Jakob Junis Goes Seven Innings Against Rangers
6 years agoIn his final spring training tune-up, Kansas City Royals starting pitcher Jakob Junis pitched well against the Rangers on Sunday. He gave up three runs over seven innings while striking out six and walking none. Junis is currently slated to be the team's No. 2 starter behind Brad Keller, and he's got some slight appeal in fantasy. He boasted a solid K/BB rate of 3.81 last year, but he's basically entirely dependent on his slider. That type of dependence on one pitch usually relegates someone to short-relief duty because hitters get it dialed in pretty quickly after facing him once. That said, some pitchers can find success with that approach if their pitcher is really working, such as Luis Severino did in the first half of last year. Unfortunately, it also means that if the money pitch starts to struggle, as Severino's slider did in the middle of last year, the pitcher may find themselves saddled with ugly numbers as they depend heavily on their fastball. Severino carried a 5.67 ERA and 1.47 WHIP over his last 14 starts last year. It would be in Junis' best interest to learn some additional offerings sooner rather than later.
Source: Jeffrey Flanagan
Source: Jeffrey Flanagan