The manager of the Cardinals is a bI don’t want to bring up Kyle Gibson. Kyle Gibson might be the final pitcher I mention if I write about free agency starting pitchers like Blake has this offseason. A part of me was disappointed that I didn’t get to write about Lance Lynn, even though I wouldn’t have done as thorough a job as Blake, because Lynn is fascinating. Lynn deserves some attention.
But what about Kyle Gibson? Listen, Kyle, if you’re reading this, you’ve realized many baseball fans’ fantasy. You are one of the best baseball players in the world, and you are one of the few who has built out a 10-year career.
That is, after all, Gibson’s appeal. He is consistent. You receive precisely what you expected. With the exception of his debut season (when he was called up midway) and the pandemic season (when he made the most number of starts possible, 12), he has made at least 29 starts in every season except one. Every fifth day, he will take the mound.
He’s also a big innings eater. In his whole career, he has averaged 5.8 innings per start. He’s pitched at least 179 innings in five of his 11 seasons, although that’s a little deceiving. He didn’t exceed 179 innings during his first season, the season in which he only made 25 starts, the season in which he was sent to the bullpen for 5 games at the end (and it was a 2.6 fWAR season, so it wasn’t due to awful pitching), and the pandemic.
That isn’t his sole dull charm. While he has never surpassed 3 fWAR in a season, he has done so in 7 of his 11 seasons. Again, he did not perform well in his rookie and pandemic seasons (although, to be fair, he was not on track for a 1.9 fWAR season in 2020). The other two seasons, while he wasn’t on pace for it anyhow, he only made 25 and 29 starts, respectively.
He’d be the safest bet in baseball to give you about 30 starts, 170 innings, and at least 2 fWAR if it weren’t for the fact that he’s 36. But those pesky aging curves will most likely keep him from winning that crown. Unfortunately for Gibson, he follows the Cardinals’ addition of Lance Lynn, and to be honest, it’s difficult to convince yourself into both of those signings. I talked myself into signing Lynn in 30 minutes, and I’m confident I’d have no objections to signing Gibson first. However, because he was signed second, he has earned the ire of the crowd.
The remainder of his pitches were ineffective. His most often used pitch, the sinker, had a little positive run value, but the others had negative run values. His change, four-seamer, and cutter (-6 runs) were all ineffective. However, his cutter was +7 as recently as 2021, his 4-seamer was +1 in 2022, and his change hasn’t had a positive run value since 2018, but it’s generally only a somewhat terrible pitch, having been -2 the previous three seasons.
Alex Eisert made an interesting comment in his Fangraphs story on Gibson’s signing. “While the cutter was significantly worse in terms of run value this season, that was offset by how well it paired with Gibson’s sweeper, which Gibson used sparingly in 2022 but used 18.5% of the time in 2023.” The right-hander whiffed on 23% of his sweepers, and the pitch’s success was attributable, in part, to how the cutter acted as a bridge between the new offering and Gibson’s sinker by sitting in between their horizontal movements. Meanwhile, the sinker and sweeper functioned well together, displaying a near-ideal (7:15 spin-axis difference) for the spin-mirroring effect:”
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