Today’s starter Mike Leake has had a pretty good year, at least by traditional standards. A 11-5 record, 3.51 ERA, on track for over 30 starts.
A deeper look gives me some concerns. A K-rate that’s gone down in back to back years coupled with an increasing walk rate. His homerun-rate has gone down to about league average (taking into account Leake’s home ballpark), so that’s good. A fielding independent pitching mark of 4.11 isn’t bad, especially for a 4th or 5th starter.
But Leake was a first round pick. A guy we were told knew how to pitch, and could ultimately turn into something of a Greg Maddux-lite. After almost four years in the big leagues (and virtually none in the minors), have we learned anything?
Mike Leake’s overall strikeout rate is 5.9 per 9 innings, 69th out of 86 qualified National League starters since 2010. He’s countered that with 2.3 walks per 9, good for 19th among the same group. His homerun rate is about league average, if you account for Leake’s home ballpark.
It’s not impossible to succeed with these peripherals, but will Leake ever ascend beyond the 4th/5th starter label? Will he ever remind us of the Mad Dog?
I took a quick look at pitchers in the last 10 years with a K-rate below 6.5, at least 1000 innings pitched, and who earned at least 2 wins above replacement per 180 innings pitched. That left me with 20 guys. Of those, Mark Buehrle was the most successful, accumulating 146 wins, 39.2 WAR, and of course a World Series championship. Of course, he’s also left handed, which Mike Leake is not.
The second most successful is Tim Hudson with 141 wins and 31.3 WAR. He’s an extreme groundball pitcher. As is the next man on the list, Derek Lowe. Mike Leake isn’t one of those either.
If you take away the lefties, extreme ground ball pitchers, and knuckleballers, we get the following list:
| Name | W | L | GS | IP | K/9 | BB/9 | HR/9 | BABIP | GB% | ERA | FIP | xFIP | WAR | Per180IP |
| Bartolo Colon | 100 | 77 | 223 | 1393 | 6.2 | 2.2 | 1.2 | 0.292 | 41.3% | 4.08 | 4.21 | 4.22 | 21.0 | 2.7 |
| Greg Maddux | 82 | 75 | 205 | 1258 | 5.2 | 1.4 | 1.0 | 0.288 | 50.8% | 4.13 | 3.97 | 3.74 | 17.9 | 2.6 |
| Carl Pavano | 81 | 69 | 198 | 1272 | 5.3 | 1.8 | 1.0 | 0.301 | 46.6% | 4.27 | 4.03 | 4.10 | 18.0 | 2.5 |
| Brad Penny | 93 | 75 | 238 | 1415 | 5.9 | 2.7 | 0.9 | 0.303 | 46.2% | 4.20 | 4.07 | 4.26 | 19.8 | 2.5 |
| Freddy Garcia | 93 | 77 | 233 | 1424 | 6.2 | 2.6 | 1.3 | 0.286 | 41.9% | 4.41 | 4.47 | 4.26 | 18.8 | 2.4 |
| Joe Blanton | 85 | 87 | 248 | 1535 | 6.2 | 2.4 | 1.1 | 0.304 | 44.2% | 4.46 | 4.20 | 4.13 | 19.3 | 2.3 |
| Kyle Lohse | 109 | 101 | 312 | 1839 | 5.5 | 2.4 | 1.0 | 0.297 | 41.9% | 4.31 | 4.26 | 4.39 | 22.2 | 2.2 |
| Bronson Arroyo | 127 | 109 | 321 | 2037 | 5.9 | 2.3 | 1.2 | 0.279 | 40.6% | 4.09 | 4.48 | 4.39 | 23.0 | 2.0 |
| Carlos Silva | 62 | 69 | 180 | 1065 | 3.9 | 1.5 | 1.2 | 0.312 | 47.1% | 4.83 | 4.56 | 4.40 | 11.9 | 2.0 |
| R.A. Dickey | 64 | 62 | 168 | 1067 | 6.5 | 2.7 | 1.1 | 0.284 | 46.8% | 4.00 | 4.25 | 4.09 | 11.8 | 2.0 |
| Joel Pineiro | 81 | 82 | 223 | 1396 | 5.2 | 2.4 | 1.0 | 0.303 | 49.3% | 4.65 | 4.26 | 4.19 | 15.3 | 2.0 |
An interesting list, but not really any consistent, top of the rotation guys.
Maddux was in his declining years, of course. What separated him from these others guys while he was in the prime was maintaining a K-rate just above the threshold I listed above, but in particular it was a walk-rate below 2, and an extremely low HR/9. For his career, Maddux allowed 0.63 homeruns per 9 innings. No one on this list comes close.
I hope Leake continues to develop, and I think he’s great to have on this team, but if he hopes to take the next step I think he’ll have to improve all three main peripherals just a bit.
Follow Aaron on Twitter @aaronjlehr