I don't know if there's been a more hyped pitching prospect debut in Fantasy than Kade Anderson's since Paul Skenes'. Bubba Chandler a year ago came pretty close, though by the time he actually debuted with the Pirates, it was in a quasi-relief role following months of struggles at Triple-A, so I'm not sure he quite got there. Either way, to say expectations for Anderson have gotten outrageously high over the past month or so would not be an overstatement.
And he didn't live up to those expectations in his first MLB start. That's not to say Anderson was bad, because he wasn't – making the leap straight from Double-A and coming up an out short of a quality start against a lineup like the Cubs is pretty impressive, even! But he wasn't transcendent, and that's where the bar was set for many.
To start with, Anderson came as advertised in a lot of ways. He showed a deep arsenal and commanded all of it well, throwing all four of his pitches at least 20% of the time and dishing out just two walks despite throwing only 40% of his pitches in the strike zone. That ability to generate chases is a big deal, a sign that he was throwing the ball close enough to the zone to induce swings, but not close enough to risk much damage.
For someone who will have to get by more on pitchability and command than pure stuff, already being able to showcase that skill is big. But the stuff is at a relative deficit compared to other high-end pitching prospects. It isn't bad, but it isn't, again, transcendent.
Anderson isn't going to come up and blow opposing hitters away, and that is especially true of his four-seamer. The fastball for Anderson doesn't have bad velocity, but even for a left-handed starter, 93.6 mph isn't exactly special these days. And the jump to the majors seems to have impacted the quality of the pitch – a known issue for any pitcher making the leap from Double-A to the majors at this point.
As Lance Brozdowski pointed out in his newsletter Sunday, the ball used at Double-A and lower levels of the minors is different from the one used at MLB and in Triple-A, in a way that often impacts the movement profile and spin rates of fastballs. Anderson's fastball went from having 18.8 inches of induced vertical break (think "rise") in Double-A to just 15.4 inches in his MLB debut. That can be the difference between missing the bat entirely and finding the barrel, and it might mean his mere two whiffs on 27 fastballs weren't just a fluke.
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