Freddy Peralta has had a down start to the season. He has a 7.50 ERA and a 1.75 WHIP so far in 3 starts…..don’t care. Freddy is one of the nastiest pitchers the league has to offer and has a great matchup to get right today.
Pittsburg has really struggled vs righties so far this season, and they have not faced many with Peralta’s ability. Freddy has a 4 pitch arsenal featuring an overpowering fastball and a disgusting slider. He will mix in a curve and a change up as well. Despite his struggles this season, he has still managed 16 K in 12 innings.
He was a strikeout machine last season as well. He managed 195 in 144.1 innings. To be more specific to today’s matchup, he had 84 K in 60 innings (1.4 per inning) in away games, and 83 K in 62.1 innings (1.3 per inning) in day games. He went over the 6.5 K number in 3 out of 4 starts vs the Pirates last year. The most encouraging part to that is the Pirates were 23rd last season in K% vs righties, whereas they are 2nd so far this season.
This Pirates lineup has struck out 119 times in 402 at bats vs righties. They also have only batted .226 vs righties so far this season so they don’t create a lot of traffic on the basepaths for Freddy to worry about. I think Freddy gets a season high in K this afternoon.
