was obviously great, he was also held back by an innings limit, which caused him to miss the final month of the season. It also prevented him from going deeper into games early in the year, as Davey Johnson wanted to preserve his stud pitcher as long as he could. Despite his dominance, Strasburg has never recorded an out during the eighth inning. But all of that is about to change. Strasburg is expected to enter next season with no restrictions. That means he won’t be shut down early, and he should be allowed to work deeper into games. Based on the potential he’s shown thus far, that could make him the top pitcher in fantasy next season.
Many people have gushed about Strasburg as a once-in-a-lifetime talent, and one of the best pitching prospects of all time. Well, 251.1 innings into his career, it’s starting to look like both of those things are true. Since 1969, when the pitcher’s mound was lowered, Strasburg leads all starters with at least 250 innings pitched with a 2.47 FIP. He also leads the same list with a 30.8% strikeout rate. In this instance, it’s tough to argue he was overhyped. The performance definitely meets the expectations.
It’s incredibly difficult to predict how Strasburg will perform next season, as there’s no great comparison for him. Sorting for pitchers who have produced similar value at age-23 is problematic, because Strasburg only threw 159.1 innings, which led to a 4.3 WAR. Under different circumstances, where he had no restrictions, he would likely place much higher on the list. Trying to find pitchers with similar styles isn’t the best either, since no pitcher has ever struck out a higher percentage of hitters at that age than Strasburg. The closest player to Strasburg in strikeout rate is Clayton Kershaw, who had a slightly better walk rate. If Strasburg can improve on his walks, he could turn into Kershaw with more strikeouts next year.
Strasburg’s early shutdown caused him to fall in the end of the season rankings for starting pitchers. In Zach Sanders’ rankings, Strasburg was the 17 most valuable pitcher. Strasburg is bound to improve on that ranking simply based on the fact that he should be available the entire season. That would presumably mean that Strasburg would also be able to run up his pitch count a bit more, allowing him to pitch deeper into games. Johnson had a quick hook in games where Strasburg struggled early. Though Strasburg probably could have thrown more pitches, Johnson didn’t want him to stay out there and labor through innings. Johnson’s most puzzling pulls came on May 4, when Strasburg allowed three runs in six innings and was pulled after throwing just 76 pitches, and on June 30, when Strasburg gave up three runs in three innings and was pulled after 67 pitches. Strasburg may not have had his best stuff during that June start, but still could have salvaged his start with a few more solid innings. Johnson should hopefully allow Strasburg to battle through some of those scenarios next season.
Even with the increase in innings, it’s probably foolish to expect Strasburg to get enough innings to finish as the top fantasy pitcher. The pitchers that finished one and two in Sanders’ rankings were R.A. Dickey and Justin Verlander, both of who finished with at least 230 innings pitched. It’s unlikely that the Nationals would allow Strasburg to turn into that type of workhorse this early in his career. It will probably take a couple of seasons before they are comfortable allowing him to throw anything near that amount. Verlander, for example, had two seasons with at least 200 innings pitched before he jumped to 240 in 2009. But, with around 200 innings next year, Strasburg seems like a sure bet to finish in the top-10, and probably has an outside shot at the top-5 based on how dominant he performs. The potential remains for Strasburg to one day be the best pitcher in baseball, but it probably won’t happen this season.
Question about Strasburg’s innings limit and how teams can hope to avoid the situation the Nats had last year when they sat him in September/October. When a team has a pitcher on an innings limit, why don’t they just skip his turn like they would the #5 starter so that his missed starts are spread throughout the season rather than in the pennant race/postseason? That way he could have contributed down the stretch.
160 innings is 160 innings no matter if it is pitched over the first 5 months of the season or over the full six months. Despite what seems to be a general consensus, a win in September does not count more then a win in April (ask the Angels how that math works). Saving innings for the post season is foolish because the team might get eliminated early and a pitcher might not max out his available innings on the mound (see Medlen, Chris 144.1 innings) Also Strasburg’s arm was showing fatigue at the end of the season his last few starts were not consistent with his other starts earlier in the season.
The point of the innings limit was to not put stress on his arm, and as a starting pitcher it is important to keep a regular pitching schedule. It was part of Rizzo’s plan from the beginning to keep him on a 5-6 day schedule until he was shut down, to build up his strength and not put extra stress on his arm by stopping and starting during the season.
I think this has been touched on before, but the Nationals were advised to let Strasburg start as if he regularly would and then shut him down after the IP limit has been reached. They were advised this because the concept of improving the durability of the pitchers arm for a prolonged career is that he can pitch increasingly regular loads for a consistent period of time and then be shutdown for an extended period of rest. Each year, the length of the regular loads increase and the length of the extended period of rest decreases. If you have the pitcher skipped often throughout the rotation and to have him pitch over a longer period, it defeats the purpose of the regular routine, consistent loads, and extended periods rest restraints that were advised. This is all theory of course.
The Rays way.
“Strasburg gave up three runs in three innings and was pulled after 67 innings.”
You mean 67 pitches, not innings.
“Despite his dominance, Strasburg has never recorded an out during the seventh inning.”
I think you mean during the 8th inning.
Anyhow, thus far his ERA has fallen short of his xFIP/SIERA which might be a slight concern. Not that you can really knock a guy for “only” having an 2.94 ERA when his xFIP/SIERA suggest a 2.60 but if there’s one thing other than injury to be concerned about, it’s that his peripherals come up to the level of a mere mortal, and his ERA moves along with them, up to the mid-3s.
Those are fixed now. Thanks.
The samples are too small to draw any sort of interesting conclusion about his ERA – FIP/xFIP skills.
250 IP; it may not be a firm conclusion, but it’s not meaningless, just like his ERA isn’t meaningless either. It’s about the only skill-based criticism I could have for him. He’s a beast, obviously.
.30 is less than the average E – F among all qualified pitchers last season, which was .46. The standard deviation in E – F was .45. A .3 E – F over 250 is not meaningful.
Johnson was not pulling Strassburg from games prematurely early in the season. He throws a lot of pitches with guys on base. Strassburg averaged 94 pitches per start, compared to 96 for Jackson, 97 for Zimmerman and 99 for Gonzales.
I don’t remember the May 4, 76 pitch game, but the June 30 game in Atlanta was in 100 degree heat. Strassburg became dehydrated and was disoriented and confused when Johnson pulled him out the game. He had to receive fluids by IV after losing 10 pounds on the mound.
Strassburg was struggling a little towards the end of the season, and was roughed up in 2 of his last 3 starts.
A win is a win, but I would have at least considered starting him in mid-May instead of early April in case the Nats made the playoffs.
A win in October is not worth the same as a win in April.
I will say the one risk with that strategy would be he has some type of injury(even just a hamstring or something non-arm related), which would then have made it tough for him to get to 160 innings. In turn, it would’ve taken a trip to the AFL or winter league to maximize his innings to prevent a 2013 limit.
The two commonly accepted problems with the “start him in mid-May” plan were:
1. Doctors agree that the biggest problem for a rehabbing arm is disrupting a routine. If Strasburg worked out with the team in spring training, and played in spring games, taking 6 weeks off afterwards would be deleterious to his health.
2. Though the Nationals were, ultimately, the best team in baseball, they had no way of expecting they would even be good enough for a playoff spot during the 2011-12 offseason.
Davey Johnson was expecting them to make the playoffs, and at the start of spring training last year said he should be fired if they didn’t.
I remember reading an article on Fangraphs several months ago that showed that on average per game, batters started to hit a lot better against him after Strasburg went through the lineup twice. While I’m sure this is a trend that’s supposed to happen, if this is more extreme than the average improvement on hitting against a pitcher after batting against him twice, perhaps either its an issue with his stamina or his ability to hide what his throwing. He’s still young and it was his first full year, but I still have my doubts about him being more than a 5~6 innings per start guy for the imminent future