Blake Snell, Tampa Bay Rays
We talked about the season Blake Snell is having not too long ago, but it’s worthy of highlighting once more because the dominance has continued. His 2.02 ERA ranks third among qualified big-league starters, and he’s on the verge of taking the American league lead (Chris Sale is sitting at 1.97). Snell’s career-high 3.6 fWAR in 2018 also equals the cumulative fWAR he produced in his first two MLB seasons.
The southpaw was already putting together a terrific performance heading into the midsummer classic, but has been even more out of this world since the break. After posting a 2.27 ERA, 28.3% strikeout rate, and 9.9% walk rate in the first half, he’s improved those numbers to 1.10, 36.4%, and 5.9%, respectively, in the second half. That ERA is the second-best in baseball among starters with at least 30 second-half innings.
He’s also managed to allow just 0.55 homers per nine innings despite a 40.9% fly-ball rate and 45.6% hard-hit rate since the All-Star game, too.
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