Welcome to David Mendelson’s Weekly Starting Pitcher Streamers for the week of June 6 – June 9.
Welcome to Week Nine of your pitching streamers! Here we like to give you an edge over your competition every week by helping find diamonds in the rough when it comes to borderline rosterable pitchers. Everyone needs to do this in one way or another during the season, and it’s important that you have the best information for making these decisions when it comes to beating your opponent.
Sometimes, your draft doesn’t work out how you intended it to. Whether it be injuries, lack of performance, or maybe your draft was just awful. At some point, you’re going to need to pick up pitchers off the waiver wire and stream them (in other words pick them up for a start or two). This becomes crucial as hitting on the right pitchers consistently will help your ratios, while also potentially beating an opponent for those that play in H2H formats.
So how do we determine which pitchers to stream? Well, there are a lot of ways but I’ve found a few ways to be most effective. This can include looking at the trends of the opposing teams over recent periods of time, how they’re faring against certain handiness, and of course, how that streaming pitcher is currently performing.
I’m here to try and help you narrow it down to five names from all games Monday – Thursday every week, my goal all season being to provide you with the BEST pitching streamers each week to hopefully help you when you’re in a pinch. It’s important to remember that I won’t always be right (no one is), but I hope to provide you with winning streamers more often than not. The criteria for being in this article? The pitcher must be rostered in 50% or less of leagues on FantasyPros (the site being referenced for these articles).
This article will go out every Sunday morning so make sure to make necessary adjustments with postponements, starts skipped, IL stints, etc affecting the projected pitcher starting. The hope for these articles is to keep having more data that we can build off of as the season moves along.
With that being said, here are some factors that go into my streaming picks:
Percentage Rostered – Pitcher must be rostered in 50% or fewer according to FantasyPros to qualify for this article.
wRC+ of Opposing Team – wRC+ or Weighed Runs Created Plus, takes the statistic Runs Created and adjusts that number to account for important external factors — like ballpark or era. It’s adjusted, so a wRC+ of 100 is league average and 150 would be 50 percent above league average. This is one of my favorite stats to look at when picking not just pitching, but hitting as well.
Home/Road ERA Splits – How a pitcher does at home versus how they do on the road. The biggest example of this is someone like German Marquez and how he pitches on the road compared to at Coors Field.
Other Analytics – Things like a pitcher’s swinging strike rate, K-BB ratios, ISO, & OPS are some of the other data that get considered for each player.
Let’s take a look at my top pitching streamers for this week.
Top Pitching Streamers 6/6 – 6/9
Jon Gray (36% Rostered) Monday @CLE – What a start by Mr. Gray last time out on the bump. Against the Tampa Bay Rays, Gray twirled a gem where he threw seven innings of one-run ball with a whopping twelve strikeouts! He had 12 whiffs on 91 pitches (13.1% swinging-strike rate), with a whopping seven of them on his four-seam fastball. Gray has alternated good and bad starts over his last six outings so be wary that this isn’t a slam dunk by any means.
The Guardians are in the middle of the pack in terms of offensive numbers against right-handers since the middle of May but have many players like Franmil Reyes, Steven Kwan, Owen Miller, and others that are currently struggling. I’d give Gray a chance on a shallow slate of games if you need the stream.
Taijuan Walker (43% Rostered) Tuesday @SD – Walker is never a hot pick, but he could be good in this matchup. Despite his AWFUL 12% K rate, Walker has only allowed more than three earned runs just once this season. While Walker has only gone seven innings twice this season, he’s failed to only go five to qualify for the win just once, leaving the Mets chances to win each time he starts.
The Padres have a .112 ISO as a team and the seventh-worst wRC+ since May 20th against RHP. I think Walker could be a good pickup for this start & I’d throw him out there for your fantasy team.
Konnor Pilkington (L) (1% Rostered) Tuesday vs TEX – I’ve never seen Konnor spelled with a “K” until our guy was recently called up to the big leagues. Through three starts he has my attention with a 3.75 ERA, 29.5% K rate, 15.3% SwStr rate, & 29.4% hard-hit percentage (shoutout to Michael Simione @SPStreamer), who put that out right as I began typing this article. He had 17 whiffs on 91 pitches in his last start and is someone that I expect to be bid on in FAAB this week.
The Rangers are in the middle of the pack in terms of runs per game, but have only scored 2.33 runs per game over their last three (6th-worst in baseball). The Rangers could be beginning to go through a cold spell and Pilkington could take advantage on Tuesday.
Edward Cabrera (13% Rostered) Wednesday vs WSH – What a debut for Cabrera! In his first start of the season in Coors, Cabrera was able to hold the Rockies scoreless over six innings, allowing only one hit and nine strikeouts. Cabrera was able to get 17 whiffs in the start, including a whopping 10 with his patented changeup. Cabrera is a player who has shown incredible strikeout stuff in the minors and should be able to build strongly on a season debut.
The Nationals are in the bottom-third of Major League Baseball in wRC+ against RHP over the last two weeks and are only hitting .243 as a team over that time. Cabrera should be one of the best streamers of the week.
Alex Cobb (37% Rostered) Thursday vs COL – One of these days, Alex Cobb’s actual numbers are going to look closer to his expected numbers. Arguably the most unlucky pitcher in baseball, Cobb’s advanced ERA metrics show he’s far outproduced what he’s shown this season, backed by a statcast page that would make a bull angry with all the red in it. He has a career-high 28.7% K rate and his increased velocity has truly made a difference in how hitters approach him.
Cobb gets to face the Rockies away from home, who are averaging over three runs LESS per game away than at home. Their 3.05 runs per game on the road is the third-worst in baseball and if Cobb is somehow still available in your league, pick him up now.
Make sure to follow me on Twitter @DMendy02 and tag me if I helped you strike gold with one of these pitching streamers. Good luck!