Can You Believe in the Magic of Javier Assad?

[Matthew Trueblood]

Image courtesy of © Christopher Hanewinckel-Imagn Images

Starting pitchers don't get better the third time through the opposing lineup, and no pitchers dramatically outperform their numbers with nobody on base once someone reaches. Those are immutable truths of baseball, around which lots of modern player evaluations and most in-game strategic choices are built. If you meet a pitcher who has great numbers the third time through the order within a game or whose opponent OPS is 100 points lower with runners on base, you're meeting a fraud; a charlatan; a mountebank. Don't believe a word they say, and don't you dare invest either your faith or your team's precious playoff hopes in them.

I've warned you. Lots of others have warned you. We've known these things for 30 years, and for half that time, they've been repeated ad nauseum on every respectable analytical website about baseball. You can't claim not to have been cautioned.

Here's the thing: Javier Assad might be special. Consider his opponents' career numbers:

• 1st time facing opponents in game as a starter: .265/.336/.415 in 457 plate appearances
• 2nd time facing opponents in game as a starter: .241/.318/.431 in 441 plate appearances
• 3rd time facing opponents in game as a starter: .237/.330/.364 in 201 plate appearances
• Nobody on base: .274/.346/.453 in 764 plate appearances
• Runners on: .210/.296/.339 in 574 plate appearances

Those sample sizes aren't all that big. You might be waving your hand dismissively right now. I get it. I was the one warning you, just a minute ago! We're on the same side here, bub. Only, I do want to draw your attention to this: These numbers have patterned themselves pretty much the same way across each of the four big-league seasons of which Assad has pitched at least a part. It's not like he just fluked into one year of a wacky split, and it hasn't washed away. Also, I guess we should notice and acknowledge that he takes the sting out of bats the third time through the order the same way he does when men reach base—not by becoming a sudden strikeout machine or anything, but by sapping hitters' power.

You can point to Assad's tremendously deep repertoire, and the fact that pitchers with bigger mixes do tend to do better as they see opponents a second and third time, but that's insufficient to explain what's happening here. You can credit him for what has always seemed a well-balanced mental approach on the mound, and tell yourself a story about him being a fairly durable late bloomer who had lots of time to refine his craft in the minors, but that doesn't adequately explain his splits with runners on, either. This is just noise, right? His 3.44 ERA has to regress toward his 4.58 FIP. His 108 career DRA-, which says he's markedly worse than an average pitcher on the fundamentals, has to tell us more than the ERA, even though he also doesn't give up many unearned runs.

Don't buy the magic beans. Keep walking. You can't give the ball to Assad to start a game in October, or even entrust him with a rotation spot over the likes of Jameson Taillon or Colin Rea. This is all a put-on.

Unless it isn't. Your call.

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[Bertz]

I tend to be a peripherals hard liner.  xFIP is the first number I look at for a pitcher.  I think strikeouts, walks, and groundballs tell you the vast majority of how a pitcher performed.  xERA is worth keeping an eye on too to make sure contact quality is accounted for, though even there I think samples should be very large to buy into someone's ability (or lack thereof) to manage contact.

Assad's bad via both!  Assad's xERA has been higher than his actual by at least a run every season of his career.  It's actually worse than just looking at his peripherals via xFIP.  So on the one hand Assad looks like the easiest regression candidate in the league.  But on the other, at this point we're past 300 innings across four seasons of this horsefeathers.  It's not exactly large sample size, but it's certainly not small. 

The best recent comp I can find is 2017-2020 Zach Davies.  He was able to go nearly 500 innings before the wheels came off, though as we know first hand when they came off they *flew* off.  I'd certainly not let Assad start a playoff game, and I'd probably try and move him over the winter (give Brown his swing role).  But man is it tempting to try and just let this go until it actually stops working.

[Tryptamine]

I'm never going to believe in a guy who requires historically high strand rates to be successful. 

[Andre and Ryno]

Very interesting!  It might be useful to look at potential selection bias.  If the manager lets a starter go through the order a third time, it might be because he's dealing.  Whereas if he's getting shelled, he gets pulled after only one or two trips through the order, increasing those stats.  So it would be interesting to look at his intragame progressions when limiting the data to only those games where he went through the order three times.

 

As for bases empty vs runners on, my guess is that when runners are on base Assad intensifies his attempt to induce ground balls.  He leans into his strength and has better results.  Just a guess.  Also possible that pitching out of the stretch is better for him, even though I think he doesn't do a full windup anyway.

[Victor Reichman]

Assad was fine yesterday and unlucky.

He had a batter fly out to PCA, the best in the game. It would have been the 3rd out. But, PCA lost it in the sun and the next guy up hits a HR, for 2 runs. Inning should have been over and he would have only given up 2 runs on a day with the wind blowing out.

[Arlen]

I think they said that Early Wynn was similar.

Some people just do better under pressure.

Edited September 9, 2025 by Arlen