Fantasy Baseball Sleepers:
Nick Pivetta – Owned in 12% of Yahoo Fantasy Baseball leagues.
This is an early grab opportunity. Now, you may look at his 6.02 ERA over 133 IP last season and wonder what I’m thinking here. But I’m not alone. First, there’s an excellent case to be made for Nick Pivetta‘s results being heavily influenced by bad luck last year. Second, his curveball appears to have significantly more drop, and his slider is looking more like a slurve than a cutter in his first two starts.
This looks like a pitcher who reworked his arsenal over the winter. Of course, he’s always had great stuff. It’s his command that has sometimes eluded him. But as Eno Sarris pointed out here, Pivetta was in the 90th percentile for the spin on his curve in 2017 and the 73rd percentile for vertical movement on his slider.
And as the linked Athletic piece goes on to show, he made improvements with that curveball as the season went on, increasing the break as the SBNation link above appears to show. If he can better utilize his fastball in 2018, there may be a breakout coming. You can probably put him on your watch list and wait for another start or two, but the longer you wait, the higher the risk that someone beats you to him.
Pivetta has a chance to be this year’s Zack Godley. With 1 W, 12 K and 9 H over his first 9 and ⅔ IP, he has the tools to be a four-category starter. If you have room to stash him or are willing to roll the dice on starting him immediately, it could pay dividends.