King Felix Is Bad, but How Bad Are We Talking?

Ever since the end of the last season, we heard so much about the looming demise of King Felix. People just wanted to talk trash about him so much that even one expert called him one of the first quarter busts, when he was putting up 2.21 ERA (Seriously, I understand the point, but he was nothing but a bust during the early season in Fantasy. Whether his performance was due to luck or not is whole another issue).

Personally I have been a King Felix fan, and I'm more than sad to see his throne ending so early. His CY Young days are probably over, and we have to be prepared to see different King for the rest of his career.

So we all agree that King isn't the King any more, but how bad is he really? At least on paper, our criticism towards a pitcher with 3.23 ERA has been little bit unfair. I feel like everybody is suddenly into Sabermetircs when it comes to King.

His first outing since he came off the DL against the White Sox was probably "I told you so" moment for a lot of people out there. He was rocked pretty heavily for 10 hits and 5 runs, and he only recorded two strikeouts. His current 7.11 K/9 and 3.62 BB/9 are both career worst, and his 9.1% K-BB% is very distant from his 16.1% career average.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that he is certainly pitching worse than his ERA suggests. There was one very important and positive sign, however, from his last outing: Velocity. His fastballs (4-seamer and sinker) have averaged 90.2 mph this season, which is obviously terrible, but he successfully brought it up to 91.6 mph in his last outing. It was just one game, but he never averaged higher than 91 mph in any of his other starts this season, so his time at DL certainly did something good for him.

Also, his bad control this season doesn't have anything to do with his mechanics. He has been putting 43.7% of his pitches inside the zone this year, which is the exact same rate as his last season. The only difference so far is that the hitters have been making better contacts on his pitches, so he couldn't get enough swings and misses to improve his K-BB numbers. If he actually have regained his velocity, we probably don't have to worry about his control issue going forward.

The best part about him is that he still has maintained his excellent batted ball profile while pitching with garbage fastballs. His 52.9 groundball % is still one of the best in the league (15^th among the qualified starters), and he hasn't even given out more line drives (2016: 19.6%, career: 18.2%) or hard hits (2016; 25.7%, career: 26.7%). Regardless how slow he throws, his curve and changeup can definitely induce weak contacts.

This is a godsend timing to acquire his service at the low. I can't remember the last time the general public was this much panicked for a low 3.00 ERA pitcher, and we are talking about a player who used to be one of the best in the game. I mean, we don't talk about Carlos Carrasco (2.31 ERA. 3.95 FIP. Velo drop 0.7 mph) or Chris Sale (3.18 ERA. 3.70 FIP. Velo drop 1.5 mph) this way, right? Yes, King is older, but surprisingly not by much (King is only a year older than Carrasco).

You probably shouldn't expect him returning to pre-2014 level, but I think his last season's line, 3.52 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, and 8.52 K/9, is still within the reach, and that's a pretty valuable starter in this game. Gamers, please make a room in your rosters. The King isn't done yet.

Rest of the Season Steamer Projection