Fernandez (12-5) gave up five runs on six hits and two walks while striking out nine over five innings in Thursday's loss to the Cardinals.

EDGE Analysis

A pair of homers in the third inning and a two-run rally in the fifth ruined the electric righty's day, but he's still piling up the strikeouts at a nearly historic pace. With 184 whiffs in 125.2 innings, Fernandez is working on the third-highest strikeout rate by a starter in MLB history, not far behind Randy Johonson's 2001 and Pedro Martinez's 1999. He is, however, giving up hard contact at the highest rate of his career, so Fernandez is making a bit of a tradeoff in his quest for more whiffs. Other than the occasional dud like this one, though, it hasn't impacted his stats -- he still has a sterling 2.79 ERA.