Listed in our sleeper section, an expanded view showing the seeds behind last year's breakout for Tyler Mahle may help value him in upcoming drafts. He went 2-2 in 2020 in nine starts spanning 10 appearances with 47.2 innings, a 60:21 K:BB, 3.59 ERA, 4.07 SIERA and 1.15 WHIP. He recorded a 29.9 strikeout percentage with a 10.4 walk rate, but his swinging strike percent jumped by over four points to 13.8 percent. Reducing his overall contact raty by 10 percentage points along with a six-point drop in Z-Contact (in the strike zone) fueled his success.

Any pitcher producing more swings and misses with less contact sets himself up for success. According to Statcast, Mahle allowed 116 batted ball events giving up seven barrels (seven percent), an 87.4 MPH average exit velocity and a 39.7 hard hit rate. His expected numbers display the gains in his arsenal illustrated by a .189 expected batting average, .284 expected weighted on-base average (xwOBA) and 3.40 expected earned run average (xERA).

A tweak to his pitch mix paved the way for his success last year. Mahle ditch his curve and essentially the cutter adding a slider. Here's his swings and misses by pitch plot from Statcast:

Breaking down each pitch, note the strikeout rate with the slider and improved whiff percentages across the board:

Pitch

Usage

xBA

xwOBA

Whiff%

Put Away%

K%

4-seam

54.9%

.195

.318

31.6%

20.8%

28.3%

Slider

32.4%

.180

.243

41.5%

22.9%

36.8%

Split

11.7%

.186

.250

22.2%

20%

19.2%

Sometimes less equals more, even for a pitcher. Streamlining his approach cut is zone contact by 7.8 percent while increasing his whiff percentage by 10.5 percent. Yes, less ground balls hurts but Mahle reduced barrel rate by 1.5 percentage points. Focus on the expected numbers along with a lower average exit velocity against. Soft contact plays in the majors. A potentially "deadened” baseball helps his profile as well. He's on the precipice of a next step improving once again in his swing and take chart:

A one MPH gain in his fastball velocity helped his cause, could there be room for a little more growth in it? Stay tuned.

Shifting to Brooks Baseball to focus on his swinging strike percentage by pitch, once again the slider proved pivotal to his success last year:

Pitch

SwStr% 2019

SwStr% 2020

 Gain/Loss (+/-)

4-seam

9.33%

14.08%

+4.75

Slider

0%

20%

+20

Split

16.61%

10.87%

-5.74

It could be an intriguing development if Mahle rebounds with his split-fingered fastball swinging strike rate and the slider gains hold. Even with some slight regression with the new slider, there's room for growth. Cincinnati seems committed to him in the rotation so it's time to make the most of his opportunity in 2021. Here's his projection sets from five sites:

Hoping for a double-digit win season with 160-ish strikeouts. Projecting wins gets dicey but targeting Mahle at his present price point with some room for upside baked in may work out well.

 

Statistical Credits:

Fangraphs.com

BaseballSavant.com

BrooksBaseball.net

THE BAT courtesy of Derek Carty

ATC courtesy of Ariel Cohen

Steamerprojections.com

ZiPS courtesy of Dan Szymborski