This is the second piece in a series of articles looking at batted ball data for both batters and pitchers.
Statistics like exit velocity, batted ball distance, and hard hit rate are still relatively new to many daily fantasy players. FantasyLabs Co-Founder Jonathan Bales recently put out a video on how to use batted ball data within our Player Models. This series uses the suite of Labs Tools to explore the DFS value of Statcast data.
Exit Velocity
This stat, though valuable, shouldn’t be considered in a vacuum. It needs to be contextualized. Using our Trends tool, we can take a closer look at FanDuel pitchers, broken into two different Exit Velocity cohorts by the following trend.
Under 90 Miles Per Hour
Over the last two years, pitchers who have allowed average exit velocities below 90 miles per hour have a +0.9 Plus/Minus. As one would expect, lower exit velocities tend to correlate with higher Consistency Ratings.
90-Plus Miles Per Hour
As pitchers allow higher exit velocities, the numbers in the trend drop. On the negative side, the raw points scored, Plus/Minus, and Consistency rating are all substantially lower. On the positive side, at least ownership is lower too. (Pro Subscribers can review exposure levels in our DFS Ownership Dashboard). For pitchers, exit velocity matters.
Pitch Speed
What’s the relationship between pitch speed and exit velocity? Does the speed with which a pitcher throws have any DFS impact when we look at his exit velocity? Generally, one would expect a harder thrower to be more successful. Is this true?
As expected, the pitchers who throw harder have better results — but there are some devils in the details: The hard throwers with low exit velocities are clearly the best, and the soft throwers with high exit velocities are clearly the worst. In between, however, the hard throwers with high exit velocities and the soft throwers with low exit velocities are remarkably similar. What this means is that a high exit velocity isn’t disqualifying if a pitcher has good pitch speed and poor pitch speed isn’t horrible if a pitcher has low exit velocity. The two metrics are probably best used in conjunction, which is something to keep in mind when using our Lineup Builder to create your lineups.
Putting It All Together
One must remember that exit velocity in a vacuum is simply just another metric. When used in combination with other Statcast metrics, Labs statistics, and Vegas data, exit velocity provides a valuable edge.
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Previous installments of the Statcast(unate) Event series can be accessed via my author page.
