We are 50 games through the 2018 season, which puts us almost at the 1/3 way point of the season. Thus far your Jersey D-bags sit with a record of 22-28, 3rd place in the division, 11.5 behind the Greenville 84's and 10.5 behind the Wild Card leading St. Louis Browns. While April showed struggles with pitching and hitting, May showed a turnaround in the hitting...but the pitching continued and still continues to struggle. What is happening? Not only is it the starters, but also the bullpen, which is usually a Jersey strong point. We will break down the pitching here and try to determine if it can get better and help Jersey climb back into the race, or if it will be the demise of the 2018 team. Current 2018 CL ranks: Starter's ERA, 12th, 5.52 ERA. Bullpen ERA, 8th, 4.01 ERA.
Starters:
It didn't help when Jose Ramos went down which will seemingly keep him out til September. That still left Jersey with a strong staff though.
Art Ellis: Art missed almost all of last season with an injury. He had a couple of meaningless starts at the end of last season, but came out strong in Spring Training having 3/4 quality starts.
Career Numbers: 3.85 ERA, 1.21 WHIP, 2.92 BABIP, 9.41 K/9, 1.20 BB/9, 1.30 HR/9, 4.00 FIP
Last Season: 4.01 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, .244 BABIP, 9.84 K/9, 2.66 BB/9, 1.35 HR/9, 3.96 FIP
This Season: 6.26 ERA, 1.63 WHIP, 2.96 BABIP, 8.23 K/9, 4.11 BB/9, 2.50 HR/9, 6.42 FIP
The problem with Ellis is both his BB/9 and HR/9 is almost double his career average. He is on pace to break the season record for HR given up in a season at this point, that cannot keep up.This could be a fallout of his injury or his age creeping up there, or just a slow start. While his K's are down, all signs point to just bad pitching.
Jose Lara: Lara came over from Toronto in the Matt Doyle trade. Though he did put up career worst numbers in TOR last season, his struggles this season have been monumental in someone Jersey hoped would helped push them over the edge, not further back down the hill.
Career Numbers: 3.80 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, .297 BABIP, 9.43 K/9, 2.83 BB/9, 1.05 HR/9, 3.61 FIP
Last Season: 4.70 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, .319 BABIP, 8.15 K/9, 2.69 BB/9, 1.10 HR/9, 3.91 FIP
Current Season: 6.79 ERA, 1.70 WHIP, .303 BABIP, 6.79 K/9, 4.01 BB/9, 2.61 HR/9, 6.92 FIP
Lara is having the same problems that Ellis has. Increased walks and HR. Lara could be attributed to a slight ratings decrease, but he is pitching down right bad. Also like Ellis is also on pace to break the all time HR allowed record. Even pitching in Jersey, this cannot keep up. His hits given up is scary for his low BABIP though, without Lara pitching well, Jersey might be doomed.
Greg Schaefer: After a great 2017, at age 28 Jersey expected Shaef to at least put up similar numbers and through 11 starts, we haven't seen that yet. While his numbers aren't as trouble as Ellis and Lara, he isn't helping much.
Career Numbers: 4.91 ERA, 1.38 WHIP, .308 BABIP, 7.57 K/9, 2.86 BB/9, 1.38 HR/9, 4.53 FIP
Last Season: 3.82 ERA, 1.15 WHIP, .270 BABIP, 8.21 K/9, 2.74 BB/9, 1.09 HR/9. 3.97 FIP
Current Season: 5.34 ERA, 1.45 WHIP, .333 BABIP, 7.53 K/9, 2.04 BB/9, 1.57 HR/9, 4.53 FIP
While Shaefer's numbers aren't far off of his career numbers, he had shown real strides in the past two seasons and thus far has regressed to his 2015 numbers. Like the other two, his HR numbers are up. Instead of walk numbers also being up, his hits are way up and K's are down. While we can only hope last season wasn't an outlier, it will be interesting to see which way he goes from here on out.
Rob Goodship: Longtime Jersey player Goodship has never been ace material, and for that matter #2 material either. Always a mid rotation type guy. But this year he looks as like a guy who shouldn't be pitching in any rotation.
Career Numbers: 4.47 ERA, 1.39 WHIP, .304 BABIP, 7.62 K/9, 3.40 BB/9, 1.17 HR/9, 4.42 FIP
Last Season: 3.61 ERA, 1.25 WHIP, .279 BABIP, 7.01 K/9, 2.71 BB/9, 1.16 HR/9, 4.31 FIP
Current Season: 6.29 ERA, 1.71 WHIP, .331 BABIP, 5.28 K/9, 3.45 BB/9, 1.22 HR/9, 4.87 FIP
Goodship like the other 3 starters has seen a considerable decrease in his K/9 while all other numbers stayed steady except for that BABIP. With a much lower FIP than his ERA, his defense is not helping him out at all. That considerably high ERA should come down, but it's still very ugly.
I didn't break down Jerry Burgess because half of his games have come out of the bullpen but is the only starter to be pitching near or above career averages. While I don't expect all of my big name pitchers to struggle, having all 4 of them decrease their K/9 and my two aces on pace to give up almost 50 HR this season, there is room for concern. When 3 veterans in your rotation decide to all have the worst year of their career at the same time, there's not much a team can do.
Struggles out of the bullpen have magnified things as well. Usually when a starter struggles the bullpen comes in and keeps us in the game, but with them also giving up runs, wins are harder to come by. I expect the team ERA to come down, it has to, but if low K numbers, hits and walks continue at this rate, Jersey might be out of the race before we hit September.
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