5 Starting Pitchers Who Need to Avoid Another Slow Start

Matt Shoemaker, Los Angeles Angels

Matt Shoemaker has produced inconsistent results throughout his big-league career, and the 2016 season was not exempt from that. While he did a lot of great things before his season ended prematurely, none of the good stuff happened last April.

There were 31 starting pitchers who threw at least 20 innings en route to producing an ERA north of 5.00 during the first month of 2016. Of this group, Shoemaker's 9.15 ERA was the second-highest mark. Obviously, we know that simply looking at a pitcher's ERA doesn't tell us everything about their performance, but bright spots were tough to come by here.

Opposing hitters produced a .413 wOBA and slashed .312/.386/.600 against him. While his FIP wasn't nearly as eye-popping, it's not as if the 6.82 mark he posted would've instilled much fear in anyone stepping into the batter's box.

But once the calendar flipped to May, the results were much better, as evidenced by his ERA (3.02) and FIP (3.10). He also increased his strikeout-to-walk ratio (K-BB%) from just 5.8% to 18.9% while his left-on-base percentage (LOB%) went from 55.6% to 78.1%.