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We are a week away from regular season baseball games, which means we are in the home stretch for fantasy baseball draft season. Some of the essential pieces of your fantasy team are found by undervalued draft targets. In my last article, I highlighted five undervalued hitters, and in this article, I will highlight five undervalued pitchers.
When looking at undervalued players, one must look at what the pitcher did last year to bring value this season potentially. Maybe some improvements this spring that makes a pitcher now valuable. Sometimes it is just market inefficacy that brings value to a draft pick. Whatever factor is in play, take advantage of the value on draft day.
I will look at the recent NFBC Online Championship ADP for this article over the last week. There are many drafts taking place, so the ADP is rapidly changing. Always change the dates to lower the number of drafts you are looking at to understand the recent ADP better. I looked at pitchers with an ADP around pick 200 or later for the later targets. Let’s look at five pitchers (there are many more) that I find as draft day values for mixed leagues.
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Jordan Montgomery, New York Yankees
ADP: 196.62
After three seasons that saw Montgomery limited on innings due to injuries, he made a solid return to the mound for the Yankees in 2021. Montgomery pitched 157.1 innings during his 30 starts and was outstanding. He racked up a 3.83 ERA with a 3.93 xFIP and 4.07 SIERA. Not too shabby for a pitcher that pitches in the very tough AL East.
Montgomery limited the run production with a 42.7% ground ball rate and a strong 24.5% strikeout rate. The strikeout rate was helped with a career-best 13.7% SwStr and a solid 28.4% CSW. Montgomery used five pitches to lead to his success with his changeup, curveball, and sinker, all thrown over 20%. The increased use of the changeup and the overall effectiveness of his curveball led to his massive improvement.
Montgomery enters the 2022 season ready to take another step in the right direction. He will be the Yankees’ number two behind Gerritt Cole and should be prepared to run with that job. Look for Montgomery to hopefully throw 170+ innings on his way to double-digit wins and another strikeout rate over one strikeout per inning. Montgomery is a primary target of mine in drafts.
Alex Wood, San Francisco Giants
ADP: 205.88
Many are turned off from drafting Wood due to his past injury history, but that is baked into his ADP. Yes, there’s an excellent chance Wood will miss time this season due to an injury. But the innings you get from Wood should be outstanding and worth every bit of his ADP.
Last season, Wood pitched 138.2 innings, which were his most since 2018. He was outstanding with a 3.83 ERA and 3.44 xFIP. Ratios have always been strong from Wood in seasons where he throws double-digit starts. Besides the excellent ratios, Wood had career bests in strikeout rate at 26% and K-BB at 19.3%.
So far this spring, Wood has looked solid in 5.2 shutout innings with six strikeouts and a 32% SwStr. Reports say his velocity is even up, which is a great thing. Wood will pencil into one of the better rotations in baseball, and he should bring back another solid fantasy season. The ratios and strikeouts that Wood can bring to your fantasy team are outstanding at this point in the draft.
Bailey Ober, Minnesota Twins
246.15
Ober burst onto the MLB scene last season, throwing 92.1 innings over 20 starts. He had a 4.19 ERA with a 4.01 xFIP and a solid 25.3% strikeout rate. However, Ober's command was more impressively than the strikeout rate, which led to a 5% walk rate and an elite 20.3% K-BB.
There are some slight concerns as Ober allowed a hard-contact rate over 42%, which helped lead to a 16.8% HR/FB. But there is a silver lining as he was much better over his last nine starts. He allowed nine home runs, but he only allowed 17 earned runs over his 45 innings for a 3.40 ERA and 3.97 xFIP. His hard-hit rate was still concerning at 41%, but he kept the ball in the park more and only allowed one walk per nine innings.
Ober is still very young, but the command is something that a young arm can build around. He threw his fastball over 58% of the time, and if he could mix the pitches up some more, utilizing his slider and curveball more (which gained more whiffs), he could take another giant step. Ober is moving up draft boards and is worth a late-round pick for the upside he brings to your roster.
Cal Quantrill, Cleveland Guardians
ADP: 264.54
I will fully admit that I am a Quantrill stan, but he is going far too late in drafts. He finished last season with a 2.89 ERA over 149.2 innings pitched. Most will point to his 4.43 xFIP, 19.6% strikeout rate, and 12% K-BB as red flags, but we must look deeper at Quantrill and how he finished the season.
From August 1st on, Quantrill made 11 starts and was outstanding. He mixed his pitch mix up, which led to an incredibly efficient pitcher. Over his 11 starts, he had at least five innings in each start and six or more innings in ten of the starts, leading to nine quality starts and six wins. More importantly, his strikeout rate rose to 23.7%, and his K-BB rose to 16.1%. In addition, Quantrill could limit hard contact to 29.6% with a .204 batting average against.
We have seen Cleveland in seasons past improve their young pitchers. Quantrill made plenty of positive moves last season and, at his current ADP, is worth a flyer late in drafts. He will pitch in a weak division and even took advantage of some powerful teams down the stretch, proving he can even handle the White Sox and some tough teams in the AL East. So do not be scared to draft Quantrill.
Matt Brash, Seattle Mariners
ADP: 356.00
I will be the first to admit that I was unaware of Brash when the draft season started. After his start to spring, it is hard to ignore just how good he has been. So far this spring, he has thrown five shutout innings, allowing one hit, while striking out seven. Brash has done this damage with filthy stuff and a 32% SwStr rate.
Brash showcased elite strikeout stuff throughout the minors with a 36% strikeout rate in double-A last year and a K-BB well over 20% at all his previous minor league stops. For now, he is vying for one of the final spots in the Mariners’ rotation, and his elite strikeout stuff makes him a solid late-round target. Of course, if things do not pan out, he can be dropped, but the upside is tremendous if he continues this strong start to the spring and carries it into the season.
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