Fantasy Baseball Out% Standouts From Week 2

This article is meant to help fantasy baseball managers identify pitchers who are and are not doing a good job of getting batters out, and exactly which of their pitches are successful at doing so. You can use our app, developed by Brett Hammit, to help track pitcher performance.

To figure out how good a pitcher’s pitch is at getting outs, you can measure a pitcher’s Out% on each of his pitches against the league average Out% for each pitch type.

Factoring Out% into your analysis of a pitcher can help you determine whether a pitcher’s performance is legitimate or not, and whether you can reasonably expect them to do well or not. Combining Out% with pitch level data like whiff% and putaway%, as well as advanced ERA metrics, will help paint a fuller picture of a pitcher’s performance.

You can read more of the intricacies of the stat here, where I reflect on what we learned from Out% last season. In particular, pitchers with a high fastball Out%, and/or multiple pitches with an Out% above league average tend to perform better in terms of ERA.

For the purposes of this article, we will focus more on how to use this stat for fantasy baseball and how it can help you make fantasy-relevant decisions this season.

Here is where league-average Out% stands on each type of pitch as of writing on Friday, April 11 (they will fluctuate as the season goes on):

• Fastball – 16.3%
• Cutter – 16.4%
• Sinker – 17.4%
• Splitter – 21.1%
• Slider – 17.6%
• Sweeper – 18.1%
• Curveball – 16.1%
• Changeup – 18.6%

A few notable pitchers sit atop the leaderboards for each pitch, including

• Max Fried – Fastball 21%
• Erick Fedde – Cutter 25%
• Jameson Taillon – Sinker 38%
• Jordan Hicks – Splitter 36%
• Spencer Schwellenbach – Slider 46%
• Steven Matz – Curveball 39%
• Joe Ryan – Sweeper 30%
• Nick Lodolo – Changeup 39%

For the sake of this article, my analysis will primarily focus on starting pitchers. Currently, the leaderboards (especially fastball and fastball adjacent pitches like cutters) are dominated by relievers because of their small sample size.

 

Fastball Out% Highlight

 

Max Fried – SP NYY

 

Max Fried’s fastball Out Rate sits at 21%, which leads pitchers who have pitched a league average amount of fastballs. Fried’s fastball is his most used pitch, and is his second-best out pitch, after his cutter. His changeup also ranks above league average in Out%.

This is important to note for Fried, who moved to New York in the offseason, a hitter friendly park. The fact that his fastball has been such an effective out pitch so far bodes well for him the rest of the season. He locates it well, and has induced a single-digit launch angle with it. If it had a below average Out% as his most used pitch, it would be a major point of concern, but that is not the case for Fried.

Additionally, his fastball has been even better than last year so far:

Max Fried's Stuff+ scores by pitch (2024 v 2025):

FF: 99 ➡️ 110
SI: 104➡️ 140
CT: 103 ➡️ 108
SL: 114 ➡️ 113
CU: 113 ➡️ 147
CH: 90 ➡️ 90

Overall: 104 ➡️ 119 (!!!) pic.twitter.com/F4ycgmP98B

— Ryan Garcia (@RyanGarciaESM) April 10, 2025

Historically, he has been a great groundball pitcher, with a 54% career rate. His fastball has played into that so far this season, as have his changeup, sinker, and curveball. Each of those pitches has a single digit launch angle, including his sinker and curveball, which have negative launch angles.

With such a good fastball Out%, as well as several other pitches that are above league average or borderline league average in Out%, expect Fried to continue to maintain a low ERA.

 

Out% Pitchers To Target

 

Spencer Schwellenbach – SP ATL

 

Spencer Schwellenbach has the best slider in terms of Out%, but also the best out pitch in the league. It has been nearly unhittable pitch, possessing a .040 batting average against. He has thrown it 52 times this season, and just one batter has a hit on it.

Among pitchers who have thrown a slider at least 50 times, Schwellenbach’s has the highest run value and putaway%, and he ranks ninth best in strikeout rate.

A huge part of his success in using his slider is its vertical break, but it also gets a ton of horizontal movement as well:

Spencer Schwellenbach, Vicious 88mph Slider. 😤

And is Fired Up. 🔥 pic.twitter.com/Tbbw1eEuDz

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) April 11, 2025

He also tosses it harder than league average, with elite extension and above-average location:

This is a recipe for success. Schwellenbach also has multiple other pitches that rank above league average in Out%, including his splitter and sinker, with his splitter being his primary out pitch against lefty hitters.

 

Nick Lodolo – SP CIN

 

Nick Lodolo has pitched exceptionally well this season, and when you see some of his pitch data, it is no surprise why. Lodolo owns one of the best changeups in baseball – much like Schwellenbach’s slider, it has been hit just once in the 60 times he has thrown it. Here he is inducing a swing and miss with it from earlier in the month:

Nick Lodolo, Nasty 88mph Changeup. 👌 pic.twitter.com/TjiL7TZXRL

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) April 4, 2025

Looking at statcast does not tell you the whole picture of Lodolo’s change. It has surprisingly low putaway, whiff, and strikeout rates, but its four-degree launch angle and its 49% groundball rate tell you it has helped him get outs in other ways.

Lodolo’s sinker has also been particularly effective at inducing outs, while his curveball (one of the best from 2024) has performed below average so far this season:

If Lodolo can maintain his changeup and sinker quality while also improving his curveball and fastball performance slightly, he could potentially extend his electric start to the season.

 

Out% Pitchers to Avoid

 

Reese Olson – SP DET

 

Reese Olson has had a rough start to the season, pitching to a 5.06 ERA across 10.2 innings. He has done well at inducing grounders and has pitched into some bad luck to the tune of a .345 BABIP, but there have been some flaws that have led to his issues.

Olson has allowed 4.2 walks per nine innings, and that, along with his below-average LOB%, explains the six earned runs he has allowed so far. He has a league-average HR/FB rate, which tells us that the earned runs against him are not due to bad home run luck. If he continues walking batters at a high rate and not stranding them, he will continue to struggle, even if the BABIP evens out.

Olson’s Out Rates on his pitches guide us to the same understanding. The only pitch of his with an Out% above league average is his changeup.

This is problematic because pitchers either need a really good fastball or multiple out pitches. And right now, Olson has neither of those.

 

Roki Sasaki – SP LAD

 

Roki Sasaki was hyped throughout the offseason, perhaps too much, and has been a mixed bag to start the season. The strikeouts have been there – he has a 9.3 K/9 rate – but he has walked 11 batters in eight innings.

Sasaki’s splitter was his bread and butter pitch in Japan, and to an extent, it has been the same so far. It hasn’t been hit yet, and has a 50% whiff rate, but just a 16% putaway rate. Part of his issue is likely due to pitch sequencing, but a major issue is his pitch location:

Just about the only thing going right for him with his splitter is the elite extension. But because he is not locating it well and not sequencing it effectively, it is not working for him to get batters out:

He has similar issues in terms of locating his other pitches as well. If he continues to struggle at putting balls in the zone, in the right sequence, he will continue to struggle at getting outs.

 

Out% Pitchers to Buy

 

• Andrew Heaney
• Brady Singer
• Dustin May
• Hayden Birdsong
• Hayden Wesneski
• Jameson Taillon
• Jordan Hicks
• Kyle Freeland
• Matthew Liberatore
• Mitch Keller
• Mitchell Parker
• Nick Pivetta
• Ryan Feltner
• Shane Smith

 

Out% Pitchers To Sell

 

• Charlie Morton
• Cole Ragans
• Eduardo Rodriguez
• Erick Fedde
• Gavin Williams
• Jacob deGrom
• Kevin Gausman
• Sean Burke
• Tanner Houck
• Taijuan Walker
• Will Warren