Collette Calls: Accountability Part 2 -- Pitcher Bold Predictions

Last week, I looked back at the 30 bold hitting predictions I made prior to the start of spring training, adjusting some numbers for the abbreviated season. Now, it is time for the pitchers.

Andrew Kittredge is a top-250 pitcher whose saves+win total will be at least (10) three. Kittredge was one of the many pitchers who went down with serious injury in 2020, as his UCL tore eight innings into the season. He was one of the 12 Rays relievers to earn a save this season, but the stuff was not the same and the injury told us why.

Brandon Bailey is a top-3 pitcher for Baltimore. Bailey, in fact, did not make the Orioles roster and was given back to Houston since he was a Rule 5 pick last winter. Bailey appeared in five games for Houston out of the bullpen late in the season.

Chris Bassitt is a top-60 starting pitcher. He did much better than that, ending the season as a SP23 in standard mixed formats with five wins, 55 strikeouts, a 2.29 ERA and a 1.16 WHIP. He outearned all the younger and more hyped arms in the rotation and was widely available later in drafts as others pursued the shiny new toys of Jesus Luzardo, A.J. Puk, and Sean Manaea. This is the one I take the most personal pride in because I very much felt out on an island with this prediction in January and rostered him for as little as $2 in AL leagues.

Corbin Burnes is a top-125 pitcher. He finished the season 12th on our pitcher earned auction values. The Burnes redemption tour was a pleasure to watch this season as he rebuilt his repertoire so that his pitches complemented one another in a more strategic fashion, forcing hitters to cover all parts of the zone. It was a shame he injured his oblique in his final outing and we missed one last chance to see him work in the postseason. 

Corey Kluber is not a $20 pitcher. Kluber threw 18 pitches in total for 2020 before coming up with a shoulder injury that ended his season. The one-time workhorse has now made just eight starts the last two seasons combined. 

Eduardo Rodriguez is not a top-175 pitcher. We never saw him pitch in 2020. He came down with arguably the most serious player-related case of COVID-19 as myocarditis was his going away present from dealing with the virus. His 2021 future is still in doubt as he only began resuming normal daily life functions in mid-September.

Edwin Diaz is a top-3 closer. He finished 12th in the closer rankings, mainly because he saved six games in nine chances. He had an early memorable blown save on a phenomenal piece of hitting by Marcell Ozuna followed by a meltdown against the cross-town Yankees shortly thereafter. Around all that, he struck out 50 batters in 25.2 innings, allowed just two homers and had a 1.75 ERA and 1.25 WHIP. What could have been ...

Garrett Richards finishes outside the top-150 pitchers. He ended the season at 172, but this prediction was still based on my dislike of him over a full season because he was not yet two years removed from his Tommy John surgery. He was two years removed when the abbreviated season began in late July, and Richards mostly pitched like the inconsistent guy we saw in his heyday with the Angels. He is no longer the groundball machine he was with that club, and the homers were a problem this year.

Giovanny Gallegos is a top-60 pitcher. His overall numbers were decent, but he only worked 15 innings as his recovery from an early COVID-19 diagnosis took quite some time. Two wins, four saves, a 0.87 WHIP and 21 strikeouts in 15 innings helped, but he did not work enough to maximize the skills he continues to display. 

Hansel Robles is a top-8 closer. There is reliever volatility, and then there is a reliever who nearly quintuples his ERA one season to the next. Robles could not throw strikes, and allowed 30 baserunners in 16.2 innings around 20 strikeouts. His velocity was down two miles an hour from 2019, and even the new splitter could not save him from that problem.

Jairo Diaz is a top-100 pitcher. Wade Davis and Scott Oberg went down in front of Diaz, and he blew his chance even though he never actually blew a save in 2020. Diaz saved four games around the 48 baserunners he allowed in 20 innings. That is not a typo; it is tough to make the top 100 with a 7.65 ERA and a 2.25 WHIP. Like Robles, Diaz had velocity issues with the disrupted start to the season and never fully recovered it.

Jharel Cotton earns $5 in NL Only Leagues. It is tough to do this when you do not throw a pitch in the major leagues in 2020.

Jose Urquidy outearns Lance McCullers Jr. Urquidy pitched well this season, but simply did not pitch enough. He made five starts once he  joined the team in September after recovering from COVID-19, winning one of the five outings with a 2.73 ERA and a 1.01 WHIP. He had better ratios than McCullers did, but pitched nearly half the time McCullers did.

Justus Sheffield earns $5 in AL Only Leagues. Seattle had another disappointing season, but Sheffield was one of the bright spots this season with four wins and a 3.58 ERA, making all 10 starts on the season and earning $7. This was the type of step forward you want to see a young pitcher take, and it will be interesting to see where 2021 is for the young arm. He is one to be concerned about with workload given the club is likely counting on him to carry a load in 2021, and we are entering unchartered territory for him and others of his age. He worked 118 innings in 2018, 169 in 2019 and then 55.1 in 2020. 

Ken Giles saves 15 games (40) and strikes out 37 (100). Giles season was mostly a wash as his elbow barked early, and then eventually bit him when he learned on his birthday he needed Tommy John surgery. He is done for 2021, so look for him to sign a Nathan Eovaldi or Garrett Richards-like free agent deal where he signs a two-year deal somewhere, and spends the first year rehabbing in hopes the club can get value from the pitcher in the second year. 

Lewis Thorpe is one of the four most valuable starters on the Minnesota staff. The Twins did not have great pitching outside Cy Young runner-up Kenta Maeda, but even that did not help Thorpe achieve this goal as he allowed 34 baserunners in 16.1 innings. 

Logan Webb is a top-175 pitcher. Webb pitched all season for the Giants, but was not one of the success stories in their surprising season. Webb essentially replicated his numbers from 2019, and those numbers were not good. He has to find better command to take a step forward.

Luke Weaver is a top-50 pitcher. There was a time when I was a vocal Weaver critic, going against the grain. He sucked me back in after his growth in 2019, and then stomped on my faith this year, going 1-9 with a 6.58 ERA and 1.56 WHIP over 12 starts. He more than doubled his 2019 home run rate and got back to walking hitters as he faced the Western division teams all season. 

Masahiro Tanaka finished outside the top-125 pitchers. A 3-3 record with a 3.56 ERA and 1.17 WHIP with 44 strikeouts was good enough to finish as the 102nd-best pitcher on the season. Tanaka slighly raised his strikeout rate, remained stingy with walks, which helped limit the damage of the homers he continues to allow. Over the course of a full season, this prediction may have worked out.

Matthew Boyd is a top-40 pitcher. He looked SO good in the spring, but once July began, Boyd picked up where he left off in September. 60 strikeouts in 60 innings is fine, but 15 homers in 60 innings is the exact opposite of fine. It took him awhile to find his curve and changeup this year, but he was nothing like the guy we saw excel at times in 2019 and shine in the Grapefruit League in March. He spent most of the season looking like he was lobbing grapefruits to hitters.

Michael Kopech is not a top-150 player. The prediction was based on the track record of first full seasons back from TJ surgery and how Kopech was being overprojected by many. It was all for naught as he opted out of the season, and may be done in Chicago given the language from the club after his opt-out was not exactly supportive.

Michael Lorenzen hits more home runs than he allows. The Universal DH did not give Lorenzen as many hitting chances as he had in previous seasons, so he could not attempt to hit at least four homers to best the three he allowed in 33.2 innings. The walks, 17, were his true undoing on the season but he still vultured three wins in 18 appearances.

Mike Soroka is not a top-50 pitcher. Soroka tore his Achilles in his third start of the season, and ended the season with a 3.95 ERA and a 1.32 WHIP as he did not look much like the guy that worked in 2019 before his injury in early August.

Mitch Keller is a top-60 pitcher. Keller is a great lesson that not all expected stats lead to better future performance. His 2020 final line is one for the ages:

• Innings: 21.2
• Hits allowed: 9
• Homers: 4
• Strikeouts: 16
• Walks: 18
• ERA: 2.91
• WHIP: 1.25

Anything is possible in a short sample size, but he seemed to enjoy putting multiple runners on base and then strand them by inning's end. Maybe he is the 2021 Corbin Burnes, but I don't trust Pittsburgh enough to develop him into something more.

Patrick Corbin is not a top-25 pitcher. Corbin took a big step back in 2020 losing strikeouts, allowing more home runs, and pushing his ERA to its highest point in the previous four seasons. World Series hangover may have been in play, but the same issue I held against Shane Bieber was there for Corbin yet only one of these guys had the overall stuff to push through it. Bieber adjusted with his new cutter, but Corbin didn't have a new pitch this time around. Not going to pat myself on the back too hard here as I closed the prediction saying I'd rather have Corbin than Trevor Bauer. 

Richard Lovelady gets three (10) saves. He did not pitch at the big-league level this year as the Josh Staumont show raged on.

Ryne Stanek gets no more than three (10) saves. Stanek and his straight fastball still only have one career save as he did not garner one this season, which was impacted by COVID-19. 

Shane Bieber is not a top-20 pitcher. I covered this a few weeks ago. He won the pitching triple crown and will be the unanimous AL Cy Young Award winner. This one hurts me to my soul.

Tony Gonsolin is a top-100 pitcher. The rookie swing man finished in the top 40 and had a historic rookie season in doing so.

Zach Eflin finishes outside the top 500. He, in fact, ended the season at 212 by improving his strikeout rate from 18 percent to 29 percent, nearly doubling his K-BB% and winning four of his 11 starts that the bullpen did not blow. Eflin went crazy with the sinker this year, picked his moments with his four-seamer and used his curveball more than he had in the previous three seasons. His sinker still wasn't a great pitch (.310 average, .469 SLG) but his curveball was nearly unhittable (.100 average, .125 SLG).

Overall, 11 of 30 of these hit. Bassitt, Burnes, Corbin and Sheffield are big wins, but that is all overshadowed by not being a Belieber.