The Cincinnati Reds sit four and a half games out of first place in the National League Central and if the season were to end right now they would land the final wild card spot in the playoffs.
The Reds offense was thought to be much better than what they have shown as their 96 wRC+ means they are are 4% worse than the league average on offense. Feel free to blame manager Dusty Baker who still insists on batting Zack Cozart in the two-hole despite his abysmal .275 on-base percentage and 76 wRC+.
It has been the Reds pitching that has been carrying this team into contention and likely into a playoff spot despite playing in a top-heavy and competitive division. Helping lead the way is fourth year starter Mike Leake who is having a career year that has made me want to dig a little deeper into his numbers.
Including last night’s start, Mike Leake currently ranks tied for ninth in the National League in Baseball-Reference’s WAR (Wins Above Replacement) with 2.7 and his Fangraphs’ WAR sits at a very solid 1.7.
Mike Leake currently ranks eighth in the NL in ERA at 2.52, seventh in ERA+ at 159, and is walking batters at a career best rate of 1.82 per nine innings and only 5.0%.Granted, Mike Leake has always been good at limiting the walks as his career rate sits at 6.1%, to limit walks to 5% usually ranks among the league leaders.
Mike Leake is keeping the ball in the ballpark, something he has never been good at. His career HR/9 rate coming into the season was 1.26 which was fourth worst in the NL among active pitchers since his major league debut season.
Somehow, though, Mike Leake has kept the ball in the park at a rate of 0.69 this season which is far below the league average of 1.01 on the year. How is he doing it?
For starters, Mike Leake is keeping the ball on the ground with a near 52% ground ball rate which is the best mark of his career and three percentage points better than his career mark coming into the season.
Mike Leake’s HR/FB rate is also way down from his 14.6% mark coming into this year and it currently sits well below the league average at 8.2%.
Limiting walks and home runs is one surefire way of improving your stats. Heck, his FIP is evidence of that at sitting at 3.52. Mike Leake has never been anything near a league-average strike out performing but he is striking out nearly 16% of batters he faces, which is right in line with his career average of 15.9%.
Mike Leake has mixed up his repertoire a bit and maybe that has been in his favor. He has reduced throwing his slider from nearly 13% coming into the year to below 6%. His slider was worth -5.8 runs coming into this season. Probably smart he uses it less.
Mike Leake is throwing his curve ball much more. Mike Leake was throwing it just over 9% of the time coming into the year and is throwing it nearly 13% of the time this year and it has been worth +5.1 runs. Yeah, I would throw it more as well.
Lastly, Mike Leake’s cutter has improved every year since 2010 when it was worth -8.4 runs. It was -2.4 runs in 2011, +4.8 runs last year, and is already at +3.9 runs this year.
Yes, Mike Leake has been using an approach that has been working halfway through this year but let’s not throw caution to the wind. A pitcher who misses that few amount of bats can still have his place in this league as long as he keeps doing what he is doing: limiting walks and home runs. But, with his track record of allowing home runs, I do not see him as anything close to the top-10 pitcher he has been to this point in the season. If you own Mike Leake in fantasy then be happy with what you have gotten and sell high.
