Sonny Gray, Oakland A's - Sonny Gray's first start since the All Star Break could be described as a less than stellar outing, but he still managed to pick up his fourth win of the season with a quality start. He allowed three runs over six innings but walked four against two strikeouts. With this start, his K/9 is now under 7.00 for the season and his BB/9 has climbed a full walk compared to his 2015 campaign. Digging into his Fangraphs page really only tells me that his swinging strike rate is down, and that his HR/FB% is high but other than that he's the same pitcher that he's always been. Gray has never been an elite swing and miss guy, but there's been a significant drop-off in the effectiveness of his slider as last season it was 8.6 runs better than the league average slider and now it's at -0.9 according to Fangraphs. Not granted at least he's stopped throwing it as often as last year, he still needs that pitch to return in order for his to return to "ace-like" levels.
Yu Darvish, Texas Rangers - Yu Darvish was activated from the DL Saturday and got the start for the Rangers, but definitely had some rust as he walked four batters in just 4.1 innings. ON the plus side though he did fan nine batters and allowed just two earned runs but still was on hook for the loss in the game. The strikeouts were the most this year for Darvish, but his season high for IP in a game is still just 5.2. While he isn't going deep into games, his rate stats are still outstanding and his ERA still is only a 3.15 with a 2.43 FIP. He's going to be more valuable do to this in roto or categories while lacking in points and DFS situations.
Matt Moore, Tampa Bay Rays - Matt Moore had a game that makes FIP go postal throwing 7.1 innings while allowing just five hits, but he only struck out one batter in the game and allowed a homer. His FIP did not appreciate this game reaching a 5.05 for the game and his season total has jumped up to 4.62 It's slightly concerning to me over just where Moore's Ks have disappeared to as over his last 2 innings he has fanned just eight batters. Two of the teams he faced in his last three starts are the Red Sox and the Angels, who both have two of the lowest five strikeout rates against lefties and the Orioles (Saturday's start) rank 14th so it could be the he just is running into some tough matchups. Oakland, his next start, strikes out at the third lowest rate against lefties so I wouldn't go into the next start expecting him to turn a corner.
Lance McCullers, Houston Astros - Lance McCullers continues to strikeout everyone he faces this year, well everyone that he doesn't walk. He struck out eight in 5.1 innings Saturday but also walked four in that same stretch and owns a 11.49 K/9 to go along with a ridiculous 5.49 BB/9. The loss Saturday drops his to 4-and-4 on the season. He does have five quality starts in his 11 starts and three of the other starts he allowed fewer than three runs but didn't make it to the six inning threshold. He's seen his swinging strike rate jump up to 12.7% this year and that will lead to more strikeouts. However, the walk numbers could climb and be even worse because even as his walk rate approaches six per nine, batters are actually swinging at 33.6% of his pitches out of the zone!! So if batters stop chasing pitches then that could balloon even higher, but McCullers does have the raw stuff to keep people chasing.
Travis Shaw, Boston Red Sox DFS - $3,000 Shaw sat against CC Sabathia Saturday due to the lefty lefty matchup but he'll definitely be in there on Sunday when the Yankees throw Masahiro Tanaka to the mound. Shaw has a homer and two RBI against Tanaka, and is hitting .291 with eight homers against opposing righties. His wRC+ is over 70 points higher against righties so he can be a nice value matchup on Sunday.
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