Cole Hamels SP (PHI) - Two nights ago Hamels dominated the Padres, and after a brutal first start of the season (6 ER, 2.2 IP) Hamels' ERA is all the way down to 2.92. For some reason, people tend to exclude Hamels as a top 10 pitcher, but he certainly has elite skills. Hamels currently boasts a 9.49 K/9, 3.25 K/BB ratio and career high 51.6 GB%. This is the second straight year Hamels has seen his GB% grow (40.4/45.4/51.6), and if he maintains that GB rate, Hamels will likely repeat last season's sparkling 3.06 ERA. There is reason to believe that GB rate is legitimate. Last season, according to Fangraphs, Hamels instituted a cut fastball and relied on his curveball less, which coincided with his increase in GB rate. While this season, Hamels is using that cutter even more (up to 20.7% from 14.75) and could be the reason for another gain in GB rate.
Ryan Dempster SP (CHW) - Dempster had yet another rough start yesterday afternoon as he gave up 7 ER in 5.2 IP while striking out 3 and walking 3. He continued an early season trend of giving up the long ball as 3 Dodger players homered off of Dempster. The bad news for Dempster owners is his next start comes in homer happy Chase Field. The good news is Dempster really hasn't pitched as badly as the ERA, WHIP and record would suggest. Following yesterday's performance, Dempster's K/9 sat at 8.51 and his K/BB ratio at 2.42. Both of those numbers are right in line with what Dempster has posted the past three seasons, all of which have been very solid. Furthermore, Dempster's GB% heading into yesterday's game was at 48% (48.1/47.2/47.4 past three seasons), so the increased homers has more to do with an unlucky HR/FB% (17.9%) that is likely to regress towards Dempster's career mark (10.6%) as the season continues. Other contributors to the high ERA are (heading into yesterday's start) a .333 BABIP (.302 career mark) and 58.1 LOB% (71.8). Sometimes an elevated LD rate can result in higher than expected HR/FB% and BABIP for a pitcher, but that is not the case for Dempster as his LD% before yesterday sat at a career best 14.7%. With all of Dempster's peripherals in line, he remains a buy low opportunity as Joe suggested last week.
Starlin Castro SS (CHC) - Castro had a big day yesterday going 4-5 with a double, a steal, 2 runs scored and 3 runs driven in. The young SS has been extremely impressive thus far this season. I don't recommend selling high on Castro as SS is a weak position, and he has a lot of skills. Sure, Castro will not hit .393 all year long like he currently is. Still, he is making strides at the plate that indicate he can hold a .300 plus average all season long. First of all, Castro is making an incredible amount of contact at the plate. His contact rate currently sits at a whopping 94%, up from 84.7% a season ago. Secondly, Castro is hitting extra base hits at a slightly better rate as indicated in his ISO jumping from .108 last season to .131 right now. Furthermore, Castro's LD rate is at 24.1%, which is flat out superb. Sure, once Castro cools off some of his peripherals may decline slightly, but the improvement from a young prospect in contact rate, ISO and LD rate make him a really safe bet to hit for average and score runs.
Jose Reyes SS (NYM) - Early on, I am completely buying into the return of Jose Reyes. He's not walking more than he did last season (5.3%), but that is not as much of a problem this year with Reyes making more contact at the plate. He is chasing pitches outside of the zone less than last year (27.5% compared to 32.1%) and is swinging and missing a career best 4.7% of the time. As a result, Reyes currently is striking out just 7.9% of the time, a career best. And while Reyes may never steal 70+ bases again, his current speed score (according to Fangraphs) of 8.8 is consistent with what he posted pre-hamstring problems. If there is an issue with Reyes early on, it's what Richard touched on about a week ago when he stated Reyes was hitting too many fly balls (45% at the time Richard wrote that). Reyes has not improved upon that, and in fact his FB% is up to 47.4%. I, personally, am not too concerned about this aspect of the speedster's game at this point as, but it is something to watch.
Jason Hammel SP (COL) - Hammel struck out 4 and walked 1 while allowed just 1 ER en route to a victory last night. Hammel is one of my favorite under the radar pitchers as I'm a sucker for a solid K/BB ratio combined with a solid GB rate, and Hammel certainly fits that bill. He has posted 2 straight seasons of a K/BB ratio of 3 or better along with three straight years of a GB% slightly over 46%. The result for Hammel has been FIP and xFIP ERA's that place him around a 3.70. Unfortunately for Hammel, he seems to have a consistently high BABIP and low LOB%. If Hammel (and it's a big if since his career marks don't suggest this is simply bad luck) can see his BABIP and LOB% move toward league averages this year, he'll post a sub-4 ERA and could notch a dozen victories.
