Tyler Beede (SP, SFG) - Week 17 Waiver Wire Pickups

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OWNED IN: 14% of leagues

ANALYSIS: Former top prospect Tyler Beede is showing signs of having figured some things out and after throwing eight shutout innings against the Mets in his last start, the fantasy world is starting to take notice. Over his first nine starts of 2019, Beede had only figured out how to get his doors blown off, posting a 6.45 ERA over his 37.2 innings. While he was striking out over a batter per inning, what really made Beede's performance untenable was the 6.69 walks per nine he was giving up.

But over his past three starts, a new Beede has been showing up; and this Tyler Beede is much improved and now includes a fancy new slider. In those three starts, he's gone a total of 21.2 innings with a 1.66 ERA and 16 strikeouts. And while his strikeout rate has dropped, Beede only walked one batter in those three starts, giving him a minuscule 0.42 BB/9.

Part of that success may be tied to a commitment to his new slider, which he threw only a handful of times prior to the past three starts. But over these last three, he threw it around 20%; and while it's not a strikeout pitch, Beede's slider does have the second-highest zone-rate after his fastball, perhaps explaining some of the dramatic decrease he's seen in his walk-rate. Grab him now in deeper leagues because if he continues to keep his walks low and can get his K-rate back up, then Beede could be in for a second-half breakout.