Fantasy Baseball Sleeper Pick: Matt Strahm

Last year in a season that was dominated by relief pitching from big household names, one reliever in particular went under the radar even though he pitched the final two months of the season at the big league level. That reliever was 25-year old, lefty Matt Strahm, of the Kansas City Royals.

Strahm received his big league callup on July 31st and immediately made an impact although it took him a while to settle in at first. During his first big league appearance, Strahm pitched to the tune of a 27.00 ERA in only 0.1 IP. The struggles continued until about the second week in August when Strahm finally got comfortable and lived up to the numbers that he put up down in the minor leagues.

That stellar pitching performance allowed Strahm to finish last season with a 1.23 ERA in 22.0 IP with 30 strikeouts. In addition, he gave up 0 home runs, 11 walks, and had 3 earned runs in that span with a 1.09 WHIP.

Strahm, who was drafted by the Royals during the 21st round of the 2012 Amateur Draft, put up a solid track record of success down in the minors prior to receiving a callup to the big leagues. Dating back to 2012, Strahm had a 3.29 ERA with 4 different minor league teams in 246.1 IP. In that span, he recorded 297 strikeouts, while surrendering 90 earned runs, 24 home runs, and 81 walks.

Besides being a solid relief pitcher, another nice quality about Strahm is his ability to be a starter as well which could benefit Kansas City depending on how they decide to address the current hole they have in their starting rotation following the tragic death of Yordano Ventura. In the minor leagues, Strahm started in 30 games and was also used a closer where he had mixed results putting up 6 saves in 10 save opportunities.

One of the most distinguishing things about Strahm that made him stand out from the other competition was his ability to be a left-handed pitcher and throw a fastball that sits in the low-90s as well as a curveball that reaches the mid-90s. While some scouts believe that he still has some work to do in the control department, they agree that he will continue to have quite a bit of impact at the big league level.

Therefore, if you're on the hunt for a sleeper pick for your fantasy baseball team that others might not think of, Matt Strahm might very well be a good addition to your team. Depending on the role that Kansas City ends up putting him in, either as a starter or a reliever, you can expect him to have another dominant season with plenty of strikeouts in 2017.