In his first start of the season, Bailey Falter allowed six earned runs in four innings. At the time, it was uncertain why the Pittsburgh Pirates gave their fifth starting spot to the lefty. He was coming off a year where he had a 5.36 ERA in 80.2 innings, and he didn’t improve those numbers in Spring Training this year.
One thing that stood out to me was that Falter was a boom or bust pitcher in 2023. He had 18 appearances in the majors. Seven of those had an ERA north of 8.31, with Falter averaging over a run per inning in these starts. He had 10 starts with an ERA of 3.86 or lower, with eight starts at 2.45 or less. There was one start with a 4.50 ERA.
If you use FIP, the results change. Falter had 10 starts with a FIP north of 5.00, and six starts with a FIP of 3.76 or less. He had two starts in the 4.38-4.57 range.
By those numbers, you could expect Falter to have success in 33-55% of his starts, with horrible results in the other 45-67%. That’s a sign of promise, but not consistency.
Falter has been the same boom or bust pitcher this year. After that first start of the year, he combined to allow four earned runs in 23 innings over his next four starts. He’s had some bad outings, with his most recent being Monday night against the Reds. Falter pitched three shutout innings, before allowing five runs, four earned, in the fourth inning.
After 15 starts this season, Falter is showing a better ratio of boom/bust splits. He has six starts with an ERA of 5.06 or higher, and nine starts with an ERA of 3.68 or lower. Looking at FIP, he has five starts above 5.00, and eight starts at 3.75 or below, with two starts in the 4.24-4.75 range.
Falter is successful in 53-55% of his starts this year, while struggling in 33-45% of those outings. He still is capable of blowing up in an individual start, but he’s reached a point of having more consistency with the boom starts.
This is exactly what you want from a back of the rotation starter. In over half of his starts, Falter gives the equivalent of an above-average pitcher, while putting up top of the rotation results in some outings. He does look like he doesn’t belong in a rotation during some outings, and the Pirates have been good to limit his innings during those appearances.
Fortunately, there have been more good outings than bad. After last night’s bad outing, I’d look for Falter to bounce back in his next start.
Roster Moves
**The Pirates optioned Ji-Hwan Bae to Triple-A Indianapolis, after activating him from the 10-day injured list. Bae was already in Indianapolis on a rehab assignment.
**RHP Jonawel Valdez was promoted from the DSL to the FCL. The 20-year-old Valdez was signed in December 2022, and had a 3.00 ERA in 12 innings across his first three starts this year, with a 20:3 K/BB.
Pirates Prospects Daily
Charles McAdoo hit two home runs after being promoted to Altoona. Bubba Chandler threw seven shutout innings, striking out ten batters for one of the best starts of his career. They were among the top performers in the Pirates system this week, detailed in the latest Pirates Prospect Watch.
Pirates Prospect Watch: Charles McAdoo and Bubba Chandler Lead Last Week’s Results
Yesterday I finished my recent MLB draft recap, looking at the Pirates 2019 draft. This was the final draft under Neal Huntington, and the final in the series of five drafts that I’ll be recapping.
Williams: Recapping the Final Draft of the Neal Huntington Era
If you missed yesterday’s First Pitch, I did a detailed breakdown of the serious problem the Pirates have on offense.
First Pitch: The Pittsburgh Pirates Have a Serious Problem on Offense
