The Enigma Formerly Known As Gavin Floyd

I can remember Gavin Floyd’s first start like it was yesterday. Never before had I been able to experience firsthand the sort of hype that surrounded him that night. The Phillies were in third place, playing the dreadful-at-the-time Mets, and had vastly underachieved all year long. When the hot prospect threw an absolutely ridiculous curveball to the befuddled Cliff Floyd, striking him out to end the first inning, it’s safe to say I was not alone in thinking this kid could be the answer.

Unfortunately, he was not the answer. Even though the Phillies went on a 20-8 run to close out the season, Floyd would frustrate fans with spurts of brilliance masked by the inability to harness his “stuff.” A change of scenery was deemed necessary and Floyd soon found himself a member of the Chicago White Sox.

In eight starts this year, Floyd is averaging a 56 Game Score, even coming close to throwing a no-no. His numbers:

8 GS, 4-2, 2.92 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 49.1 IP, 33 H, 23 BB, 22 K

Okay, the walks and strikeouts clearly signal a red flag, but it has been very hard to hit Floyd in the early going. He has an opponents BABIP of just .193 which should also signal a red flag, especially considering his LD% would predict something in the .230 range. Oh, and his ridiculously low LD% requires us to buy a new set of flags since the 11.8% is a far cry from his 18.4% career rate.

His FIP of 5.07 results in the second highest discrepancy between FIP and ERA; only Fausto Carmona’s ERA has been luckier than Floyd’s. Instead of focusing on why he will not sustain this current level of performance, I would much rather look at what has contributed to these numbers.

His fastball usage has dipped from 72% in 2004 to 59% right now. He has increased his usage of sliders, mainly due to his development of the slider, and cut back on his curveball. The problem during Floyd’s Phillies tenure was that he could not locate his fastball; due to this, he would pitch behind hitters and not be able to utilize the curveball as much. Additionally, his changeup frequency has stayed stagnant. His velocities of these pitches have not shifted much since 2004 or even from last year to now.

Last week I wrote about Brett Myers and how odd it was that he had better numbers at home, in one of the top hitters parks in the league. The same can be said for Floyd:

Home: 3 GS, 21.2 IP, 7 H, 11 BB, 12 K, 2.08 ERA, .101/.220/.188, 16 OPS+
Road: 5 GS, 27.2 IP, 26 H, 12 BB, 10 K, 3.58 ERA, .252/.350/.456, 112 OPS+

Unlike Myers, whose road starts took place in notorious hitters parks, Floyd has experienced his fair share in pitchers parks this year.

It seems he has been successful due to his limited damage when runners get on base.

Nobody On: 126 PA, .180/.278/.252
Runners On: 77 PA, .213/.329/.525

Despite the increase in OPS with runners on he has also gotten help from five double play balls, and the fact of the matter is that I had to combine all of the baserunner states to even have something remotely close to a significant amount of PAs to analyze. In case the message was lost just now, Floyd has not allowed many runners to reach base and when they have he has done a good job keeping them there.

I don’t know if he’s found the right repertoire and frequency to help harness the “stuff” he clearly has but, for now, he definitely does not look as bad as he did in 2006.