Fresh off his first-ever All-Star appearance in 2015 — along with finishing third in American League Cy Young award voting — Oakland Athletics hurler Sonny Gray had solidified himself as one of baseball’s best young pitchers. Unfortunately for him, he still has a lot to prove after a lackluster 2016 campaign.
After winning 33 games and posting a sparkling 2.88 ERA and 1.13 WHIP with a 7.7 K/9 over his first 491 big-league innings between 2013-15, he stumbled to a 5-11 record with a 5.69 ERA, 1.50 WHIP and just 94 strikeouts in 117 innings last year. He did deal with injury issues throughout, but either way, this wasn’t the pitcher we were used to seeing.
Those struggles are represented in his current Average Draft Position (ADP) for the 2017 season, which is currently 205.41, according to NFBC.
So, what should we expect from him? Was last year just a blip on the radar or something to be concerned about? That’s what I talked about with Garion Thorne of FNTSY Sports Network’s The Rotation last week. Check it out below, along with the article I wrote on numberFire about the potential of Gray bouncing back in 2017.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7YUynHMysg?list=PLQwcm8xgEtvB4EAP6p1PIvnKpglOnFJFC]Thanks for reading! If you’d like to jumpstart your sportswriting career and aren’t sure how, check out my eBook. Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter so we can chat about baseball: @mmusico8.
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