Matt Boyd (SP, DET) - Week 21 Waiver Wire Pickups

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OWNED IN: 26% of leagues

ANALYSIS: From the end of July to this point in August, Matt Boyd has been in a nice rhythm for the Tigers to the tune of a 3.13 ERA, 0.82 WHIP, and 8.0 K/9 over his last five starts. He got off to an excellent start to the season through the first two months, but limped through June with a 6.32 ERA and 1.47 WHIP after allowing six HR and 42.7% hard contact on batted balls. Boyd struggled to gain footing after June, but since the start of August he improved his production in several telling aspects.

For one, since the start of the month he has improved his allowance of hard contact and soft contact with respective figures of 35.3% and 23.5%, both being his best since his fantastic month of April. Boyd is a FB-heavy pitcher (his fly ball rate for August is 60.8%), and although this causes HR vulnerability, his improved soft contact when combined with his IFFB rate that has been consistently over 10% all year greatly helps to neutralize that risk and minimize the potential damage. Although his August K/9 is down to 7.13 after steadily moving from 8.21 to 9.62 from May through July, his walk frequency has improved mightily. His BB/9 this month sits all the way down at just 1.02, after producing 4.32 during his woeful June. Matt Boyd's career trends seem to indicate that he produces his best outings when he focuses less on strikeouts (though he still produces a nice volume) and more on control and producing weak fly balls, and that is the direction he has been trending in August.