Look for a few strikeouts when finding a back-end starter for your fantasy baseball roster this week.
Los Angeles Angels starting pitcher Matt Shoemaker is owned in less than 30 percent of leagues on ESPN.com, making his start on Saturday against the Cleveland Indians a good opportunity for your team to garner a few nice statistics for the week.
Don’t worry about Shoemaker’s slow start, either. He was atrocious during the season’s first month. He muddled through four straight losses where he allowed 19 earned runs in 15.2 innings. Since that time, he still isn’t dominating in the win/loss category, going 2-2, but he’s generating a better resume for fantasy baseball teams with 37 strikeouts in his four previous outings.
In two of those starts, he mustered two double-digit strikeout performances.
What’s promising, especially against the Indians, is Shoemaker’s continued opposition to issuing walks. Even when he was bad, he still was at most walking only three batters per game. In his previous four outings, he hasn’t walked a single batter in 30.1 innings of work.
As the Indians have crept up the standings in the last month, Cleveland has been using bases on balls as a way to generate offense. For the season, Cleveland is 11th in working walks in Major League Baseball.
In May, as the Indians were winning more, Cleveland generated the fifth-most walks in Major League Baseball.
If Shoemaker can continue to limit his walks, he should be in good shape at home against the Indians on Saturday. What also helps his case is during two other career starts against Cleveland in his short career, he’s dominated the Indians.
He has 20 strikeouts and a 1.29 ERA against Cleveland in his career. Expect more of the same when he meets up with the Indians again Saturday.
