Luis Severino is a 22 year old who was born in the Dominican Republic. Standing 6’2”, and weighing in at about 210 lbs, the righty has a heavy fastball that allowed him to shred the minor league competition. He had immediate success last year with the Yankees, and though he’s had a hiccup early this season there are still plenty of reasons to like the arm of the righty of the Yankees.
THE MINOR LEAGUE NUMBERS
Entering last season Severino was ranked as the 35th best prospect in baseball according to Baseball America. He was ranked 51st at Baseball Prospectus and 23rd at MLB.com.
| LEVEL | W-L | ERA | WHIP | K/9 | BB/9 | IP |
2012 | DOSL | 4-2 | 1.68 | 0.98 | 6.3 | 2.4 | 64.1 |
2013 | Rookie, A | 4-2 | 2.45 | 1.07 | 10.8 | 2.0 | 44.0 |
2014 | A, High-A, AA | 6-5 | 2.47 | 1.06 | 10.1 | 2.2 | 113.0 |
2015 | AA, AAA | 9-2 | 2.45 | 1.00 | 8.9 | 2.4 | 99.1 |
Career |
| 23-11 | 2.30 | 1.03 | 9.1 | 2.3 | 320.2 |
*DOSL – Dominican Summer League
Those are some utterly dominating numbers.
THE MAJOR LEAGUE NUMBERS
| W-L | ERA | WHIP | K/9 | BB/9 | IP |
2015 | 5-3 | 3.03 | 1.20 | 8.09 | 3.18 | 62.1 |
2016 | 0-3 | 6.86 | 1.78 | 5.49 | 1.37 | 19.2 |
Career | 5-6 | 3.84 | 1.34 | 7.46 | 2.74 | 82.0 |
THE SKILLS
Let’s talk about his fastball. Over the course of his 15 big league starts Severino has thrown his fastball an average of 95.3 mph according to PITCHf/x. Since the start of the season, amongst guys who have thrown 15 innings, Severino is 6th in baseball with a 95.6 mph mark on his fastball.
At this point of his big league career, here’s how things have gone with the fastball.
| AVG | OBP | SLG | BABIP | wOBA |
2015-16 | .277 | .324 | .491 | .316 | .350 |
Let’s talk about his slider. PITCHf/x shows his slider this season to be coming in at 89.6 mph, six tenths more than last season. Since the start of the season, amongst guys who have thrown 15 innings, Severino is 2nd in baseball with a 89.6 mph mark on his slider. The only man who has thrown his slider harder is Noah Syndergaard, and I wrote about the dangers of that Tuesday.
At this point of his big league career, here’s how things have gone with the slider.
| AVG | OBP | SLG | BABIP | wOBA |
2015-16 | .283 | .339 | .415 | .318 | .332 |
The point is that Severino throws hard, and his fastball/slider combo, in terms of velocity, has only been bettered by one man in baseball – Syndergaard. If that was the only data point you had with Severino, how could you not be excited?
Severino has also been able to effectively spot his changeup which he doesn’t throw frequently (13 percent of the time).
| AVG | OBP | SLG | BABIP | wOBA |
2015-16 | .200 | .273 | .225 | .276 | .231 |
Let’s talk the batted ball.
For his career Severino has a .311 BABIP. That’s right in the normal range. This year the mark is .417. It will drop as the innings pile up, likely back down to his career level with enough frames. I mean, come on. 
After posting a 20.0 percent line drive rate, a league average mark as a rookie, that mark has soared to 33.8 percent after the beating he took in his last outing. That ain’t gonna continue. #SampleSizeFunnyBusiness
The guy, on the plus side, doesn’t give up fly balls. Last year the fly ball rate was 29.2 percent, and this year it’s even lower at 14.9 percent giving Severino a career mark of 25.3 percent. That’s so low it’s hard to completely buy into it, but if he can maintain that, wow. Note that he’s allowed 1.21 homers per nine innings at this point of his career. How can that possibly continue if he never gives up the fly ball? There’s little reason to believe that his 17.5 percent HR/FB ratio will continue unabated. I base that on the league average of 10 percent, and the fact that during his minor league career his HR/FB ratio was about five percent.
Let’s talk grounders. Last year his ground ball rate was 50.3 percent. This year the mark is 51.4 percent. That leaves him with a career mark of 50.6 percent. That’s an excellent mark that was attained by only 21 men who qualified for the ERA title last season. Those grounders are key when you consider that he pitches in a home park that can lead to a few big flies.
Severino struck out more than a batter per inning as a minor leaguer. As a rookie with the Yankees he posted a strong 8.09 mark. This season the mark has plummeted down to 5.49 per nine. There nothing in his background to suggest that the mark shouldn’t increase, significantly, as the season moves forward. Note that his current swinging strike rate is 7.8 percent after a mark of 9.6 percent last season. Keep an eye on this measure.
Severino barely walked two batters per nine innings as a minor leaguer. Though the mark went up to 3.18 batters per nine last season it might surprise you to learn that his walk rate has crashed this season down to 1.37 per nine this season, even with all the struggles. In total he has a 2.74 BB/9 rate that is slightly below the league average. He should be able to sustain his career mark moving forward.
CONCLUSION
I say/write it all the time. I want strikeouts, grounders and no walks. Though the strikeouts are down a bit this season, Severino still profiles exceptionally well in all three of these measures. This is a profile that you want to own. Doesn’t mean things will turn around in his next start, but eventually they will. One would think that he has a relatively long leash with the Yanks, so he should be given a chance to work through this slow start. He’s a really nice talent.
In a 10-team league you can move on. Hard to roster strugglers when there is so much talent available on waivers.
In a 12-team league I would hold if I owned Severino. You can do the Jose Berrios, Sean Manaea, Michael Fulmer route if you want, and if you did that it could certainly work out, but note that Severino is a talent on par with those arms and that he is the only one with big league experience.
In a 15-team league I wouldn’t be a bailing on talent like this. Depends on the particulars of the club, but hold if you can.
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).
Player News
Yankees’ manager Aaron Boone said after Friday’s game that Marcus Stroman’s knee was bothering him during his miserable outing and that he was sent for X-rays.
Stroman gave up five runs on four hits and three walks in just 2/3 of an inning in a brutal loss to the Giants on Friday, leaving some to wonder whether or not his spot was safe in the Yankees’ rotation. Now it sounds like he could be heading for a stay on the injured list, which may be the next best thing for all parties involved.
Masyn Winn (back) told reporters after Friday’s game that he would likely miss a couple of games but that he would not require a trip to the injured list.
Winn was pulled from Friday’s game after one inning due to spasms in his lower back. While it’s encouraging to hear that he’s unlikely to require a trip to the injured list, it sounds like fantasy managers are going to be without him for at least the rest of the weekend. Thomas Saggese slid over and covered shortstop when Winn exited on Friday night and is likely to see increased action there while he is shelved.
Yainer Diaz went 3-for-5 with a home run, double, five total RBI, and two runs scored in a 14-3 win over the Angels on Friday.
Diaz really needed a game like this. Hit-less in seven of his nine games this season, he teed off on the Angels bullpen in this one. His fifth inning grand slam broke the game open and his sixth inning double was tattooed as well. Hopefully he can build on this because he’s had one of the worst starts for any hitter in the league and he still has a lowly .432 OPS even after this huge performance. In the end, the Astros pulverized the Angels and reminded them who the top dogs still are in the AL West.
Ronel Blanco allowed four hits and two earned runs with one walk and seven strikeouts in a win over the Angels on Friday.
This was Blanco’s best start of the season results wise by far, but he still faced some of the same challenges that have caused him to start slow. The Angels had plenty of traffic on the bases as Blanco struggled to spot his slider against this right-handed heavy lineup. However, he worked his curveball well as a pitch he could consistently throw in the zone and stole seven called strikes with it and then mixed his pitches well when ahead in the count to set down what was a red-hot Angels lineup. This was a huge step in the right direction and he’ll look to build on it in his next scheduled start against the Cardinals.
Mike Trout went 1-for-4 with a solo home run on Friday against the Astros.
Don’t look now, but Trout tied the major league lead with this blast. At the time, it pulled the Angels to a 1-1 tie early in this game before the Astros unleashed their wrath on Jack Kochanowicz and the Angels bullpen. Nevertheless, it’s amazing to see Trout healthy and mashing for the time being. Fingers crossed he can stay on the field and we get one more vintage season from Trout.
Jack Kochanowicz allowed six hits and six earned runs with three walks and one strikeout across 4 2/3 innings in a loss to the Astros on Friday.
After reducing his sinker usage significantly in his first two starts, Kochanowicz must have heard it calling to him like the Green Goblin mask because he threw it a season-high 69% of the time in this one. It did its job early, forcing 14 ground balls on the 19 total balls in play by the Astros, but they wound up getting around on it during their third time around the order and chased Kochanowicz after five straight batters reached base with two outs in the fifth inning. Then, Yainer Diaz blasted a grand slam and added three more runs to Kochanowicz’s ledger. He will probably need to find a way to throw slightly fewer sinkers if he wants to succeed at the major league level. He’s scheduled to face the Rangers in his next start.