Oak’s Corner: A Huge Weekend in the AL West

The Week That Was

Joey Votto is one of the best hitters in baseball, but it's tough to watch him struggle right now. The knee contusion he suffered when he was hit by a pitch on August 4 seems to be affecting him, as anyone can see from watching him try to run the bases. Votto has been a big disappointment, considering he was drafted in the second round of fantasy drafts. Even though he is still hitting .284, the nine homers just kill all of his value. After averaging 31 homers over the past three seasons, including 36 in 2017, Votto was a popular pick for his high batting average floor plus the power in a great park. His strikeout rate has jumped a bit to 15.9 percent from the absurd 11.7 percent rate of 2017, but it's still really good, as is his walk rate of 17.9 percent, which is good for second in baseball behind Mike Trout.

Surprisingly, despite the drop in power, Votto's batted ball numbers actually look as solid as always. Votto's hard hit rate is actually up to 39.8 percent, and his line drive rate is at a career high 32.5 percent. The spots where you can see how the homers have suffered is in his big drop in fly ball rate from 2017 to 30.7 percent, but especially in his HR/FB rate, which sits at a career low 8.9 percent after sitting just over 20 percent the past three seasons. His crazy ability to not pop up the ball is still intact at the moment, as shown by his league leading 0 percent infield fly ball rate – yes 0 percent. In looking at that HR/FB rate, I think it's a mix of some bad luck on fly balls, but maybe his current knee injury is affecting his ability to drive the ball as usual. The injury keeps me from being too optimistic on him getting hot soon, but I think this very low homer season is going to present a nice buying opportunity in 2019, as he will have to fall at least into the middle of the third round with all the new young stars moving ahead of him into the second and third rounds. A healthy Votto clearly clearly still rake, and I'd love to grab him as one of 2018's bum candidates in 2019.

There were many Ervin Santana pickups when he finally came back from his injury, and he's still 94 percent owned in the NFBC Main Event, but it looks ugly right now for Big Erv. Santana was a godsend for fantasy teams in 2017, posting a 3.28 ERA across 211.1 innings, but there were reasons for concern with his 4.46 FIP. He has made five starts so far for the Twins this season and has compiled an ugly 7.30 ERA in 24.2 innings, including a gross four-inning, five earned-run outing against the 20 games under .500 Tigers on Thursday night. While he's likely still ramping up after the time off and only 29 innings in the minors, the strikeout rate of 5.84 K/9 is really rough, even for a guy who has never been a huge punch out guy.

Santana has been able to regularly outpitch his FIP's over the years by limiting hard contact with an excellent hard hit rate under 30 percent for his career. This year has not seen that at all with a career high 37.1 percent hard hit rate (granted the innings are very limited so far) even before getting hit around on Thursday. The most concerning aspect regarding Santana is the significant velocity drop he has seen this year, with an average fastball so far of 88.7 mph, a full four mph below last year's velocity. It's hard to see Santana remotely helping any fantasy teams when he's throwing only 89. Not only would I not buy in low on Erv, I think he is a drop across the board in 12 or 15 team leagues.

For so many years, Jose Quintana was the ultra-consistent guy you could grab in drafts and lock in a low to mid three's ERA with 200-plus innings. In 2017, his ERA rose to 4.15, but his FIP was still strong at 3.68, and his large boost in strikeouts to 9.87 K/9 was cause for optimism for 2018. Those factors coupled with a full season playing for the Cubs with their defensive acumen and run support looked like a great formula for Quintana to have a big year, and his ADP checked in accordingly at a fourth-round price in the NFBC Main Event at 57.6. The strikeout bump hasn't been sustained, not a huge surprise considering the swinging strike rate in 2017 was still 8.4 percent. The big shock has been the out of nowhere huge bump in his walk rate to 3.96 BB/9.

Quintana showed some signs of command issues with his career-high walk rate in 2017 of 2.91 BB/9, but this large jump has been truly shocking, putting him way out of the norm for his career. Further, homers have become a big issue for Quintana with a career high 1.44 HR/9 rate. Adding to the negativity in this profile, Quintana has always suppressed hard contact well with a career hard hit rate of 30.1 percent, but this year it sits at the highest of his career at 36.2 percent. From a pitch mix perspective, Quintana has morphed into a two-pitch pitcher, as he has only thrown 7.4 percent changeups this year and is throwing more fastballs than at any other point at 67.6 percent. Surprisingly, for a guy who's only 29 with such a long stretch of solid results, there is not a lot to latch on to with Quintana. I wouldn't trade for him right now, and I'd have to see something from him these next six weeks to consider grabbing him in drafts next year.

FAAB Feelings

Mike Fiers – With Fiers' move from the Tigers to the A's earlier this month, his situation improved greatly in terms of the offense behind him. He's scheduled to make two starts this week, home against the Rangers followed by a trip to Minnesota. So far this year, he had posted a very solid line with a 3.38 ERA in 130.1 innings, but his time in Detroit has left him with only eight wins. Fiers has been very up and down over his career in terms of strikeouts, and this year finds him at one of those downs with a current strikeout rate of only 6.91 K/9, a year after posting 8.57 K/9. However, while the strikeouts have come down, he has also drastically cut the walks from 3.64 BB/9 in 2017 to a career low 1.80 BB.9 this season.

The homers are always going to be an issue with Fiers, as 2018 is his fourth consecutive season allowing more than a homer per nine with 22 allowed already. Also concerning on Fiers is that after dropping his hard hit rate nicely last year, it has bumped back up this season to 38.4 percent. Velocity is obviously something that has never been a positive for Fiers; he has had an average fastball under 90 mph in every season of his time in the majors, but it should be noted that he surprisingly hit 92 mph a number of times in his start earlier this week against the Mariners. I don't love Fiers and don't consider him an every-week play with the home run issues and the drop in strikeouts, but two-start pitchers on good teams are hard to find right now, and Fiers is only 52 percent owned in NFBC 12-team leagues.

The matchups are at opposite end of the spectrum as, believe it or not, the Rangers actually possess the highest team OPS since the All-Star break and lead baseball by a large margin in runs scored in that stretch. At least that start is at home, but Texas is not an offense to overlook right now. On the flip side, the road game in Minnesota gives us a Twins offense that is 27th in baseball in OPS since the break and is missing two of its best hitters in Eduardo Escobar and Brian Dozier. I'm a bit more fearful on Fiers after looking deeper into him, but with two starts, I think he's worth a bid this weekend. It will be a smaller bid than I first thought after a deeper dive and a realization just how good the Texas offense has been.

Rafael Ortega – As we have talked about many times, stolen bases are down this year (Jeff Erickson penned an excellent piece about SB on RotoWire this past week, definitely check it out), which has made the stolen base category very bunched up in most leagues. Anyone with a shot at six to eight stolen bases in the final six weeks could swing that category a point or two, and every point is golden. Ortega was called up last week, and after hitting seventh in his first game with the Marlins, he was elevated to the leadoff spot and has resided there for six games in a row. In that stretch of seven games, he has managed to steal four bases already.

Ortega played 121 games with the Padres in Triple-A in 2017, and while he hit .317 with 26 stolen bases, he was released by the team and signed was a free agent by the Marlins. Ortega had one decent chunk of time in the majors with the Angels in 2016 but only hit .232 in 202 plate appearances. He has an excellent contact rate with a 9.5 percent strikeout rate in the minors this season and, surprisingly, he walks a good amount (13.4 percent in Triple-A this year) for a guy with minimal power. Ortega is readily available this week. He has a current six percent ownership in NFBC 15-team leagues and is only one percent owned in NFBC 12-teamers. He's obviously a deeper league flyer, but I actually like his strikeout and walk profiles, and with a history of good stolen base numbers in the minors and leading off for a team that has no reason not to give him a green light, he makes for an intriguing pickup for teams in need of some steals down the stretch.

A Closer Look

This will be the third week in a row where an injury alters the closer situation in Washington, all while they wait for Sean Doolittle to hopefully return. As the Nats fall further out of the race (eight games back at the moment), their desire to push the return of Doolittle or Kelvin Herrera loses some intensity. The current guy to slide into the closer role is a name we remember being in the mix to close last season (with Blake Treinen!) in Koda Glover. Glover has spent a large majority of the season on the DL after suffering shoulder inflammation early in spring training. He began his rehab assignment in early July, was called up in early August, and the injuries have thrust him into the closer role. He had a 2017 cut short by back and shoulder injuries and only threw 19.1 inning in the majors with a 5.12 ERA.

Looking back in his last full season in 2016, he threw 56 innings across three minor league levels with a lot of success, posting an ERA under 3.00 while striking out more than 10 batters per nine. Glover is obviously a dart throw with the extremely limited workload over the last two years to really dissect, but needing saves, one has to bid on him as he currently has the job. It's unclear how much they can push Glover in back-to-backs, and one would have to think they will ease him into the role. In addition, Doolittle threw off a mound for the first time on Tuesday, so he's making progress, finally. I will be bidding on Glover, but there is too much going on with him and the role to place anything more than a very small bid on him.

Series of the Weekend

Astros at A's. – Before you roll your eyes, I have only used the A's in this spot once this year even though they have rolled through the league for the last six weeks. Well, we have now arrived at the biggest series of the year for the young and upstart boys from Oakland. Their recent run has put them in range of the defending champs, as they find themselves two games back in the AL West and sit with a 2.5 game lead in the Wild Card over the Mariners. The Astros come into Oakland with the best road record in baseball, with an incredible 41-18 mark away from Minute Maid Park, and they won all six games in Oakland earlier this year with three games sweeps in both May and June.

Through the first half of the season, Saturday's starter, Dallas Keuchel was actually the weak spot in the Astros rotation, as he dragged down the rest of the aces with a 4.22 ERA through June. However, Keuchel has ramped it up in the second half with a sparkling 1.88 ERA over eight starts since July 1. He has reverted back to his soft contact ways that brought him a lot of his success and he has an excellent 23.9 percent hard hit rate in that run of great starts. In that time period, he has allowed one run or fewer in five of the eight starts and hasn't allowed more than three runs in any of the outings. This weekend should be a good test for the streaking Keuchel, as the A's rank top 10 in MLB in both OPS and runs scored.

The Astros are finally getting back some of their offensive studs and should get George Springer back to start the series, and Carlos Correa has already returned from the DL. This isn't great news for Edwin Jackson who takes the hill for the A's on Friday night with his shocking 2.48 ERA. As much as I would love to buy the E Jax resurgence – he has been huge for the A's in his nine starts – that .224 BABIP really sticks out as a problem. If he was inducing a ton of soft contact, I might feel better about his BABIP, but his hard hit rate is 34 percent (not super bad) and his line drive rate is 23.5 percent. With much of the Astros lineup back, I'm concerned this start might be one that really bites Jackson, and I think the A's are going to have to score a bunch of runs off Charlie Morton to have a chance to win the very important game one of the series.

I'm the first to admit that Khris Davis has his faults. He's very streaky and cannot throw in the outfield, but, man, can he hit for a ton of power. Over the past three seasons (well, really three and half since he crushed in the second half for the Brewers in 2015), Davis has established himself as one of the most consistent home run hitters in baseball. With 34 homers so far this year, he's well on pace for his third consecutive 40-homer season. Long gone are the concerns over whether his power would play in the spacious Oakland Coliseum.

Davis has been a hard hit rate beast over the years with a career mark of more than 40 percent but has ramped it up even more this year at 46.8 percent. He has also lifted the ball more than at any point in his career with a 47.7 percent fly ball rate. The best improvement I see with Davis is his improved strikeout rate, which has dropped to 25.7 percent, the lowest in his three years in Oaktown. The A's offense has a bunch of weapons, but when Davis is feeling it, the lineup truly gets elevated to a different level. He's going to be the guy who has to carry them in September if they are going to make their first playoff appearance since the debacle of 2014. This series should be a lot of fun, and the Coliseum should be jumping, as the fans don't always come out but when they do, no place is louder.