Expectations for Jose Urquidy

A week or so ago, I wrote an article about Luis Garcia thinking that despite being the runner up in the Rookie of the Year, I felt like he was really underrated and there was not much buzz about him. In the spring training game thread, Whatdelayindustries commented “I think Urquidy is the most underrated pitcher on the team.” and I wanted to take a bit deeper of a look at Urquidy’s performances and expectations for him.

Who is Jose Urquidy

Up until 2019, NO ONE had heard of Jose Urquidy. I don’t mean that in just the unheralded prospect way as Jose Luis Hernandez changed his name adding the Urquidy surname. The unheralded part is true, but Urquidy changed his last name in tribute to his mother Alba who was the one who raised him and supported his baseball dreams.

As for the unheralded part, the Athletic captured it well:

“Then again, maybe the entire industry misses it, too. On that Thursday last December, every club in baseball could have selected Jose Urquidy, a 23-year-old right-hander in the Astros system who had never pitched above A-ball, had Tommy John surgery in 2017 and was still known to the baseball world by a different name: José Luis Hernandez.

No one did.”

While he wasn’t recognized as a top prospect, his performances since joining the Astros has made a lot of believers out of him. His career stats to date include an 11-5 record, 3.55 ERA, 1.019 WHIP driven by a miniscule 1.7 K/9 across his 177.2 IP.

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/jose-urquidy-664353?stats=statcast-r-pitching-mlb

With that said, the advanced stats don’t paint quite as rosy of a picture with a 4.13 FIP/4.53 xFIP. Most of his pitches came in a tick below average velocity wise, and nothing in his sliders stands out as exceptional other than BB% where he is in the top 4% of the league.

The projections are a step below those numbers coming in at anywhere from 4.24 - 4.64 ERA in 125.7-145 IP (1.7-1.9 WAR).

It feels like a stark contrast given his performance to date, but there is small sample size to play, with his total IP across the 3 years coming to a grand total of 177.2 IP.

I was actually pretty surprised by the numbers, and I could actually argue we may be overestimating his value given the regression indicated. But I’m not sure why, but I can’t help but agree that he still feels underrated and that he’ll outperform the projections significantly. I completely understand that it could be my Astros bias, or that I was in Mexico watching the Astros in the World Series and got to witness the impact and draw he had to the people there. There’s something truly enjoyable about watching him pitch, and maybe it’s those things, or maybe it’s just watching beautiful clips like these:

Additionally, if you haven’t read it, I highly recommend Fangraphs’ article on Urquidy’s offspeed makeover which details a bit of the changes we saw and introduced me to Vertical Approach Angle, which is an intriguing read for any of you that enjoyed the Strom series of articles.

Depth Chart Projections: 137 IP, 4.48 ERA, 4.53 FIP. 1.7 WAR

2021: 107 IP, 3.62 ERA, 4.14 FIP, 1.8 WAR