Justin Verlander Finds Another Gear

Justin Verlander had himself a night in Anaheim on Wednesday, throwing his first complete-game shutout since August 26, 2015 and becoming the 33rd pitcher to notch 2,500 strikeouts. What’s more, he did it in a game where the Astros’ sole possession of first place in the AL West was on the line. It’s just the latest chapter of the now 35-year-old righty’s rebirth, one that has returned him to the upper echelon of the game’s starters and positioned him for a run at the Hall of Fame. The pitcher famous for finding another gear with his fastball late in the game has done just that with his career.

Verlander collected his milestone strikeout against none other than Shohei Ohtani, who foul-tipped a 96 mph heater in the ninth inning:

That was one of seven strikeouts Verlander notched on the night, and yes, he was still Bringing It late. He threw his six fastest four-seamers of the night, and nine of his top 11, in the eighth or ninth innings, all 97.5 mph or above according to Brooks Baseball.

Three of his strikeouts came against Ohtani (the second silver sombrero of his brief MLB career), who while avoiding a strikeout in the fourth inning — and even getting the call on this 87 mph slider — nonetheless wound up with his ankles repurposed into a pretzel, with Verlander supplying the mustard:

Now that’s just nasty, but then Verlander has been nothing but nasty to hitters this year. He hasn’t allowed a single run in five of his 10 starts (of the other four, two were six innings, one was seven and one was eight) and has allowed two runs or fewer in eight straight and nine of 10. Through those 10 starts, he leads the majors in ERA (1.05) and is tied with teammate Gerrit Cole in WAR (2.7). Meanwhile, he’s third in the AL in FIP (2.20), K% (32.8%) and K-BB% (27.3 points). His 25 ERA- is 10 points lower than Pedro Martinez’s 35 in 2000, the lowest full-season mark since the start of the 20th century.

It wasn’t too long ago that Verlander’s days as an ace appeared to be finished. From the start of the 2014 season to the All-Star break in 2016 — a span that included his worst full-season ERA since 2008 (4.54 in 2014) and a triceps strain that limited him to 20 starts in 2015 — the six-time All-Star and former Cy Young and MVP winner posted a 4.08 ERA, 3.70 FIP, and 20.6% strikeout rate, respectable numbers but hardly elite. His performance in the first half of 2016 was very similar save for more strikeouts (4.07 ERA, 3.85 FIP, 25.1%), but he had a stellar second half of that year and nearly won his second Cy Young; his 14 first-place votes trumped winner Rick Porcello’s eight, but he lost nonetheless. His 2017 season was uneven, as well, with a 4.73 ERA, 4.29 FIP, and 21.0% K rate in the first half, and a 1.95 ERA, 3.37 FIP, and 31.7% K rate in the second. Amid that stellar run, of course, he was traded to the Astros on August 31 and posted a 1.06 ERA and 2.69 FIP over five September starts before helping the Astros win the World Series

Via his 15-game rolling averages — a sample size that exactly encompasses the Houston portion of his career — Verlander is stingier than he’s ever been in terms of ERA, and pretty close when it comes to FIP. He’s also striking out batters at a far higher rate than ever:

As Jeff Sullivan detailed last fall, Verlander’s rebound has had a lot to do with an increase in slider usage and decrease in the velocity of that pitch, thus facilitating more drop — a trend that predates the trade. Via Brooks Baseball, his increased slider usage has come at the expense of his curve and changeup:

While the trend hasn’t been uniform, Verlander’s whiff percentages on his four-seamer, slider, and curve have climbed considerably from where they were in 2014-15, and thus far, those on both his four-seamer and slider are up relative to last year:

In all, Verlander’s 13.4% whiff rate is a career high, topping his previous full-season best from 2016 (12.0%); he was at 10.7% last year. What’s more, when batters have put his pitches in play, they haven’t been able to do anything with them:

You might get better results swinging a wet newspaper at a Swedish meatball. For comparison, Verlander’s 2016-17 numbers on contact were still pretty remarkable:

I omitted the changeups from the first of those two tables because batters have only put seven into play (they’re hitless), but you can see why he more or less abandoned that pitch in favor of more effective ones.

Verlander isn’t likely to sustain this insane level of dominance over the course of a full season, but pitching the way he has, not just this year but for the past three, has jump-started his push for the Hall of Fame. Using Baseball-Reference’s version of WAR, which is driven by actual runs allowed (with an adjustment for defense) instead of by FIP, his 2016 and 2017 seasons (7.2 and 6.5 WAR, respectively) rank as the third- and fourth-best of his career, and so they’ve boosted his seven-year peak score by 5.5 WAR, to 44.7. That’s still short of the average Hall of Famer (50.1), but he stands to close the gap further this year. He’s at 2.9 rWAR already, and anything above 4.3 (his seventh-best season, from 2013) will further improve his peak score.

Pulling up the table I updated last week for CC Sabathia, here’s how Verlander stacks up among his contemporaries:

Verlander has a ways to go as far as JAWS is concerned, but he does have some further low-hanging fruit when it comes to his peak score, in the form of a 4.5-WAR 2010 season as his sixth-best to date. Supposing that he finishes at 6.5 WAR this season and adds another five or so wins next year, that would take his line to 68.6/46.9/57.8, ahead of Halladay, whom I think is likely to be elected this winter. Meanwhile, he’s likely to blow past the 200-win mark this year and could reach 3,000 strikeouts — something only 16 pitchers have done, with Sabathia (2,874) next in line — in 2020, if he stays healthy.

I won’t rehash what I said in this space just a week ago about the eventuality of BBWAA voters adjusting to the “workload constraint era,” with its five-man rotations, pitch counts, times-through-the-order concerns, and de facto innings caps that will make both the win-based milestones and the WAR-based measures from past eras harder to reach, as it’s all in the Sabathia piece in concise form. He’s far from a lock now, but I do think that if Verlander can check off the 3,000-strikeout box while pitching like an All-Star for another season or two along the way, potentially with some Cy Young votes and postseason highlights thrown in, he’s going to be in very good shape when it comes to Cooperstown. And again, while I don’t think it’s fair to expect him to put up a dead-ball era ERA in this home-run-saturated era, I can’t wait to see where he takes this current run.