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The Toronto Blue Jays led the league in home runs hit last year, and it was not particularly close. Despite that, they still failed to make the playoffs.
The main reason for that failure was the tough division they played in, as well as just some rotten luck. They were actually a pretty good pitching team as well with a team ERA in the top third of the league. Marcus Semien departing was a key loss for them, but the rest of the team is still intact.
Clearly their aim this offseason was to improve their starting rotation. They inked Kevin Gausman to a long-term deal before the lockout, and now they have come out firing right away after the lockout was lifted, signing Yusei Kikuchi to a three-year contract. Kikuchi was far from a fantasy star in 2021, but he is more than interesting enough to discuss for 2022 - let's break it down.
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A Brutal Schedule in 2021
Shortly after the conclusion of the season, I did some research into what pitchers faced the toughest and easiest schedules. You can find that analysis here.
What the article found was Kikuchi faced the second-toughest schedule in the entire league as measured by average slugging percentage of the list of hitters each pitcher faced. The main reason for that: he faced the Astros six times. Houston was a uniquely tough matchup last year. They were not world-beaters in terms of the long ball, but they saw more pitches and put more balls in play than any other team. It was not a fun time pitching against them, and a full 21% of times Kikuchi took the mound he was facing them.
Pitching in the American League East certainly is no walk in the park, but it does help when you are on the Blue Jays and don't have to face that offense. He will get plenty of starts against the Orioles and Rays, teams that were very beatable with left-handed pitching last year, so it is fair to expect him to face a much easier schedule in 2022.
The Good
Kikuchi's short Major League career so far has been mediocre. He has a bad career ERA at 4.97 and an equally bad career WHIP of 1.40. He did improve on those numbers quite a bit in 2021 (4.41 and 1.32), but it was still lacking in terms of what you want from a fantasy pitcher.
He showed serious signs of promise last summer, however, and it has given us some hope that maybe he will turn into something very useful for fantasy soon. From May through July, he posted a great 28.5% K% with a good enough 8% BB%. That's a really strong strikeout-to-walk ratio, and it resulted in a strong 3.87 ERA and a 1.17 WHIP in those 84 innings. That's a small sample size, and his full-season numbers (which mean a lot more) are much less encouraging, but it was at least good to see the potential there.
What gives us some extra hope is the pitch arsenal. Last year, he threw a four-seamer, a cutter, a slider, and a changeup. The first three pitches mentioned there all had above-average CSW% and SwStr% rates, and he got a ton of ground-balls with the cutter. Any time a pitcher can have both the four-seamer and a cutter, there is a little bit of added floor and ceiling since those two offerings tunnel so well together.
The fact that we have to dig a bit to find encouraging things from Kikuchi tells us that this is far from a safe bet for 2022, but for how cheap he is going - there's ample upside.
The Bad
A three-year contract is a vote of confidence, no doubt about it. However, Kikuchi is seemingly the #5 starter on the Blue Jays right now, which makes his spot in the rotation notably less secure than it was with the Mariners.
The other big worry is the home run issues he's had in his career (1.62 HR/9 in his 365.2 innings). The humidor being added to the Rogers Centre helps a bit, that park is no longer the bandbox it used to be, but it's still a pretty good spot for hitters, and there are plenty of home run hitters in the AL East - especially from the right side of the plate. I think there is room for Kikuchi to improve in home runs allowed (elevated cutter usage?), but typically you don't see pitchers make huge swings in their home run rates from year-to-year, so he is more likely than not to continue to struggle in that arena.
You can survive a higher home run rate if you are getting a lot of strikeouts, which he has the ability to do, but he has not been able to put that part of his together for a full season yet. The career K% is just 20.6%, and even in his best year, 2021, it ended at 24.5%, about league average. I do expect that to tick up to 26% or so this year, but it's far from a guarantee, and given his lack of an elite walk rate, things could turn out pretty ugly for the lefty.
Conclusion
I was pretty interested in Kikuchi in deep leagues prior to this move, and I can't say this changes much. The better team behind him should result in some extra wins, and you never know what a new coaching staff can do for a guy with talent. All things considered, I might move Kikuchi up slightly with this move, but it's definitely not a huge shift.
In shallow leagues, I wouldn't go out of my way to roster Kikuchi - but he's someone to keep a close eye on when the season starts, and I'm definitely drafting him in deeper leagues if he's there after pick 300. Even with the uncertainty, the upside is big for Kikuchi given the strides we saw him make in 2021.
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