2017 MLB Draft Guide Player Profile: Aaron Sanchez

Aaron Sanchez

24 years old

Bats/Throws: R/R

Height/Weight: 6’4”, 210 lbs

Position: Starting Pitcher

THE NUMBERS

Minor League Overall Rankings per season for Sanchez.

THE SKILLS

Let’s start out with the strikeout. I frequently hear, even amongst “experts,” that Sanchez is a big-time strikeout arm. Hate to break it to you all, but this is a demonstrably false statement.

Here is the proof.

1 – Sanchez has a 7.06 K/9 rate in his career. The league average since he began his career is 7.78. This means that since Sanchez began his career he has NOT been a league average strikeout arm.

2 – As a starting pitcher, if we remove his relief innings, Sanchez has a career K/9 rate of 7.08. Last season the big league average for strikeouts was 8.10 per nine. Last season Sanchez was NOT a league average strikeout arm.

3 – ‘But Ray, he was a starter and you’re including relievers so that isn’t fair.’ Fine. The league average strikeout rate for a starting pitcher in 2016 was 7.76 (see Pitching Targets to Know). Sanchez had a K/9 last season of 7.55. Sanchez was NOT a league average strikeout arm for a starting pitcher last season.

4 – As noted in Swinging Strike Ratios, Sanchez was one of the worst starting pitchers in baseball in 2016 at generating swinging strikes. Out of the 73 men who threw at least 162 innings last season, Sanchez was the 12^th worst in baseball at generating swinging strikes (8.2 percent). Last season the league average was 10.1 percent.

So, I’m sorry to burst your bubble folks, but to this point of his big-league career Aaron Sanchez has not been a strikeout arm. He hasn’t even been a league average strikeout arm.

Let’s talk walks.

Sanchez has a 3.29 BB/9 rate for his career. The league average since 2014 is 2.91. That means Sanchez has been worse than the league average in issuing walks in his career. Last season the mark was 2.95 per nine which was slightly better than the 3.14 walk rate the league posted in 2016. Still, that’s a small victory.

Sanchez has a 2.15 K/BB rate for his career, way worse than the league average of 2.68 since 2014. Sanchez has been worse than the league average in the K/BB ratio category in his career. Last season Sanchez was better at 2.56, but that’s still worse than the league average.

‘Ok, Ray, fine. He doesn’t strike out as many as I thought, and he walks a few more than is ideal, but he’s still gonna be great. Did you look at that ERA from last season?’

Let’s talk ERA.

Sanchez posted a mark of 3.00 last season over 192 innings. However, he didn’t truly “earn” it. As described in MLB Sabermetrics Primer, I gave a few details on measurements like SIERA and xFIP. Short-hand is that each measure is read the same as ERA, and that they attempt to speak more directly to the factors that a pitcher can control. Here’s what those measure suggest – that Aaron’s ERA of 3.00 was nowhere near being earned in ‘16. In fact, SIERA (4.01) and xFIP (3.75) are both suggestive of a pitcher who’s earned runs average should have been three quarters of a run higher last season than it actually was. Sanchez may have led the American League in ERA last season, but he really shouldn’t have.

A few more data points of concern.

Sanchez owns a 78.2 percent career left on base percentage. That’s a massive number and one that he simply isn’t likely to be able to hold on to long-term. I mean, the greatest pitcher of our generation is Clayton Kershaw and his career mark is 78.4 percent. This fact will lead to more runs being scored off Sanchez.

Sanchez doesn’t miss that many bats, a fact established above, yet he’s still been able to hold batters to a .251 career BABIP. Players establish their own level in the BABIP category, but a mark of .251 isn’t likely to be a sustainable pace. Referencing the great Kershaw yet again... only once in his entire career has his BABIP been .251 (his career mark is .271).

Now, the positives.

Sanchez throws a heavy fastball that comes in at 95 mph. He threw his fastball 74.5 percent of the time last season with 52.8 percent of his overall pitches being the sinking fastball. Only four starting pitchers in baseball threw the 2-seam fastball more than Sanchez did (Bartolo Colon was the only starter above 59 percent at 62.9. The others were Tanner Roark, Zach Davies and Chris Sale).

Thanks to that sinking fastball Sanchez has produced a ground ball rate of 57.3 percent for his career. The mark was 54.4 percent last season, the 5^th best mark in baseball for a starting pitcher. As a result of all those grounders, a great trait, Sanchez has been able to keep the ball in the yard. For his career his HR/9 mark is 0.71, just one hundredth above his 2016 mark. Sanchez’s 0.70 HR/9 rate last season was, again, the 5^th best mark in baseball.

PLAYING TIME

Last season, as highlighted in Hurler Workload Concerns, I detailed the whopping increase that Sanchez dealt with last season in workload after spending the 2015 season as a reliever. The highlights of that article are that Sanchez saw the 6^th biggest increase last season in innings amongst players that were reviewed as he went from 102 to 192 innings, an increase of 90 frames. Sanchez obviously also saw a massive increase in his pitch count as he doubled his pitch total from 2015 (1,449) to 2016 (2,919). That increase of 1,470 tosses was the third most amongst all the pitchers detailed. Tell me that doesn’t concern you? If you say it doesn’t, I don’t believe you. If you say it doesn’t, you’re not being honest. It has to be an issue. Truth is we never know when a guy’s arm is going to go, but when we’re talking about doubling innings or pitches that has to be a concern for any rational thinking human being. I don’t know if it’s 100 percent relevant or not, but look at his numbers from the start of August on last season: 3.76 ERA, 3.76 BB/9, 1.25 WHIP. Are those numbers a sample size thing-a-ma-bobber, or is it a sign that his arm might have worn down a bit? Just food for thought.

AVERAGE DRAFT POSITION DATA

As of this writing, here are Aaron Sanchez ADP data.

Fantasy Alarm Player Rankings - note that we have Sanchez ranked a lot lower than his ADP.

CONCLUSION

Sanchez is 24 years old. He has a pedigree and a big right arm that generates a ton of ground balls. Those are the facts. Additional facts include a league average walk rate and a less than league average strikeout rate. Add in the uncertainty relating to the workload increase last season and my personal opinion is that folks are a bit too bullish on Sanchez this season.

10-Team Mixed: He should be your 3^rd starter at most, hopefully your fourth, in this format. As the above ADP shows that’s a pipedream. What that means is that, in my opinion, it’s inherently too risky for me to recommend that you target Sanchez in a league this small.

12-Team Mixed: Still want him as my third here. He’s young with that heavy heater, but the lack of elite punchouts, the walks, and some concern with workload mark him, again, as someone I wouldn’t target aggressively.

15-Team Mixed: If you disregard the above, and take him as your #2, make sure that your third and fourth arms offer you stability. Don’t roster too much risk early if you’re planning on going all in with Sanchez.

AL-Only League: He has the profile of an arm to target, finally, even if he pitches in a bad park in the AL East.

Ray Flowers can be heard Monday/Tuesday and Thursday/Friday, 8 PM EDT, Wednesday 7 PM EDT on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 9 PM EDT PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).