As a former first-round pick (16th overall in 2012) who later became one of Major League Baseball’s premier prospects, there was optimism right-hander Lucas Giolito would develop into a front-line starter in the pros. It just took longer than expected. Seven years after the Nationals selected him, it looks as if Giolito is breaking through in a White Sox uniform.
Giolito joined the White Sox in December 2016 as part of one of that offseason’s highest-profile trades. It was a polarizing deal for the Nationals, with many enthusiastic about their addition of outfielder Adam Eaton – who was controllable for an eminently reasonable $38.4MM over a half-decade at the time. Others ripped the Nationals for giving up too much to acquire Eaton, for whom they surrendered Giolito and a pair of other quality righty prospects in Reynaldo Lopez and Dane Dunning.
A couple years later, it’s fair to say the trade hasn’t worked out quite as Washington hoped. Eaton has been mostly good in a Nationals uniform when on the field, but injuries limited him to 23 games in 2017 and 95 last year. Durability hasn’t been an issue for Eaton this season, though he’s not yet producing at prior levels. Worsening matters, the Nats haven’t won a playoff series since adding Eaton, and the disappointing club’s currently on track to miss out on October ball for the second straight season.
As for the rebuilding White Sox, the results of the Eaton deal have been mixed. Lopez has been inconsistent since he debuted with them in 2017, while Dunning – although still a good prospect – just underwent Tommy John surgery in March. Fortunately for the White Sox, Giolito may be here to save the day, which is somewhat unexpected considering the struggles he endured in both the minors and majors over the past couple years.
Giolito pitched his first full major league season in 2018, racking up 32 starts and 173 1/3 innings, but it wasn’t pretty. He ranked dead last among qualified starters in ERA (6.13), FIP (5.56) and K/BB ratio (1.39). Consequently, there wasn’t much optimism centering on Giolito entering the 2019 campaign. But the 24-year-old worked diligently over the winter to turn around his fortunes, as James Fegan of The Athletic detailed in February, and has reaped the rewards of a change in delivery.
Giolito got off to a slow start through his first five outings of the season, evidenced by the 5.32 ERA he possessed and the 12 walks he issued through 23 2/3 innings as of May 2. But over his five most recent starts, Giolito has delivered excellent results; he yielded five earned runs on 17 hits over that 36 1/3-frame span and posted a 39:8 K/BB ratio. In his crowning moment of that stretch, Giolito fired a complete game, four-hit road shutout against Houston’s incredible offense on May 23. Thanks in part to that start, Giolito owns a superb 2.85 ERA/2.84 FIP with 10.35 K/9 and 3.00 BB/9 across 60 innings on the season. He has already accounted for two wins above replacement after finishing in the minuses in that category in 2018.
Perhaps you’re still skeptical of Giolito, who did face the below-averages offenses of the Blue Jays (twice), Indians and Royals during his recent stretch of brilliance. It’s hard to deny there has been major progress, though. Here’s a look at some of the key strides Giolito has made this year…
- Throwing more strikes: According to Baseball-Reference, Giolito threw strikes 60.5 percent of the time last year. That ranked 116th out of 121 qualifiers and helped lead to 4.57 walks per nine innings. He’s now generating strikes at a 66.3 percent clip, good for 31st out of 130 hurlers. Giolito has also seen his zone percentage climb from 47.2 to 52.6 percent, and his first-pitch strike rate has shot from 55.4 to 62.0.
- Amassing far more strikeouts and whiffs: Giolito drew swinging strikes at an 8.3 percent clip in 2018. That number’s now at 12.8 percent. This year’s version of Giolito ranks 19th among all starters in that category. It helps explain the meteoric rise in his K/9, which was 6.49 in 2018.
- An increase in velocity and a remade repertoire: Giolito’s average fastball velocity clocked in below 93 mph from 2017-18. The mean has jumped to 94.5 mph this year, though, and he’s throwing the pitch far more often. After turning to the offering just under 40 percent of the time in 2018, Giolito has gone to it at a 55.2 percent rate this season. He has also bagged his sinker, which was his second-most common pitch a year ago, and thrown more change-ups and fewer breaking balls. Giolito’s three main pitches – his fastball, change and slider – have all been among the most effective in baseball so far, according to FanGraphs.
- Limiting contact: Giolito’s contact rate has dropped from 80.7 percent to 73.5 in a year’s time. While his groundball percentage simultaneously has fallen 8 percentage points (44.4 to 36.4), Giolito isn’t allowing high-impact fly balls. Not only is Giolito second in the majors in infield fly rate (17.5 percent), but his average FB distance against has plunged from 315 feet to 301. In the process, his wOBA/xwOBA tandem has gone from .345/.350 to .261/.277.
All things considered, it appears Giolito is evolving into one of baseball’s preeminent young starters and delivering on the considerable hype he garnered as a prospect. If true, he’ll be a long-term building block for the White Sox and one-fifth of what could be an exciting rotation for years to come. That will depend somewhat on whether Lopez, Dunning and top-end prospects Dylan Cease and Michael Kopech – who’s recovering from 2018 Tommy John surgery – pan out.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
I like these articles instead of the mainly “Players A, B, and C are injured while players D and Q are making progress” that we usually get this point in the season
Amen. I like the change of pace
Yeah, this one was solid. 95% of these pieces on this site are comically bad. High-risk/high-reward.
Kind of like how I write: making stuff on Fangraphs more digestible for the average reader. The people on Reddit agree on that with the amount of upvotes I get. Great piece. Also, I think the White Sox are probably going to use Cease as a multi inning relief piece at first since he’s only averaging five IP per start in AAA.
You think Reddit upvotes mean anything? A bunch of losers in their underwear in their Mom’s basement?
What does that make you then? What value do I hold in your opinion? About as much as I hold in my opinion of our tantrum throwing President. If you think you’re so clever, why don’t YOU go write something and reply to my comment with a link to it. reddit.com/user/andycannolis/posts/ is mine if you think you can do any better.
Well yeah, considering those “basement dwellers” are notorious for being trolls, then I’d say getting some recs is actually a pretty good indication Andrew Farelli is doing something correct!! lol
I actually forgot about that. Thanks. I have also been thinking about making a blog site like Fangraphs but have it with more of a focus on foreign leagues.
Way to pat yourself on the back
Good for him to finally put it together
Good article Connor! I wish the Giants would do Beede like the Whitesox did Giolito, knowing they arent going to compete, they let him pitch and let him figure it out, he took the ball every 5 even with not so good results knowing his stuff and his makeup he’s proven to learn from his mistakes.
great informative piece. Lucas has looked great. I think Reynaldo will also figure it out soon.
I like that we are to ignore the first five starts and consider his last five starts to be his permanent future. Pitchers can get on streaks, just as hitters do. I would not expect this level of production to continue indefinitely. Still, he may have figured something out, and anything better than last year is a plus.
You realize that his ERA from his first 5 starts is bad because of 2 games, right? The other 3 he looked good-to-great… So he’s been good, at the very least, in 80% of his starts, not 50%.
He gave up 9 earned runs in 9.1 innings vs Seattle (when they were the hottest team in the league) and the Yankees (in Yankee Stadium). He gave up 5 earned in the other 14.1 innings (2 vs KC and 1 vs Boston), and he got hurt in what looked like it was going to be his most dominant outing of the year.
He very well may revert to previous form (I highly doubt it), and he’s likely not as good as what he’s shown the last 5 starts, but he looks significantly improved from last year, and pretty much every data point backs that.
I appreciate the optimism of this article but it’s a bit premature to say he’s finally arrived.
A full season with actual good/strong numbers would be a better indicator of an arrival than would five starts over a 3 week period in May.
Keep swinging Connor, maybe you’ll give us a cold.
Shout out to James McCann who has handled Giolito like an absolute pro. Those two are working great together. I can only hope the Sox are smart enough to ditch Castillo ASAP and bring up Collins to let him learn from McCann for as long as possible.
Thanks pal
No problem, bud.
@Priggs89
Yes, absolutely McCann has been a huge pickup for the Sox, especially with Castillo being the bust he’s been so far with the Sox. That might be more important to Giolito’s rebound so far than all the other things listed (or, at least McCann might be a big factor why some of those items listed above are now occurring). Some pitchers and catchers click perfectly. I’m not sure if this is 100% the case, but I’m sure it’s helping the cause. Hopefully once Collins is deemed ready, Castillo will get cut right then and there (assuming he’s not still injured when that happens).
Amen to that statement. Catchers like McCann don’t get the recognition for the strategy they bring to pitchers and how to work with their repertoire. He’s been the best offseason acquisition for them this year.
McCann is very good behind the plate. Definitely deserves some love.
2020…year 7 of the rebuild.
Yup. Totally.
2020. will be year 4 of the rebuild
Take a look at their record for the previous 5 seasons plus 2019 so far then get back.
Being bad =/= rebuilding. Didn’t they “win the offseason” one of those years? Check around 2014/2015 and get back.
Steven Chinwood will never get it. It can be obvious to 99.9% of the people, and there’s always that one person who just can’t grasp something so simple. It’s just a lost cause.
Anyone who actually paid attention before the Sale trade could see the Sox weren’t in rebuild more. They were trying to compete for the division, albeit a feeble attempt. I’ve said it several times and I’ll say it again: if what the Sox were doing before the Sale trade a rebuild, it was the worst attempt at a rebuild in the history of sports. Yet Stevie can’t understand the difference between sucking and rebuilding.
They acquired James Shields (I won’t say for whom) on 6/4/16. That’s not what rebuilding teams do.
The need to rebuild was acknowledged later that year and started 6 months later when they traded Sale.
This trade continues to make we wonder how Mike Rizzo still has a job, and nobody has asked how he still has a job.
Not only was Eaton a poor fit on the field, he’s a brutal cancer to a clubhouse
Way too early to tell
Giolito looked like a true ace against Houston. He looked like a man on a mission. I think the Astros destroyed him in a start in 2018, this last week, it certainly looked like Giolito was a new and improved pitcher.
Fun fact – Giolito’s grandfather, Warren Frost, played Mr.Ross, George’s fiancés father, on Seinfeld.
Jordan Zimmermann nearly became a lock for Cooperstown shutting down the Blue Jays. So it’s still early to say Giolito has arrived. However, he deserves praise. Can’t control the schedule.
Anything is better than last year from him, and I am enjoying his pitching over the last month, but let’s ease up on the hyperbole a bit. I gotta agree with some of the posts on here, it’s too early. KC, Toronto & Cleveland aren’t exactly the ’27 Yankees lineup.
Now the Houston game gives me hope for him. Plus, he could’ve easily went down in flames the other day against KC after the 1st inning like he did several times last year. So I think it’s possible he’s finally turned the corner, but the sample size is still way too small to declare it that. If he’s sustained this improvement into August and Sept, then I’ll be sold on him.
I don’t want to sound like the Sox hating trolls on this website, I’m just being cautious about his potential turnaround. If the turnaround is in fact real, who would’ve guessed the stark improvements for TA, Moncada, AND Giolito all in the same season. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, let’s see what happens over the next few months.