3 notable White Sox who won’t be back and where they’ll go

3) White Sox P Johnny Cueto – Colorado Rockies

After suffering a number of injuries in the last four seasons, the White Sox took a flier on Johnny Cueto to help their starting pitching depth this year … and he has been their second-best starting pitcher behind Dylan Cease.

Cueto, who turns 37 in February, won’t be getting a huge, long-term contract because of his age but there are some teams in need of starting pitching that could look to sign him. One of those is the Colorado Rockies.

For the Rockies, their strength entering the season was their starting rotation. The problem with their rotation is that they have little depth and their “depth” is not of high quality or been injured. Two of their top starting pitching candidates in the minors (Ryan Rolison and Peter Lambert) have combined to pitch 8.2 innings in Triple-A this year due to injuries.

Furthermore, everyone in their starting rotation has regressed this year and/or regressed in the second half, leading to their 5.28 starter’s ERA, which is second-worst in the sport.

For the Rockies, it has been hard to find quality starting pitching in their history due to the altitude of Denver. However, in 2021, their starting pitchers were actually far superior at home rather than on the road. This was due to two things: a high groundball rate and low fastball spin rate.

Their four starting pitchers that had an ERA of at least one run lower at home in 2021 all had those two qualities.

For Cueto in 2022, the groundball rate is about average. Of the 67 starting pitchers with at least 140 innings pitched this year, his 43.5 percent groundball rate is 33rd, or right in the middle. However, his fastball spin rate is among the lowest.

Of the 239 pitchers that have at least 250 plate appearances against them in 2022, Cueto’s 2189 RPM on his fastball is 76th. That’s sandwiched in between José Ureña (53rd) above Chad Kuhl’s (86th). Both of them are members of the Rockies who started off well at Coors Field before second-half slumps.

The Rockies won’t be contenders at the trade deadline next year but they could trade Cueto to a contender and then get some prospects for him.