2016 Pittsburgh Pirates Projections – Jared Hughes

Jared Hughes has been Mr. Fix-It during his time as a member of the Pittsburgh Pirates’ bullpen. Will he continue that success in 2016?

This off-season the writers at Pirates Breakdown will take a look at two different sets of projections for meaningful players on the roster and give you, the readers, their take on whether or not they think said player will meet, surpass, or fall below those projections. The projections for Steamer and ZiPs (created by Dan Szymborski) can be found on fangraphs.com. Catch up on the rest of our projections HERE.

Jared Hughes has been a pretty reliable arm for the Pirates since his 2011 call-up. He put together a very good season in 2015. He was great in his role as he excelled at getting out of jams and getting ground balls with his sinker, which he threw 78 percent of the time.

One notable thing about Hughes, especially in 2014 and 2015, is that he has always outperformed his FIP. He has a career FIP of 3.95 and, despite that, he has a career ERA of 2.77. So when Hughes induces a ground ball, good things tend to happen, and he isn’t the victim of a lot of bad luck.

Will Hughes continue his good fortune in 2016? Lets take a look at his projections:

The first thing we notice is that both his Steamer and ZiPS projection predict that Hughes’ ERA in 2016 will be much closer to his career FIP. It seems that both projections believe that all the good luck that Hughes has had to outperform his FIP since his call-up will run out in 2016.

Hughes has always been a ground ball pitcher. He has a career GB percentage of 61.7. That is well above the league average rate of 44.8 percent. I think a lot of projections struggle with such an extreme ground ball pitcher because the assumption is that eventually things normalize and those balls that have been outs for Hughes will eventually become hits, which will obviously cause a jump in his ERA. Hughes has been a perfect pitcher for the Pirates because of how often the team utilize shifts. It’s hard for me to think that all those ground ball outs are simply luck because that’s the entire Pirates’ pitching philosophy under Ray Searage.

Projections may not be kind for Jared Hughes in 2016, but I wouldn’t be surprised at all if Hughes once again outperforms both his projections and his FIP next season. He is such an extreme ground ball pitcher and that fits exactly what the Pirates do better than pretty much any other team in the league. One thing is certain: we will all still enjoy watching Jared Hughes run to the mound, looking very scary in the process.

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