Philadelphia Phillies' Ranger Suárez in action during a baseball game against the St. Louis ... [+]
It’s been a magical season thus far for the Philadelphia Phillies. They have the game’s best record despite injuries to (Trea Turner, Brandon Marsh) and inneffectiveness of (Nick Castellanos) some of their key position players. There are plenty of drivers behind their success, but foremost among them has been their starting pitching.
The Phils’ rotation paces the NL in all of the important categories. Innings, by over 27, through Sunday’s games. Strikeouts, by 29. And they’ve posted a cumulative ERA of 2.65, almost a full run better than the second-best club.
The leaders of the Phillies’ rotation are perennial workhorses Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola. Wheeler has a good argument to be the single best starting pitcher in the game today, and Nola hasn’t been all that far behind him in recent years. In 2024, they’ve had plenty of help. Spencer Turnbull got off to a great start, though since the return of veteran Taijuan Walker from injury, he’s been preserved in a bulk relief role. Lefty Cristopher Sanchez has been excellent for almost a full calendar year now, and simply can’t be written off as a small sample size fluke. But the current frontrunner for the NL Cy Young Award is none of these men - it’s lefty Ranger Suarez, who’s currently sitting on a 10-1, 1.81, record, leading the league in both wins and ERA.
Now if you’ve read any of my work here, you know that I don’t simply rely on the mainstream stat categories - I like to pull some layers back to see what the advanced data has to say.
The first thing that’s notable about Suarez’ track record is his relative lack of one. He’s never pitched enough innings to qualify for an ERA title, peaking at 155 1/3 innings in 2022. His 2023 was shortened by an elbow strain first suffered in the World Baseball Classic that winter. He was never a huge prospect as he wound his way through the Phillies’ system, never hurling more than 124 1/3 innings in a season. Suarez always had statistical success in the minors, but was never a huge prospect due to his lack of electric stuff. Even my minor league pitching ranking system, purely statistical, didn’t think all that highly of him, placing him outside the Top 100 pitching prospects (#101 in 2017, #179 in 2018 and #181 in 2019) all three years that he qualified.
It cannot be denied that he has had nothing but success on a per inning basis since reaching the major leagues. His 2021 was especially brilliant, as he posted a glittering 1.36 ERA over 106 innings that included 12 starts. Suarez has never been particularly overpowering, but a strong grounder tendency and stinginess with free passes gave him a strong foundation for success.
And his contact management success goes beyond the grounder tendency - Suarez has shown a keen ability to throttle fly ball authority over his relatively short career. In 2021, his average fly ball exit speed was 85.5 mph, over two full standard deviations lower than average. In 2023 (88.9 mph) and 2024 (88.3 mph), he’s been over one full standard deviation lower than average in this area.
While he’s been better in the past at limiting fly ball authority, he’s staking out new ground in many other areas this season. His 28.0% K rate is a career best, as is his 5.6% BB rate. His 21.9% fly ball rate is a career low, but somehow his 3.6% pop up rate is a career high. He’s getting easy outs at the both the top and bottom of the strike zone. And get this - he’s dominating to this level despite allowing a career high 22.4% liner rate, which should regress downward to the mean going forward.
There has been one area in which Suarez has been quite fortunate - hitters are batting only .100 AVG-.111 SLG against him on grounders this season, but “should be” hitting .210 AVG-.228 SLG based on their exit speed. No matter - his Adjusted Contact Score is still an exceptional 82, in contention for Contact Manager of the Year honors, and his “Tru” ERA- is still a strong 63, more in line with his 65 FIP- than his 44 ERA-.
The big question - can Suarez keep it up? Given his qualitative history, one can’t simply wave off the possibility of continued excellence. To gain better insight, let’s dig into his repertoire of pitches.
He only pitched enough innings to get full season pitch grades from me once, in 2022. His four-seam fastball (84 Adjusted Contact Score, 7.7% whiff rate) got a “B+”, while his changeup (81, 15.9%) and sinker (86, 3.9%) both got “B” grades. No red or even orange flags there, but no signs of imminent stardom either. Pitchers with two average or better fastballs tend to have strong foundations for future success, though the lack of a playable breaking pitch was a concern.
What has changed thus far in 2024? Well, Suarez now has five, count ‘em five pitches that are on track to receive pitch grades this season. The two new pitches are important ones. He now has a legit breaking pitch, as his “A” grade curve (73, 16.7%) just might be his single best offering. He’s also added a “B+” cutter (55, 5.6%) that has been the primary driver of his newly pumped up pop up rate.
His changeup (87, 22.0%) has become his best bat-missing pitch, giving him a second “A” offering. Meanwhile, his two fastballs remain as they were in 2022. The “B+” four-seamer (87, 7.2%) and “B” sinker (90, 4.1%) haven’t taken the next step, but remain perfectly solid foundational pieces. Mitch Keller and Merrill Kelly, a pair of righties, are a couple of hurlers who have built success in recent years atop a pair of average to slightly above average fastballs.
What we’re seeing right now is peak Ranger Suarez. It simply doesn’t get any better than this. The jury remains out regarding innings bulk - let’s see how he looks as he approaches and passes the 150-inning mark. Qualitatively, however, he is legit. A 22%+ K-BB split with elite contact management ability? Sign me up. Any rotation with a healthy Suarez as its third wheel in October is going to present very formidable opposition.
