Josh James

A quadriceps injury suffered early in spring training took James out of the mix for a rotation spot. He ended up making the team in a relief role and the bullpen is where he remained throughout the campaign, with only one of his 49 appearances coming as a starter. Using a fastball that averaged north of 97 mph, an 89-mph changeup and two variations of a breaking ball, James struck batters out at a healthy 37.6% clip, with the swinging-strike rate to match (16.2%). His walk rate was too high at 13.2% and he was burned at times by the long ball, but even so the estimators say he should have been a sub-4.00 ERA pitcher. James was sidelined by a sore shoulder in the summer and went on to post ERAs of 4.50 and 5.40 in September and October, respectively, though he did have a 34:11 K:BB in those two months. The arm is electric, but James will be 27 on Opening Day and the door may be closed for him as a starter.

Astros pitching devil magic is the new Cardinals position player devil magic. Houston has a slew of high-strikeout, high-spin hurlers at every level of the minors, and since James reached MLB last season and throws smoke, he has become the face of this movement. He was a 34th-round pick in 2014 and pitched all last season as a 25-year-old, so nobody outside the organization could have seen this coming. James credits fixing his sleep apnea as the reason for his velocity spike. Just on the strength of his 98-mph fastball (has touched 102) and plus 89-mph changeup, he will miss bats at a very high clip throughout his big-league career. His 86-mph slider is a work in progress, but it has a chance to be an above-average offering. His command is fringe-average and his groundball rate is below-average, but his stuff is good enough that he could be a high-strikeout No. 3 starter as is. He has a good chance to win a rotation spot in spring training.