Price Is Wrong For Playoff Rotation

David Price made his first major league start against the Orioles and did not disappoint those who were looking to be impressed by the former #1 overall pick. He took a no-hitter into the 5th inning before running out of gas, and while his command wasn’t top notch, his stuff was still good enough to keep the runs off the board.

Price has now made three appearances for the Rays since they called him up and given Tampa Bay fans reasons for optimism. His fastball is averaging 95.1 MPH but also inducing a lot of groundballs – his early GB% is 58.8%. The hard throwing groundball pitcher group is one of the best peer groups in baseball, consisting of a bunch of Cy Young candidates (and Fausto Carmona). Being able to get groundballs while throwing hard is a terrific building block for a pitcher.

Price hasn’t been afraid to work in his slider, either, throwing it 40 percent of the time, and using it as his out pitch. It’s a good but not great pitch, and it can get slurvy at times, but it’s a terrific weapon against left-handed hitters. We see that, so far, lefties haven’t been able to touch Price, going 3-18 with a walk and six strikeouts. All three hits have been singles, so LHBs are hitting .167/.211/.167 against him.

Given his stuff, we’d expect him to dominate same handed hitters, but the lack of a change-up makes him somewhat vulnerable to right-handed batters. In general, we’d expect a pitcher who throws exclusively a fastball/slider to show a larger than average platoon split, and even in the small sample of his ML performance to date, that’s been true – RHBs are 5 for 24 with a couple of extra base hits and only three strikeouts. The slider just isn’t nearly the weapon against RHB that it is against LHB, so Price has to rely more on in play outs to keep righties off the bases.

Because of his early success and his pedigree, there will probably be some talk that the Rays should use Price as their #4 starter in the playoffs, supplanting both Edwin Jackson and Andy Sonnanstine. I’ve even heard Jim Callis, who I have a lot of respect for, suggest this very thing, but based on his current two pitch repertoire, his ability to hold down good RH hitters is still a work in progress. Price could be a dominant force coming out of the pen, where he could be selectively used to maximize his ability to shut down LHBs.

Price’s talent is certainly there, and I have few doubts that he’ll eventually settle in as a quality starting pitcher, but that can wait until next year. For right now, the Rays should see Price for what he can be the next month – a fantastic LH relief pitcher.