For years, the mantra in fantasy baseball drafts has been to wait to select your starting pitchers. Pitching is deep, they say. Pitchers suffer more injuries and they’re just too inconsistent to waste high draft picks on in non-auction leagues. I subscribed to that viewpoint, I will confess, but my experience is that those premises are no longer valid. Hitters get injured just as often as pitchers, there is plenty of inconsistency to go around in baseball that pitchers no longer have a lock on up and down seasons, and while I agree that if you are savvy enough to study starting pitchers, you can find gems in the later rounds, there is still plenty to like among the top 20-25 starters in any given season to make them a part of your draft or auction strategy. In fact, my preferred strategy is to see if perhaps a Clayton Kershaw, Madison Bumgarner, or Max Scherzer (those are my top three, but others could easily be included depending on your league setup) is available in the latter part of the first round or in the second round to provide my lock-down ace early on.

These articles that will be published prior to Opening Day, however, are not about the stud starting pitching options available in your drafts or auctions. What we are looking at are those very good options that for one reason or another are being ignored in early drafts and mock drafts. What sorts of hidden values are dropping below the 12th round in most drafts that you can snag for great value with an eye to dominating your league this season? Note: I am operating on the assumption you are drafting in a 12 team league, so all pitchers profiled here will be below the 144th pick.

I will be profiling one (or at most two) mid to late round options in the starting pitching realm on a bi-weekly basis (that is twice a week, not the alternate definition of every two weeks-why is English so difficult and confusing?). If you have questions about any pitchers and their viability as a “sleeper” pick, hit me up at ia@fantasyalarm.com and I will do my best to provide some insight. Also, I am always available to answer starting pitching (or other fantasy baseball) questions all season long.

Ian Kennedy – RHP – Kansas City Royals

2015 Stats: 9-15, 168.1 IP, 4.28 ERA, 174 K’s, 1.30 WHIP

Current ADP

Mock Draft Army ADP: 234.2 (based on current ADPs generated by Howard Bender’s Mock Draft Army results)

National Fantasy Baseball Championship (NFBC): 246.66

FSTA Draft on January 14th, 2016: Drafted 22nd round (213th overall)

LABR Mixed Draft on February 16, 2016: Drafted 19th round (284 overall)

Availability

Kennedy moves out of Petco, and from the NL to the AL, both flags that tend to push down a pitcher’s value. Add in his disappointing win total from 2015, and you can understand why he is valued so low, despite moving to the reigning World Series champs and their rotation. He is being drafted as a back of the rotation starting pitcher, and there is little to warrant him moving up in drafts at this point. Keep him in mind late in drafts this March.

Upside

Kennedy has always been a good source of strikeouts, and last season he continued to miss bats at a great clip, posting a 9.30 K/9 rate and a palatable 3.35 K/BB ratio. His fastball velocity remained about the same as in previous seasons, in the low 90s, nothing exciting but nothing to worry about drastically as he was not losing velocity. He demonstrates a good swinging strike rate, which has been in double digits the past four seasons. He is moving to a team that provides better defense, and that tends to lead to a regression (progression?) in a positive sense for the coming season.

Downside

Even pitching in San Diego, he was victimized by the long ball, yielding 1.66 HR/9, which is clearly unacceptable. His BABIP (.310) and strand rate (73.8%) were average, so it was his inability to limit the home runs that hurt him most in 2015. He also is plagued by allowing a ton of line drives, with his LD% sitting above 22% for the past three seasons. Add to that his propensity to give up fly balls, and you can understand how his 2015 was less than noteworthy. He does have issues limiting contact, and those will follow him to Kauffman Stadium, and his fly ball tendency will not allow him a lot of leeway on the mound.

Summary

If you are looking for strikeouts late in your drafts, and have covered your peripheral numbers with your other starting pitchers, then Kennedy is a fine back-of-the-rotation SP to draft. Expect his victories to head into the double digits with the Royals backing him up on defense, and if he can control the home runs this season, he is a decent SP4/5, trending more toward the SP5 range.