The Marlins Are the Worst Team in Baseball.

[Mainge]

So fucking what?

I've never understood this obsession with his low K rate.

Is it possible to succeed with a low K rate? Yes.
Is it possible to be an ace with a low K rate? No.
Do we need him to be an ace? No.

If he's a left handed 4 starter long term locked up for years at minimum I don't care if he never strikes out another hitter again. With how much 4 starters go for on the open market and how little this team spends in free agency, I take it as a win.

The lower his k rate is, the more unlikely it is that he'll succeed. This isn't hard.

[emkayseven]

I understand that. But it's not unheard of and it's not like he K'd a bunch of dudes in the minors and suddenly stopped.

Again, we don't need him to be an ace. There's value in back end starters too.

[Miamarlin21]

Mark Buehrle is posting a career-low of K/9 this year at 4.1. He's owns a career 5.1 K/9. Maybe Nicolino can be a poor man's Buehrle?

[Bobbob1313]

So fucking what?

I've never understood this obsession with his low K rate.

Is it possible to succeed with a low K rate? Yes.
Is it possible to be an ace with a low K rate? No.
Do we need him to be an ace? No.

If he's a left handed 4 starter long term locked up for years at minimum I don't care if he never strikes out another hitter again. With how much 4 starters go for on the open market and how little this team spends in free agency, I take it as a win.

He has a 4.86 FIP. He has a 5.21 xFIP.

Here's the entire list of players in the last 20 years who have posted a K/9 below 4.00 and a league average or better ERA in a season more than once: Carlos Silva, Aaron Cook, Kirk Rueter

There have been 37 seasons with a K/9 below 4.00 in that span; 12 have posted a league-average or better ERA. The average ERA for that group has been 4.75.

It's not impossible to be a league-average pitcher who strikes out this few batters, but it's pretty dang tough. Especially since he isn't a big ground ball pitcher. The odds are stacked against him putting together even a league-average major-league career. He might enjoy a few passable seasons, but basically nobody sustains league-average production for a career with this low of a strikeout rate.

And oh yeah 4.0 K/9 would be a 33% improvement on his current rate.

[emkayseven]

Okay, but he also has all of 54 innings under his belt. His K/9 in the minors was 6.33. Do we really think it's going to be cut in half making the jump to the majors? It was almost 5 in hitter friendly PCL.

For a bunch of people constantly wary of sample size I feel like some are getting way too bent out of shape over K totals in 54 innings.

[Jay]

Okay, but he also has all of 54 innings under his belt. His K/9 in the minors was 6.33. Do we really think it's going to be cut in half making the jump to the majors? It was almost 5 in hitter friendly PCL.

For a bunch of people constantly wary of sample size I feel like some are getting way too bent out of shape over K totals in 54 innings.

I don't think K rate would be negatively affected by the hitter friendliness of a league. I think it is more likely that batters strike out more in that league. Batters know the parks in that league are hitter friendly and are probably swinging at more pitches as a result.

[Erick]

Mark Buehrle is posting a career-low of K/9 this year at 4.1. He's owns a career 5.1 K/9. Maybe Nicolino can be a poor man's Buehrle?

A "poor man's Buehrle" is not a guy I would ever want in my rotation.
So, if other teams value him like he's the next coming of Buehrle rather than a poor man's Buehrle, I really hope he's traded this offseason.

We could do a lot better.

[marlinsfan24]

Okay, but he also has all of 54 innings under his belt. His K/9 in the minors was 6.33. Do we really think it's going to be cut in half making the jump to the majors? It was almost 5 in hitter friendly PCL.

For a bunch of people constantly wary of sample size I feel like some are getting way too bent out of shape over K totals in 54 innings.

He struck out 4.28 per nine last season in 170 innings and just 4.93 in 115 innings this year. This is at the higher levels. He's not all of a sudden going to find strikeouts.

[emkayseven]

A "poor man's Buehrle" is not a guy I would ever want in my rotation.
So, if other teams value him like he's the next coming of Buehrle rather than a poor man's Buehrle, I really hope he's traded this offseason.

We could do a lot better.

There's a lot of value in a young club-controlled left handed starter even if he's a #4 or #5.

[Bobbob1313]

Okay, but he also has all of 54 innings under his belt. His K/9 in the minors was 6.33. Do we really think it's going to be cut in half making the jump to the majors? It was almost 5 in hitter friendly PCL.

For a bunch of people constantly wary of sample size I feel like some are getting way too bent out of shape over K totals in 54 innings.

His K/9 in the minors was 6.33. Okay, great. He hasn't hit 6.33 since joining the Marlins, so I think it's fair to mostly throw his Blue Jays totals away. Something clearly changed there; whether it was the organization changing something about him or tougher competition, we're talking about his last 481 2/3 innings of 6.0 or below. Is that a big enough sample size?

Perhaps more importantly, his last 340 innings over the last two seasons have been below 5.0 That's probably even more significant than what he did 4 years ago with the Blue Jays. I think it's also fair to assume a pitcher's strikeout rate would be expected to fall as he goes up in levels, so I'd say 5.0 is probably a ceiling at this point for him in the majors. According to this research, his 4.9 K/9 in AAA would be expected to translate to about 4.5. Given that he doesn't generate any swings and misses, I don't think we're exactly being unfair here.

If I was overreacting to a small sample size, I would be saying he's a 2.9 K/9 pitcher. Even if you want to give him the benefit of the doubt, it's awfully hard to project him for more than a strikeout every other inning. ZiPS has him at 4.18 K/9, Steamer at 4.50, PECOTA for 4.50 ROS. They also have him for 4.63, 4.56 and 4.48 ERA. This is not some knee-jerk overreaction here. He's got middling stuff, he struggled to get strikeouts in the minors, and that trend has only gotten more extreme in his time in the majors.

Pitchers with his profile don't succeed. For every Mark Beuhrle, there's a dozen Nick Greenwood's or Caleb Clay's who turn into Triple-A fodder. The fact that Nicolino has managed to survive pitching this way in the high minors necessarily makes him an outlier, but the odds are stacked against him becoming a league-average pitcher. This isn't just about his major-league stint so far; it's about the sum total of what he's done since joining the Marlins' organization, especially over the last two seasons. He had a 4.61 FIP in the minors this year too.

What ERA would you be looking for from Nicolino? Keep in mind, league-average for a starter in the NL this season is 4.07.

[emkayseven]

Like I've been saying over and over again, there's value in a controlled back end starter, especially a lefty.

If he gives us 3-5 years of 4.50 ERA over 180 IP, I'll happily take it, given that those pitchers generally make somewhere between 6-10 million dollars a year and spending on a 4-5 starter is not something we ever do (except if we sign a 4-5 starter in order to call him our 2 starter).

[Bobbob1313]

There's a lot of value in a young club-controlled left handed starter even if he's a #4 or #5.

Sure. It's why Tom Koehler has been nice to have around for the last two seasons. And he's not even a lefty!

His strikeout rate is one reason why even "Tom Koehler" may be more than he is capable of. I think you're overstating how safe he is; he could absolutely implode and turn into a high-5.00 ERA guy. That's absolutely on the table, based on his peripherals both in the minors and majors. That's the point. There's not even close to a guarantee that he can be a No. 4 or 5 guy for his minimum club controlled years. If they just pencil him into the rotation at the start of next season and don't try to upgrade that spot because of him, they're limiting the upside of the rotation and drastically increasing the downside.

[Nick]

I don't think anyone disagrees with you there.

[emkayseven]

I definitely don't disagree, he obviously needs to earn a spot and they should always be looking to upgrade any way they can. I'm also not saying he's a safe bet or a sure thing. All I'm saying is that the lack of K doesn't bother me if these (or thereabout) are the results, because I'm fine with him being a 4/5 starter.