Collette Calls: Bold Pitcher Predictions Accountability

This is the second half of my annual accountability review for the 60 bold predictions I make each season. You can review the hitting accountability article here. Spoiler alert: there are several big misses in this, but I am rather proud of where I did find success, especially since many of these players ended up being undervalued on the draft market compared to their final earned auction value. 

Celebrating Success

Michael King is a top-40 overall pitcher - King's ADP was 143 when I made this prediction, and he was barely inside the top-100 pitcher rankings. By ADP, he was right behind Chris Bassitt and Jordan Montgomery and right in front of Hunter Greene and Merrill Kelly. Greene finished one spot behind King in the final starting pitcher rankings as the only one of those other names to have a positive final earned auction value. King finished 16th amongst starting pitchers with a strong season and kicked off the postseason by dominating Atlanta. 

Chad Green is a top-150 pitcher - Green finished 112th overall on the pitcher list thanks to his four wins, 17 saves and good ratios. He did have some late-season blowups, but a $3 final earned value for a pitcher with an ADP of 719 is a big win.

Spencer Strider is not a top-20 pitcher - This was not based on any injury prediction as much as it was the unknown of how the young man would bounce back after both a sizable jump in workload year over year as well as the volume of work he put in during the 2023 season alone. The references to Triston McKenzie, Alek Manoah and Julio Urias were used to show the good (Urias) and the bad (McKenzie and Manoah) and why I strongly suggested not taking Strider in the first round as many were at that time. 

Sean Manaea is a top-100 pitcher - Manaea finished 19th on the starting pitcher final rankings and 25th on the overall pitcher rankings with his resurgent season. He set career highs in innings, opponent's batting average and WHIP (over a full season) while tying a career-high in wins. The next question is whether he can he do something he has never done before: have consecutive healthy seasons.

Jeff Hoffman is a top-125 pitcher - Hoffman finished the season as the 86th-best fantasy pitcher by earned auction value despite not having a clear role in the bullpen all season. He picked up where he left off last season while adding 10 saves and setting a new career high in strikeout rate. Hoffman, over the past two seasons, now owns the fourth-best K-BB% and the fifth-lowest batting average against of all relievers with at least 100 innings worked in that time. Hoffman would be an elite closer for a team that used a traditional one, but that isn't how Rob Thompson rolls. 

Michael Kopech is a top-150 pitcher - Kopech finished the season as the 89th-best pitcher, which is phenomenal considering his ADP was outside the top-500 when the prediction was made and he pitched most of the season for the worst team in modern history. Kopech had nearly as many losses (eight) as saves (nine) before the trade to the Dodgers, but he went on to win four games and save six more while mowing everyone down in the last stanza of his regular-season work. Six wins, 15 saves and respectable ratios from Kopech reminds us that you cannot quit on high-end talent. 

Nick Martinez is a top-350 overall player - Martinez was a man without a role when the prediction was made and I felt there was still value in him despite his ADP of 427. I speculated he could find more success dialing back his fastball and leaning on his other pitches, but he in fact did much better with his fastball (.288 xwOBA) this seaosn than he did in 2023 (.369 xwOBA) and finished the season 47th overall in the pitcher rankings. His kitchen sink approach is rather Chris Bassitt-like, but Martinez will now likely cost more than Bassitt this coming draft season. 

Matt Brash isn't a top-150 pitcher - Brash never threw a regular-season pitch and had the internal brace procedure in June. Brash was being drafted ahead of Seth Lugo and just behind Taj Bradley during draft season because of the appeal of his breaking balls. I cited several examples of how pitchers of a similar ilk failed to repeat their dominant seasons, and Brash's arm gave out on him in camp before he had a chance to prove me wrong. 

Zac Gallen finishes outside the top 100 - Gallen finished 53rd in the overall pitcher rankings but 174th in the overall rankings. That was a terrible return on investment for a pitcher who was being taken no later than the 4th round in drafts when the prediction was made. I was so concerned with the workload hangover that I dedicated an article to Gallen a year ago and the worries did in fact prove prescient. Zach Wheeler is shaping up to be that guy this winter should the Phillies push deep into the postseason. 

Close, But No Cigar

Framber Valdez wins the Cy Young - Valdez is not going to win the Cy Young, as that will go to Tarik Skubal in a landslide, but he did finish as the 11th-best starting pitcher this season overall and fifth-best in the American League. More importantly, he out-earned Cole Ragans so I get bragging rights over Pitcher List's Nick Pollack at First Pitch Arizona!

Lucas Erceg leads the A's in saves - Erceg finished the season with 14 saves, but 11 of them came after his trade to Kansas City. Mason Miller ended up going to the bullpen and flourishing as a closer, but Erceg had a terrific season of growth. He improved his K-BB% from 12.7 to 22.1 percent while cutting his walk rate from a ghastly 14.3 percent to an impressive 6.3 percent. In 119 innings of professional work, he has now allowed only four home runs and has positioned himself as the closer in Kansas City for 2025. His ADP was 558 this past winter but is likely to jump some 400 points this winter. 

Lessons Learned

DL Hall MVP of the Baltimore bullpen - Hall was dealt to Milwaukee in the Corbin Burnes deal a few weeks after the prediction was made and missed a good chunk of the season with an injury. Hall was ineffective in his work with Milwaukee and with Triple-A Nashville due to the same walk issues which plagued him in the Baltimore system. This was Erceg's issue in MIlwaukee as well, so they either fix it or they sell him to the A's. 

Nick Pivetta is a top-50 pitcher - This one hurt me on many of my teams because he simply could not get out of his own way. The strikeouts were there, the walks were not, but the home runs were once again terrible and he finished the season with six wins and a 4.14 ERA around a 1.13 WHIP. He started 26 games with 11 quality starts, but six wins in 26 starts was just painful to watch in leagues where wins were needed. 

Tommy Kahnle is a top-150 pitcher - Kahnle spent more time on the IL than he did the mound, but his 2024 was a lot like his 2023. Middle relief is his lot in life, and the walk rate doesn't look as if it will improve enough to give him better leverage.

Colby White is a top-400 player - Remember this name when people assume Tommy John surgery is just routine. White was one of the more dominant relievers in the minors before his 2022 surgery and has not been anything close since. The Rays cut White early on after he allowed 15 runs in 7.2 innings, and he ended up in the Yankee system where he walked 22 batters in 32.1 innings in Double-A. 

Edward Cabrera is a top-75 pitcher - Cabrera missed time to injury, but allowing 15 homers in 96.1 innings of work along with 50 walks didn't help either. I'm not ready to quit the upside just yet, but this absolutely was not the growth year I expected. 

Thaddeus Ward is a top-250 pitcher - Ward never made it out of Triple-A this season, and even there, his numbers were hideous. Ward allowed 94 walks and 13 homers in 119.2 innings of work along with 15 hit batters and eight wild pitches. Somehow, he still won eight games.

Joey Cantillo is a top-200 pitcher - So this is a loss right now, but hopefully you saw Cantillo pitch after his August 21st meltdown against the Yankees and can see why I was excited for him coming into this season — and why I am even keeping him in XFL this winter. Cantillo ended up with 95 strikeouts in 77 innings of work, but issues with walks and homers hurt a bit. I am still giving a lot of trust to the Cleveland pitching factory and hoping that this is their next pet project.

Shelby Miller leads Detroit in saves - Miller ended up serving many roles in the Tigers bullpen but was never its primary closer. He did save two games but also had 14 decisions out of the pen, going 6-8 in 55.2 innings of work. Homers were a problem, which is notable considering the decline in homers league-wide this season. 

Cole Ragans is not a top-50 starting pitcher - Ragans finished 14th and looked more like Steve Carlton than Steve Trout. The craziest part of it all is Ragans never once faced the White Sox in 2024 and still had a dominant season. That said, if the Royals push deep into the postseason, the sizable jump in workload for him greatly concerns me for 2025. He is going to be drafted as a top-five starting pitcher, but not by me. 

Louie Varland is a top-75 pitcher - The Twins finally gave up on Varland being a starter by September, and with good reason. He allowed nine homers in 36.2 innings as a starter and finished the season with 12 homers in 49.2 innings of work. Varland's 2.1 HR/9 is the worst in baseball for all pitchers with at least 100 innings worked over the past two seasons, and the Twins should just let him work full-time out of the pen to see if that can solve his severe case of gopheritis. 

Hayden Wesneski is a top-150 pitcher - Speaking of home runs, Wesneski has the ninth-worst HR/9 rate on the aforementioned list over the past two seasons and has now allowed 32 homers in just under 160 innings of work since the start of last season. The strikeouts are still there, but until the homers go away, his fantasy relevancy is marginalized to mono leagues. 

Aaron Ashby is a top-120 pitcher - Ashby spent more time in Triple-A than in the majors. He walked 73 in 84 innings of work for Nashville, but was better out of the pen for the Brewers. The pen is where he belongs, and watching him pump 99 mph in the wildcard round echoes as much. The prediction was me being excited for what Ashby could do out the pen, but the usage did not happen. He is still worth a very late dart in mono leagues. 

Kyle Nicolas is a top-250 pitcher - Nicolas ended up working in the pen for the Pirates, but the results were problematic as the walks continue to plague him, as he walked 40 in just over 66 innings of work between Triple-A and the majors. 

Sem Robberse is a top-200 pitcher - Robberse never threw a pitch in St. Louis but did work as a starter in Triple-A Memphis, struggling with 13 homers in 84.1 innings. 

Chase Silseth is a top-100 pitcher - Silseth made two starts before his elbow gave out, and his season ended with surgery. 

Jose Leclerc is a top-60 pitcher - This was made on the predication that Leclerc was going to be the primary closer, but the fantasy ghost of Kirby Yates squashed that. Leclerc ended up with six wins and 89 strikeouts, but the bad ratios offset that. 

Victor Vodnik has positive fantasy value - You know the ratios are bad when a pitcher wins five games, saves nine more and still finishes with a negative final value. The 8.7 percent K-BB% drove the 1.48 WHIP but he was still somehow able to keep his ERA under 4.50.

Tyler Glasnow wins the Cy Young - The good news is Glasnow set a career high in innings, but he also ended the season with elbow troubles, winning nine of his 22 starts in those 134 innings. It would really help to see him pitch in October so we know what risks to live with in 2025 drafts. 

Landen Roupp is a top-250 pitcher - Back troubles limited him to 71.1 innings of work between Triple-A and the majors. He struck out 77 in that time and allowed just three homers, but the 40 walks need to be addressed for him to progress in his career.