Tejay Antone (SP/RP, CIN) - Week 5 Waiver Wire Pickups

BALLER MOVE: Add in All Leagues

ROSTERED IN: 35% of leagues

ANALYSIS: Tejay Antone, the 6'4, 230-lb. alumnus of Weatherford College, came up mega-clutch for Cincy on many occasions last year, and while he closed out 2020 with a 2.80 ERA and 1.02 WHIP over 35.1 innings, the circumstances of being a spot-starter/long-reliever are fickle, and Antone was left with an 0-3 record, zero saves, and a single hold for his efforts. He definitely went unrewarded in 2020, but his virtue and professionalism will not go unrewarded in 2021: Tejay started the year with a 0.66 ERA, 0.73 WHIP, one win, and three holds through 13.2 IP, immediately building on his breakout rookie campaign and has been unfazed by the staff shuffle-up, hungry prospect-arrivals, plus his higher-leverage role and the lofty expectations it carries. This does not appear to be accident or fluke; the changes made to his pitching approach were very deliberate, and very effective.

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Last year he was throwing his fastball 40.5% of the time and his slider at 39.7% frequency, with 17% of his pitches being curveballs and just 2.9% of the time opting for his changeup, a pitch that had proven ineffective. Turns out that his slider and curve are his money-makers, as their linear-weight value over the past two seasons has combined for 14.8 while his fastball and changeup sit at -2.7. So far he has dumped the changeup, throws both his fastball and slider at a reduced 32.1% frequency, and has more-than doubled his curveball usage from 16.9% to 35.9%. The result has been a 17% combined drop in his outside-contact rate and zone-contact rate while batters are still taking the bait (39.2% swing-rate) and missing, leading to a boost in strikeout rate (38.5%) and K/9 (13.2).

He still has a little bugaboo with his walk rate, but walks don't hurt too bad when you're so heavily suppressing most of the quality contact. He's logging multiple innings of work in most cases, notching voluminous strikeout numbers, he's now in position to collect a delightful assortment of wins and holds (maybe saves too? Why not?), and most important: he's slinging absolutely unconscious baseball right now. If you're in a league of any size/scoring format, you can benefit highly from throwing Tejay Antone into the mix. If you're in a "Saves+Holds" format: good luck with that acquisition, he's about to be like the Zack Greinke of "Saves+Holds".

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