2016 Fantasy Baseball Player Profile: Julio Urias

Julio Urias is a 19 year old lefty for the Dodgers. He might not be young enough to drink, or do a lot of things for that matter, but one thing he can do is fiercely chuck the pelota at batters. The Dodgers have decided to call up Urias to start Friday in place of an injured Alex Wood. It’s unclear how much time Wood will miss with triceps tightness, it could just be one start, so the normal cautions apply with Urias as he could be back in the minors next week. There’s also the obvious workload issues, that I’ll detail below, but this is, without a doubt, one special arm.  

THE NUMBERS

Here are Urias’ rankings amongst all the prospects in baseball.

As I stated at the top, this guy is the elite of the elite.

THE MOTION

For those of you that have yet to see Urias on the bump, here’s some video from Spring Training. As you will see, he has a small degree of deception that allows him to hide the ball which aids his elite stuff.

THE SKILLS

Urias has a feel for pitching which is exceedingly rare for a pitcher of his age. There are plenty of pitchers in the big leagues that can’t make that claim and this kid isn’t 20 years old yet. That, along with his slight bit of deception, really helps to up the pure stuff, which on its own, is impressive. Julio is sometimes compared to Felix Hernandez, not because of their size or because of the arm they throw with, but because of his innate feel for pitching at such a young age.

Urias’ fastball is an elite pitch. It routinely sits at 90-94 mph, though he has at times tickled 97 mph. It’s not the overall velocity the scouts drool over but the late life the pitch has. “Late life” means the ball seems to explode on hitters the last 15 feet. He also has pinpoint control with the pitch which, when combined with the late movement, has the baseball universe drooling. Obviously he has control of the pitch in all quadrants of the strike zone.

Urias throws a curveball that is a plus pitch. In fact, it’s so impressive there are some who think he should use the pitch more frequently. Urias has the “touch’ with this pitch as well as he can spin it for a strike or drop a hammer low in the strike zone to create a swing and miss. He will throw the pitch from multiple angles to help aid the deception of the pitch. He also has the rate talent that allows him to manipulate the pitch. By that I mean he can tighten the spin on the pitcher to create the old 12-to-6 break (the top of a clock, to the bottom). He can also get around the pitch, intentionally, and give it move of a sweeping break than the top to bottom hammer. It’s almost as if he has two pitches in one with the curveball.

Unlike most prospects, Urias has three plus pitches as his changeup also falls into that category. The changeup has a ton of late fade, much like the late movement on his fastball, and it simply darts away from hitters. The pitch is also coming in at a perfect speed giving him the ideal separation between his fastball and changeup.

His three pitch repertoire suggests that he can be an elite pitcher in the big leagues.

THE WORKLOAD

Signed out of the Mexican League as a 16 year old, Urias threw 54.1 innings in 2013.

He then threw a career-high 87.2 innings as a 17 year old in 2014.

Last season the 18 year old threw 80.1 innings.

This season he’s thrown 41 frames in the minors.

Urias has never thrown 90 innings in a professional season.

Urias is 19 years old.

Those last two points are massive negatives for his 2016 outlook. Teams usually like to increase young arms by about 20-25 percent or 30 or so innings year over year. A plan like that would cap Urias at about 115-120 innings this season and that means there is simply no way that he will make 20 starts the rest of the way for the Dodgers. If we go with 120 innings as the limit that leaves a mere 80-innings on the arm of Urias this season. Even if he averaged a terrible five innings a start, 20 starts would leave him with 100 innings in the big league and then 41 in the minors, way above the likely target zone for Urias. It’s not just that Urias has no seasons of 90 frames on his arm it’s also that he is just 19 years old. The Dodgers simply cannot push him aggressively at that age. In fact, they have been extremely reluctant to push him at all since they signed him and there is no reason to think that will change in 2016.

PLAYING TIME

As I noted at the top, we have no idea how long Urias will be in the big leagues in 2016. Will he make one start? Four? Fourteen? We just don’t know. Here’s why.

The Dodgers have a top-3 of Clayton Kershaw, Kenta Maeda and Scott Kazmir. There are then a ton of options to for the fourth and fifth spots in the rotation.

We don’t know how much time Alex Wood will miss with his triceps issue. It could be as little as one start.

Mike Bolsinger was recently recalled as he’s finally healthy.

Hyun-Jin Ryu is nearing a return from shoulder/groin issues, seemingly within about three weeks.

Brandon McCarthy recently had a setback in his recovery from Tommy John surgery but he figures to be ready to rock in July.

Brett Anderson had back surgery in March for a bulging disk, but the belief is that he will able to return in the second half.

Ross Stripling is waiting in the wings at Triple-A having made eight starts with the big league club this season.

As you can see, it’s not like the Dodgers lack options at the back end of their rotation.

CONCLUSION

Unlikely most youngsters, hell most big leaguers, Urias has three plus pitches. He can control them all and has certain strikeout per inning stuff. If able to throw 200-innings at the big league level he should be able to attain the level of a top-20 starting pitcher in the fantasy game with the ability to be even better – an SP1. The floor would seem to be a mid-level big league hurler, let’s say the third starter on his own club, and there just aren’t many prospects that carry this level of risk (virtually none). The only real concern with Urias at this point are the miles on his arm. Until he throws more innings we simply don’t know if he will be able to handle the workload though, so there is always the chance that he becomes a shutdown closer if his body doesn’t hold up.

For 2016 it is certainly plausible to posit that Urias will end up in the Dodgers’ bullpen. There are simply no miles on his arm, and as we see all over the baseball landscape, teams are rue to simply run out young, dynamic arms, if there isn’t a stable base of innings to draw from. That fact alone makes Urias as nothing more than a short-term pick up in mixed leagues. The temptation will be to go all in with Urias, and the arm warrants it, but with his role up in the air resistance is the prudent course of action.  

A final AUDIO shot on what to expect with Urias.

Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 6 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).