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Through one month, the Cardinals<\/a> have a back-of-the-baseball-card pitching star in Michael McGreevy. In seven starts and nearly 40 innings of work, McGreevy owns a sparkling 2.52 ERA. That\u2019s good for 13th in all of baseball for qualified starters. For the Cardinals’ overall team record, this means that McGreevy has been supplying elite run-suppressing innings for a team that\u2019s in desperate need of quality pitching<\/a>.<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=5l q:key=vcaa:This is all fantastic news. Truly and genuinely. What Cardinals fan isn’t absolutely in love with this team at this moment in time? When you go to look at how<\/em> Michael McGreevy is arriving at these results though, you’re honestly left scratching your head. Before I dive into the numbers, let me prime you with a conversation we had on Redbird Rundown about whether McGreevy can keep outpitching his metrics. It’s a fascinating subject and one that will be very important if this team can make a playoff push well before anyone expected. Apple<\/a> and Spotify<\/a>!<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n This is all fantastic news. Truly and genuinely. What Cardinals fan isn\u2019t absolutely in love with this team at this moment in time? When you go to look at how<\/em> Michael McGreevy is arriving at these results though, you\u2019re honestly left scratching your head. Before I dive into the numbers, let me prime you with a conversation we had on Redbird Rundown about whether McGreevy can keep outpitching his metrics. It\u2019s a fascinating subject and one that will be very important if this team can make a playoff push well before anyone expected. Apple<\/a> and Spotify<\/a>!<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=5s q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=5v q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n And now, some startling numbers so we can intelligently and rationally (hopefully!) discuss what McGreevy has been doing. Statcast, as I’m sure you know, takes the raw data from cameras in the stadium <\/a>to compare to every other baseball play that’s ever been tracked<\/em> to give fans some expected stats. It’s honestly an incredible amount of data and so the results are pretty durable. Remember, McGreevy is 13th amongst qualified starters with a 2.52 ERA. Well, Statcast has him in the 10th percentile for expected<\/em> ERA at 6.18. Yikes. He’s also in the bottom 10th percentile when it comes to expected batting average and expected slugging.<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n And now, some startling numbers so we can intelligently and rationally (hopefully!) discuss what McGreevy has been doing. Statcast, as I\u2019m sure you know, takes the raw data from cameras in the stadium <\/a>to compare to every other baseball play that\u2019s ever been tracked<\/em> to give fans some expected stats. It\u2019s honestly an incredible amount of data and so the results are pretty durable. Remember, McGreevy is 13th amongst qualified starters with a 2.52 ERA. Well, Statcast has him in the 10th percentile for expected<\/em> ERA at 6.18. Yikes. He\u2019s also in the bottom 10th percentile when it comes to expected batting average and expected slugging.<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=5y q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n Basically, when Statcast compares how players are hitting balls off of McGreevy to how players are hitting balls off of every other pitcher in the MLB since 2015<\/em>, it thinks McGreevy is a ticking time bomb. This is obviously not the result Cardinals fans want and would be a devastating blow to any nascent playoff hopes that are kindling in the fanbase. <\/p>\n –><\/p>\n Basically, when Statcast compares how players are hitting balls off of McGreevy to how players are hitting balls off of every other pitcher in the MLB since 2015<\/em>, it thinks McGreevy is a ticking time bomb. This is obviously not the result Cardinals fans want and would be a devastating blow to any nascent playoff hopes that are kindling in the fanbase.\u00a0<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=61 q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n Let’s hold our collective breath for one more collective cold plunge. McGreevy is almost the worst pitcher in baseball when it comes to strikeout rate, whiff %, and chase %. Essentially, batters are just not fooled by his arsenal and don’t swing and miss very often. What’s odd is he’s not even keeping the ball on the ground at career-high rates. In fact, flyballs against McGreevy are up<\/em> 10%. So what gives? How is this guy vastly<\/em> outpitching his stuff through seven starts?<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n Let\u2019s hold our collective breath for one more collective cold plunge. McGreevy is almost the worst pitcher in baseball when it comes to strikeout rate, whiff %, and chase %. Essentially, batters are just not fooled by his arsenal and don\u2019t swing and miss very often. What\u2019s odd is he\u2019s not even keeping the ball on the ground at career-high rates. In fact, flyballs against McGreevy are up<\/em> 10%. So what gives? How is this guy vastly<\/em> outpitching his stuff through seven starts?<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=64 q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=67 q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n First of all, he doesn’t walk anyone. Well, that’s not strictly true, but his walk rate is in the 96th percentile. One of the coaches for my brother’s team had a saying growing up that has always stuck in my head. He’d say “‘em walks is killin’ us.” He’s not a major league coach. He’s not a D1 coach. He coached middle school Little League – but his baseball observation was timelessly true. (Just ask Ryne Stanek.) Michael McGreevy excels<\/em> in not beating himself. That’s vitally important for a guy who does not, and will not ever, have the raw stuff to overpower a lineup. So, Michael, ‘em non-walks is givin’ us life. Keep it up!<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n First of all, he doesn\u2019t walk anyone. Well, that\u2019s not strictly true, but his walk rate is in the 96th percentile. One of the coaches for my brother\u2019s team had a saying growing up that has always stuck in my head. He\u2019d say \u201c\u2018em walks is killin\u2019 us.\u201d He\u2019s not a major league coach. He\u2019s not a D1 coach. He coached middle school Little League \u2013 but his baseball observation was timelessly true. (Just ask Ryne Stanek.) Michael McGreevy excels<\/em> in not beating himself. That\u2019s vitally important for a guy who does not, and will not ever, have the raw stuff to overpower a lineup. So, Michael, \u2018em non-walks is givin\u2019 us life. Keep it up!<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=6a q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n The other way he’s finding success is going to get dorkier, so strap on your pocket protectors. Pitchers do worse each time they make their way through a batting order. This makes sense. Batters see the arsenal more, adjust to it, and do far more damage. When you look at McGreevy’s splits, his second time through the order and dreaded third time through the order numbers look normal. But, he has been Greg Maddux so far the first time through the order.<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n The other way he\u2019s finding success is going to get dorkier, so strap on your pocket protectors. Pitchers do worse each time they make their way through a batting order. This makes sense. Batters see the arsenal more, adjust to it, and do far more damage. When you look at McGreevy\u2019s splits, his second time through the order and dreaded third time through the order numbers look normal. But, he has been Greg Maddux so far the first time through the order.<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=6d q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n He’s running a 1.04 ERA in the first turn through the order and stifling lineups to a .194\/.206\/.290 line. So far in 2026, there’s been no period of “settling in” to games for McGreevy. He’s been locked in and ready to go from the outset. His bullpen preparation pregame, pinpoint control, and varied pitching arsenal have teamed up to put a wet blanket on teams the first time through the order.<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n He\u2019s running a 1.04 ERA in the first turn through the order and stifling lineups to a .194\/.206\/.290 line. So far in 2026, there\u2019s been no period of \u201csettling in\u201d to games for McGreevy. He\u2019s been locked in and ready to go from the outset. His bullpen preparation pregame, pinpoint control, and varied pitching arsenal have teamed up to put a wet blanket on teams the first time through the order.<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=6g q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n Will this continue? Honestly, I’m a bit doubtful that he can continue to outpitch these batted ball metrics to this<\/em> level, but Michael McGreevy does have a couple of very important skills that he can lean on to continue to outpitch what the raw data says. I don’t know about you, but I’m rooting for him to just that. I’d love nothing more than for this young team to stay in the playoff hunt all season.<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n Will this continue? Honestly, I\u2019m a bit doubtful that he can continue to outpitch these batted ball metrics to this<\/em> level, but Michael McGreevy does have a couple of very important skills that he can lean on to continue to outpitch what the raw data says. I don\u2019t know about you, but I\u2019m rooting for him to just that. I\u2019d love nothing more than for this young team to stay in the playoff hunt all season.<\/p>\n <!–qv q:id=6j q:key=vcaa:<\/p>\n Thanks for reading!<\/p>\n –><\/p>\n Thanks for reading!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Follow<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <!–qv q:id=5i q:key=vcaa:Through one month, the Cardinals have a back-of-the-baseball-card pitching star in Michael McGreevy. In seven starts and nearly 40 innings of work, McGreevy owns a sparkling 2.52 ERA. That’s good for 13th in all of baseball for qualified starters. For the Cardinals' overall team record, this means that McGreevy has been supplying elite … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30202,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Michael-McGreevys-numbers-look-elite-but-data-seems-to-hate.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30201"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30203,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30201\/revisions\/30203"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/30202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jubi24.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The scary numbers behind McGreevy’s start to the season for the Cardinals<\/h2>\n
The scary numbers behind McGreevy\u2019s start to the season for the Cardinals<\/h2>\n
There are two key ways McGreevy is finding success early this season<\/h2>\n
There are two key ways McGreevy is finding success early this season<\/h2>\n
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