Starling Marte (OF, Pirates)
Starling Marte was 0 for 4 today with two K's as his BA dropped to .258 in this somewhat disappointing follow-up to his fine season last year. Much was expected of Marte after a season where he batted .280, hit 12 HR's, scored 83 runs and stole 41 bases in 136 games. He has played in 70 games this year and he is behind his pace of last year in every category with the exception of RBI's. Looking at his underlying stats he is making less contact this year and with a contact rate of 71% he is well below the league average. Since everything else about his peripherals seems to be about in the same range as in 2013, it looks like this 4% drop in contact has made all the difference in his effectiveness at the plate. He is not chasing more pitches outside of the zone and there is nothing dramatically different in the way pitchers have approached him this year. At 25 years old there is no reason to believe that he won't be able to right the ship and make more contact as the year progresses. It just may be that he has less margin of error than other hitters with his overall talent level.
Gregory Polanco (OF, Pirates)
Gregory Polanco had one hit and a walk in today's game against the Cubs. Polanco has been one of the most highly touted rookies to make an appearance in the Majors this year. Unlike some of his peer prospects like George Springer, Oscar Taveras, and Jon Singleton, Polanco seems to have made the very early adjustment quite well. Of course we are only dealing with a very small sample size of 53 AB's, but there are some things to like already. He is walking at a 7.5% rate and striking out only 11% of the time. This plate discipline was a hallmark of his career in the minors so the fact that it has carried over is very encouraging. His .367 average is elevated by a .410 BABIP but with his speed afoot he should maintain a better than average number so the descent in BA may not be quite as severe as for some other hitters. Again temper this number, but his LD rate is a phenomenal 37.5% which does not leave much room for FB's so he has hit only one HR. While we can nitpick over the fact that he has not stolen a base, the thing I like most about him is the poise he has shown thrust into the leadoff position at the start of his career. Polanco seems to have all the attributes of a very fine hitter and a major fantasy contributor for many years to come.
Starlin Castro (SS-Cubs)
When we checked in earlier in the year on Castro I felt very comfortable with my prediction of a strong rebound year. Castro gave further evidence of that with his 11th HR of the year today driving in 3 to bring his RBI total to 43 on the year. His batted ball statistics are a testament to his improvement. Castro sports an excellent 22.3% LD rate, he is elevating the ball more with the highest FB% of his career, and his HR/FB rate is twice his career 6.7% average. The HR rate seems elevated for him so I would not be surprised to see a slowdown there, but he still seems poised to easily best his career high of 14. The strong LD% would seem to support his current .290 average. The only disappointment has been in steals where his 2 on the season would be far off the pace he set in 2012 when he stole 25. However, I don't think anyone will complain about a SS who produces a .285/.325/.480 slash line at the bargain price you paid for him and at only 24 could be on the precipice of even better years ahead.
Daisuke Matsuzaka (SP-Mets)
Daisuke Matsuzaka picked up his 1st loss of the year pitching 5.1 innings of 1 run ball giving up 6 hits and striking out 4. With an ERA sitting at 2.68, and averaging almost a K/Inning on an almost 2 mph gain over last year in fastball velocity, this could be one of more interesting turnaround stories in baseball this year. Except it won't be. Unfortunately for Dice-K, the base on balls which has been his Achilles heel throughout his career is going to again be the undoing of this wonderful tale. Averaging almost 6 walks per 9 innings pitched, and benefiting from a .225 BABIP and a 76.3% LOB rate, we will soon see a major reversal of fortunes for Matsuzaka. For a pitcher with an 8.4% HR/FB career rate, it is not very likely that his current 2.2% rate will be sustained. A look at his 4.63 xFIP and his 4.64 SIERA is all you need to know about how this story will end. Marco Estrada (SP-MIL)
Marco Estrada may have finally pitched himself out of the Brewers rotation today giving up 10 hits and 6 runs in 5.2 innings of awful pitching to see his ERA rise to 5.12. With a fastball that sits at less than 89 mph, Estrada has managed the remarkable feat of giving up 24 HR's in less than 90 innings. I don't think that anyone could sustain that level of futility and if the Brewers are smart they won't let it continue. Estrada is by no means a lost cause. He has the ability to strike batters out and while HR's have always been an issue with him, there should at least be a way to get this under control in another setting. The likely cause of all of this carnage has been significant regression in the effectiveness of both his change and cutter which in combination he throws 45% of the time. If he could get the bite back in at least one of these two pitches, batters would not be able to just sit back and wait on a very average fastball. The time to do this is now before Estrada becomes really damaged goods.
@stevietheshu
This is just a small sample of our daily analysis, join our member area for more premium content: http://www.fantistics.com/join/join.php3
