Starting Pitcher Notes (June 3): Payton Tolle, Stephen Kolek, and weekly articles
Corbin Young examines a couple of starting pitchers from Wednesday, June 3.
Life has been busy this spring with the day job, coaching soccer, coaching softball, and writing four fantasy baseball articles per week. My apologies for not being as active on here, but priorities have been work, family, coaching, and written content at Yahoo Fantasy and RotoGraphs.
Regular Fantasy Baseball Articles:
Yahoo: Fantasy Baseball Hitter Waiver Wire: Using advanced stats to exploit the best matchups in Week 11
RotoGraphs: Three Starting Pitchers Who Gained Stuff and Command
Payton Tolle, SP, Red Sox
Boston Red Sox starting pitcher Payton Tolle threw six scoreless innings against the Orioles on Wednesday. Tolle had a 17.2% swinging-strike rate and a 31% ball rate on Wednesday.
⏩Tolle’s electric four-seam fastball generated a 17% swinging-strike rate on Wednesday, which had plenty of called strikes as he threw them often in the zone. The zone and swinging-strike rates have been similar to his career averages, with a few more whiffs.
✂️Tolle’s cutter was thrown 2 mph slower, and led to 4 additional inches of drop. The cutter elicited a 27.8% swinging-strike rate, with 4 of 5 coming low and below the zone.
I’ve been high on Tolle and impressed by him this season.
Stephen Kolek, SP, Royals
Oops, Kansas City Royals’ starting pitcher Stephen Kolek did it again by commanding his pitches well for his 4th quality start against the Reds on Wednesday. Kolek had a 9.4% swinging-strike rate and a 41% ball rate against the Reds.
🛝Kolek’s slider led his arsenal in whiffs (36.8% swinging-strike rate), with most of his sliders being located low and toward his glove side. He has been locating his slider in the zone at a consistent rate, but opposing hitters have been chasing more often.
🎯Kolek has been a command artist (111 Location+), with four pitches showing above-average locations. That’s been evident via Kolek’s four-seam (115 Location+), sinker (126 Location+), cutter (103 Location+), and changeup (112 Location+).
Be cautious about Kolek sustaining his outcomes.