The news this week that Cardinals pitcher Jack Flaherty would be starting on Opening Day - April 1st in Cincinnati - wasn't a surprise, in fact it was expected. He is one of the top young pitchers in the game today and even though a first glance at his 2020 numbers seems to indicate some sort of problem. A slightly deeper look tells a different story.
Flaherty posted a 4.91 ERA in 9 starts last year, which is certainly a big change compared to his 3.01 ERA combined for 2018-2019, but it's not cause for concern. He had one "blow up" start against Milwaukee where he allowed 9 ER in just 3 IP and that skews the numbers. In his 8 other starts Flaherty posted a 3.14 ERA which is a lot more like what we saw the previous two seasons.
In a short season like 2020 one bad game carries a lot more weight than it would over a full season, there just wasn't time to bring that ERA down.
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Many of Flaherty's other metrics were fine.
Consider...
AVG Fastball Velocity
2018 - 93.2 MPH
2019 - 94.3 MPH
2020 - 94.0 MPH
Strikeout Rate
2018 - 87th percentile
2019 - 85th percentile
2020 - 76th percentile
Whiff Rate (swings and misses against)
2018 - 86th percentile
2019 - 83rd percentile
2020 - 88th percentile
Hard Hit Rate (against)
2018 - 55th percentile
2019 - 91st percentile
2020 - 79th percentile
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The one area where there was a clear slip from 2019 to 2020 was his Walk Rate which saw him in the 65th percentile in 2019 but just the 41st percentile in 2020. Even that doesn't concern me because of the nature of the season for the Cardinals. With a long pause and then a somewhat abnormal work schedule after the pause (one that was used to protect Flaherty for the long term) it's not surprising or concerning that command was off a little compared to before. With a normal routine, I'd expect him to be back where he was before in 2021.
If you look at 2018-2019 combined Flaherty had the 8th best ERA in MLB. The names in front of him: DeGrom, Verlander, Cole, Scherzer, Kershaw, Clevinger, Buehler.
That's it. That's the list.
Flaherty also ranked 11th in strikeout rate and was 23 in all of baseball in Pitcher fWAR.
Barring injury Flaherty should be a Cy Young contender in the National League in 2021, just like he was in 2019. He's got all the pitches necessary for a starter to have success, his competitiveness is on par with the other aces in the NL, he limits hard contact and he strikes a lot of people out...those last two are of critical importance if you're going to be a Cy Young contender.
Injuries are always a concern for pitchers but there is no reason to expect anything with Flaherty at this point. If he's able to make all of his scheduled starts the performance will be there.
2020 was a statistical outlier based on one outlier game.
The projection systems seem to have him in the 3.25-3.50 ERA range coming into 2021 ... and I'll take the under on that.
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