Rum Bunter 2020 Pittsburgh Pirates Staff Predictions: Noah

With the season now just days away, it’s time for the Rum Bunter staff to begin making their predictions for the 2020 edition of the Pittsburgh Pirates

At long last, the 2020 season is just around the corner for the Pittsburgh Pirates. By the end of next week, Major League Baseball should be in full swing. So, of course, that means now is the time to make our predictions for what we think is going to happen.

Who will be the team MVP For the Pittsburgh Pirates? Who will be their rookie of the year, and who will be breakout candidates? Which positions are the strongest, and weakest? And what will the team’s final record be?

It’s a bit harder to predict what’s going to happen in a season like this. After all, this will be the shortest season in MLB history and one that could be thrown off the rails by the coronavirus at any point. That said, all of us here at Rum Bunter will do out best to make predictions to what’s going to happen throughout 2020. So without further ado, let’s get into it, starting with what I think the team’s record will be and why.

Team Record: 28-32

The Pittsburgh Pirates are not supposed to be a competitive team, nor are they really built like one. Now, yes, I would love for them to get off to a blazing hot start and somehow make the postseason, even if it is a shallow run, and that isn’t out of the question as we know they can get off to a hot start.

But just because they’re not competitive doesn’t mean they’re going to be completely awful. The Pirates could have one of the best defenses in the National League by the end of the season. Plus they’ll have Josh Bell, Bryan Reynolds, Kevin Newman as above average bats with Adam Frazier, although not really all that great of a batter, one who you can rely on to put up a .277/.340/.410 line at the plate.

But there are a lot of questions about pitching. Aside from Joe Musgrove and Mitch Keller, can Trevor Williams bounce back? How will the Steven Brault/Chad Kuhl piggyback starts work out? Can Derek Holland bounce back to some form that isn’t his 2019 self?

What about guys in the bullpen like Geoff Hartlieb, Clay Holmes, Michael Feliz, Kyle Crick, and Richard Rodriguez? Can they take that next step to be reliable relief pitchers, or bounce back from rough 2019 seasons? Some of these players will have good 2020 seasons, as I don’t think all will fail, but there’s a lot of if’s surrounding the pitching staff.

MVP and Rookie Of The Year: Ke’Bryan Hayes

Ke’Bryan Hayes has the potential to be a 5 WAR player in a full season, and I think he’ll show that potential this year. There are absolutely no questions about Hayes’ defensive ability. Hayes has a 70 future grade per FanGraphs with a current of 60. MLB Pipeline currently gives his fielding a 65 grade. He’s got a great arm too, with both FanGraphs and Pipeline having him at 60. He’s the only third base prospect with at least 60+ grades for his fielding and arm by FanGraphs.

Hayes can also run a bit. Through the last three years, Hayes has stolen 52 bases in 68 attempts. Right now, FanGraphs has his speed grade at 60, while MLB Pipeline places it at 55. This gives him an athletic ability not too many third basemen have.

Though he isn’t a typical big time corner bat, that doesn’t mean he won’t be unproductive at the plate. Now yes, last year Hayes had a 92 wRC+ and .329 wOBA. But Hayes also put the ball on the ground 46.4% of the time last season. Plus, he was much better in the second half of 2019, showing that he was improving at Triple-A.

Hayes has a 9.4% career minor league walk rate to go with a 16.8% strikeout rate. Pretty good numbers. The top prospect was doing great in Spring Training before it was shut down, collecting seven hits, including a double, and home run, while walking five times to go against four strikeouts.

Hayes’ 92 MPH exit velocity last season gives a lot of hope that as long as he isn’t hitting the ball on the ground, he’ll find plenty of hits, including a lot of doubles with his speed. I think you could expect a 2018 Ben Zobrist-like season when he hit .305/.378/.440 with a 117 wRC+ with defense that will give Nolan Arenado and Manny Machado a run for their money for the National League Third Base Gold Glove Award.

Cy Young: Mitch Keller

While Hayes might be the team’s rookie of the year, the Pirates number one pitching prospect will give him a run for his money. I’ll go with the Pirates’ top pitching prospect Mitch Keller as the Pittsbrguh Pirates’ Cy Young.

When you look at it, Keller and 2019 NL ERA leader and 3rd place finisher in Cy Young voting, Hyun-Jin Ryu had really similar ‘19 seasons. Keller had a 3.19 FIP, Ryu had a 3.10 FIP. Keller had a 3.47 xFIP, Ryu had a 3.30 xFIP. Keller had a 3.78 SIERA, Ryu had a 3.77 SIERA.

Keller could also be compared to Jack Flaherty of the Cardinals as he had a similar xFIP (3.64), and SIERA (3.68). Keller also had a 28.6% strikeout rate compared to Flahety’s 29.9%. Flahetty had a 1.15 HR/9, almost identical to Keller’s 1.13 HR/9. Flaherty had a 39.5% and Keller had a 39.2% ground ball rate. While Flaherty induced more soft contact (23.6%) than Keller (15.2%), Keller still gave up less hard contact (35.9%) than Flaherty (37.6%).

I should also mention that he was the best pitcher at Triple-A as he led all Triple-A pitchers in ERA, FIP, K/9, strikeout rate, HR/9, and posting a solid 8% walk rate to go with a WHIP that was the 2nd lowest at Triple-A (1.24).

So what did Keller do wrong that gave him an ERA above 7 while both Flaherty and Ryu both had ERA’s below 3? Well it wasn’t really anything that Keller did, much more being what he didn’t have. Both Flaherty and Ryu had two of the best defenses in baseball behind them. In the National League, the Cardinals were third in the league in DRS, UZR, and were 6th in range runs. The Dodgers led the league in DRS, and the 5th highest range runs above average, and while they did have a negative UZR at -2.0, it was really the only defensive stat they were lacking in. Meanwhile, the Pirates ranked next to last in DRS, last in UZR, and last in range runs above average. The Pirates gave ample amount of playing time to Colin Moran, Josh Bell, Elias Diaz, and Starling Marte who all were the worst defenders at their position, with Kevin Newman as the 5th worst at his position of shortstop.

This all led to a .475 batting average on balls in play. You literally can’t get more unlucky than this. It’s the highest single season BAbip by a starter ever in at least 40 innings of work. The highest BAbip of all time in at least 150 innings is from Cy Bentley at .385 in 1872, almost a whole .100 lower than Keller’s.

Since 1950, there have only been eight single seasons where a pitcher has had at least 150 innings and a BAbip of .350 or higher. The Pittsburgh Pirates are going to have a whole new defense with Hayes, Cole Tucker, Jose Ousna, Jacob Stallings, and Jarrod Dyson all projected to serve regular roles for the Pirates in 2020, with Josh Bell seeing an ample amount of time, if not all of his plate appearances coming from designated hitter.

Keller could have an ERA in the low-3’s with the numbers he put up last year. Keller has outstanding peripherals. Aside from his ERA and BAbip, everything points to him being an ace. He has perpherials that are near-identical to Jack Flaherty and Patrick Corbin. He has a pitch repertoire that you could confuse for Justin Verlander’s. His ERA estimators are similar to that of Ryu’s. This is a recipe for greatness. Not only do I think Mitch Keller could win the National League Rookie Of The Year, but I also think we could see Keller get a few Cy Young votes. Expect big things from Keller in 2020.

Breakout Pitcher: Clay Holmes

Now, yes, Clay Holmes did not have a great 2019 season. His biggest weakness was walks, which he gave up at a 15% rate. But aside from that, he overall had a solid season. Holmes had a 23.3% strikeout rate and 0.9 HR/9. He also induced soft contact 25% of the time when the league average was 17%. Not only was he giving up a lot of soft contact, but he induced ground balls at an outstanding 60% rate.

All of Holmes’ struggles came from his fastball. Holmes’ walk rate with his fastball was nearly 38% at 37.9%. 14 of his 36 walks came from his fastball. Opponents hit for a .313 batting average and .563 slugging percentage against the pitch. Meanwhile, his three other primary pitches, his sinker, slider and curve all had an opponent batting average against of .250 or lower and slugging percentage of .381 or lower. His fastball has very little spin coming in at the bottom 7th percentile. Combined with below average movement and only averaging 94 MPH on it and you have a pitch that is easy to hit.

In comparison, his sinker is a better version of his fastball. Not only can he throw it harder at 94.3 MPH on average, but it has a lot more movement with 27.8 inches of vertical drop (32% above average) and 14.6 inches of horizontal movement (average). His curveball has 55.2 inches of vertical drop to go with 9.9 inches of horizontal movement and his slider has 39.1/2.8 inches vertical/horizontal movement. With Oscar Marin as the new pitching coach, hopefully they realize that Holmes has a lot of potential. But in order to reach that potential, Holmes needs to drop his fastball.

Breakout Position Player: Jacob Stallings

Now I think catcher Jacob Stallings could be one of the most valuable players on the Pirates’ roster in 2020 in multiple ways. I even think he could be one of the team’s best players.

First, there’s his defense. Stallings had +14 DRS, and caught 40% of the runners trying to steal on him. Not only did he do that, but was worth +8.7 framing runs. That ranked 11th in the MLB. Despite having just 3058 framing chances, nearly 5000 fewer than the 2nd place leader in framing runs, Yasmani Grandal, and nearly half of the 10th place finisher Buster Posey.

Stallings showed outstanding work behind the plate. Across 6000 chances, that would equal about 17.1 framing runs. Stallings also had 3.6 blocking runs, showing that he was outstanding at keeping the ball in front of him. All told, Stallings had a 1.4 defensive WAR in just 463.1 innings behind the dish. Across 800 innings, that comes out to a 2.4 dWAR. That will all surely help the pitchers.

While that’s great for defense, and defense is what you want to focus on when looking at a catcher, I think many overlook Stallings could be a contributor with the bat, more so than you think. For one, Stallings batted .262/.325/.382 with a 82 wRC+ and .297 wOBA in 210 plate appearances. The average major league catcher batted .236/.308/.405 with an 85 wRC+ and .303 wOBA. Basically, Stallings was your league average catcher offensively.

But Stallings has shown the ability to be a much more productive batter, even for a catcher. Deserved runs created plus is Baseball Prospectus’ version of wRC+ and OPS+, and is a better way of predicting a player’s future performance. Stallings had a pretty solid 96 DRC+.

Some notable names with a DRC+ around that are Amed Rosario (96), Didi Gregorious (96), James McCann (96), and our very own Adam Frazier (95). Not only does DRC+ see Stallings improving, but so does some of his expected stats. You shouldn’t expect much regression in terms of batting average as he still had an xBA of .259. But Stallings had a expected slugging of .423, again placing him right with Mets’ shortstop Amed Rosario who had 15 home runs and 30 doubles. Stallings also had a .313 xWOBA. Although not outstanding by any means, it shows he can improve in that area too as he had a .297 wOBA in ‘19. His xWOBA also tied him with Jonathan Villar, a guy who had a 109 OPS+ last year. With an 88.8 MPH average exit velocity in 2019, Stallings would rank in the top 10 of all catchers last year too. Just for reference, the MLB average exit velo was 87.5 MPH.

Although Stallings might not be the best batter on the team, all the signs point that he could be an underrated player in 2020. If he stays healthy, I could see Stallings hitting .260/.330/.420. A catcher who has a .750 OPS is really, really good, and even more so considering the defensive value that Stallings brings to the table.

Best Position: Shortstop

When you look at the amount of young talent the Pittsburgh Pirates have at shortstop, you can see why it can be their best position on the diamond. For now, Kevin Newman will start out as the team’s primary option at short. Although he lacks the defense, being the 5th worst defender in baseball at the position with -7 DRS, -5.2 UZR, and -4 range runs above average, Newman definitely had a fairly good bat. Through 531 plate appearances, Newman hit .308/.353/.446 with a dozen home runs, 20 doubles, all putting together a 111 OPS+ and 110 wRC+. Newman also stole 16 bases.

But the hope is that Cole Tucker will eventually take over at shortstop. Tucker is an outstanding defender, no question about it. Through just the 318.2 innings he got at the MLB level at short, Tucker had +2 DRS, a 4.6 UZR/150 and 0.3 range runs above average. FanGraphs gives him a 55 future fielding grade with a 70 throwing grade as well. However, Tucker has also shown some promise with the bat at the major league level. Despite his overall sub-par numbers at Triple-A, he isn’t one you should really worry about offensively. Tucker still walked at a strong 10.8% last year at Triple-A, with an above average hard hit rate in the Majors. Along with that, Tucker also looked to get a lot more familiar with major league pitching as the season went on. Through his final 64 plate appearances of the season, the switch hitter had a .294/.359/.517 line.

Bold Prediction: Pirates Have Two Players Get Cy Young Votes

If you want bold, this is it. The Pittsburgh Pirates haven’t had a player finish with any Cy Young votes since 2015 with Gerrit Cole finishing 4th in voting. You know you have a good pitching staff when your team gets two players with Cy Young votes, but I think the Pirates can do it. The first one being Keller. I’ve already said why I think Keller will be an outstanding player. But the other player, Joe Musgrove, has the potential to be just as good.

Since coming over from Houston in the Cole trade, Musgrove has a 4.28 ERA, but really strong peripherals. For one, in those two seasons, the right hander has a 3.72 FIP. He has also been a control artist, walking just 1.95 batters per 9 innings, and having a 5.1% walk rate.

Those are almost identical control numbers to the two-time Cy Young winner, Jacob deGrom (1.92 BB/9, 5.5% walk rate). Musgrove has also allowed just a HR/9 of 1.04 since the beginning of 2018, which actually ties him with Corey Kluber. Despite being a control-heavy pitcher, he still can get some strikeouts with a 21.4% strikeout rate the past two years.

In terms of deserved run average, Musgrove has excelled in that too. In 2018, he had a 3.43 DRA, and last year he had a 3.59 DRA. Clearly, it’s been bad batted ball luck that has hurt Musgrove. In both years, his opponent xBA has been lower than their actual BA. He also had a strong 3.35 xERA in 2018. Despite inducing soft contact at a 20.2% rate in 2018 and 19.2% rate in 2019 while posting a ground ball rate above 40% in both seasons with runners on base, Musgrove still has a sub-70% left on base rate. If the baseball is truly unjucied, and the defense holds up, Musgrove could get a Cy Young vote or two. After all, he has the potential to be the Pirates’ co-ace with Keller.