Jack Flaherty Joins a New Flock in Baltimore

The Orioles entered Tuesday with the American League’s finest file at 65-41 due to a rebuilding effort that’s lastly paying off. Nonetheless, the workforce made only one transfer to shore up its main league roster within the remaining week forward of the commerce deadline, buying righty Jack Flaherty from the Cardinals in trade for a trio of prospects, infielder César Prieto, lefty Drew Rom, and righty Zack Showalter.

It’s hardly a high-impact transfer, significantly on condition that the Orioles have been reportedly among the many frontrunners to land Justin Verlander and will deal from energy due to their well-stocked minor league system. Yet Verlander — who to be truthful might have used his no-trade clause to dam a transfer to Baltimore if it weren’t to his liking — as an alternative wound up being traded again to the Astros. What’s extra, other than Verlander and former Mets co-ace Max Scherzer, who was traded to the Rangers on Saturday, this wasn’t a market the place frontline starters modified groups. Instead the strikes have been centered round leases resembling Lucas Giolito and Lance Lynn, whose new groups are hoping they’ll rebound with a change of surroundings, whereas strikes for higher performers, and pitchers underneath membership management, have been typically stifled by the excessive asking costs. Notably, the Rays, who entered Tuesday a recreation and a half behind the Orioles, have been one workforce prepared to chunk the bullet for a better-performing starter by buying and selling for the Guardians’ Aaron Civale.

The 27-year-old Flaherty, who can turn out to be a free agent for the primary time this winter, matches into the bounce-back group. The former 2014 first-round decide, who had spent his complete profession with the Cardinals, made an affect in his first few seasons, inserting fifth within the NL Rookie of the Year voting in 2018 (his age-22 season) after which fourth within the Cy Young voting (and thirteenth within the MVP voting) the next yr. For these two seasons mixed, he pitched to a 3.01 ERA and three.64 FIP with a 29.8% strikeout price and 6.9 WAR in 347.1 innings. Whether it was his workload, which included 196.1 innings at age 23 (plus one other 17 within the postseason), or simply dangerous luck, his availability has solely been sporadic since then. He’s totaled 264.1 inning because the begin of 2020, and didn’t throw greater than 78.1 in any season from ’20–22 as a result of an indirect pressure and recurrent shoulder woes, which mixed to ship him to the 60-day injured record 3 times.

Flaherty has been wholesome this season, avoiding the IL and lacking just one begin as a result of proper hip discomfort. His efficiency has hardly been exceptional, nonetheless. In 108.2 innings, he’s pitched to a 4.43 ERA (106 ERA-) and 4.22 FIP (100 FIP-) whereas hanging out 21.9% of hitters, 0.1 factors under the key league common for starters. He’s strolling 11.1% of hitters, and so his 10.7% strikeout-to-walk differential is nearly precisely half of his 21.6% differential from his 2018-19 heyday. Where he generated a 31.7% chase price and a 13.6% swinging strike price in these two seasons, he’s right down to a 27.7% chase price and a ten.2% swinging strike price this yr.

Not shocking given the accidents, Flaherty’s arsenal isn’t what it as soon as was. His common fastball velocity is down 1.4 mph from his seasonal peak of 94.3 mph, set in 2019, and his horizontal motion on the pitch has diminished from a mean of 4.8 inches in 2019 to 1.8 this yr. When batters make contact with the fastball, they’ve hit it for a .304 common and .439 slugging share. The pitch was 22 runs higher than common in 2019 in keeping with Statcast, however is 5 runs worst than common now. His simplest pitch is his curve, which generates a 41.7% whiff price; batters have hit it for only a .176 AVG and .324 SLG. The Stuff+ mannequin isn’t significantly impressed with both pitch, grading his fastball at 95, his curve at 91, and his general Stuff at 93.

The excellent news is that Flaherty has generated a career-high 44.6% groundball price and allowed a career-low 0.82 homers per 9. He’s performed an excellent job of stopping onerous contact; his 87.5 mph common exit velocity, 6.4% barrel price, and 35.8% hard-hit price vary from the 71st to the 77th percentile. He’s been singed for a .345 BABIP, which figures to enhance as he strikes from a workforce with one of many majors’ worst defenses to 1 that’s been fairly middle-of-the-pack primarily based on an evaluation I did of a number of totally different metrics a month in the past. If nothing else, the Orioles’ .686 defensive effectivity is 21 factors higher than the Cardinals’ main league-low .665, which ought to assist trim that BABIP.

Flaherty joins a rotation that’s been higher than anticipated — which isn’t to say that it’s been good, precisely. In our preseason beginning pitcher Positional Power Rankings, the Orioles ranked twenty eighth within the majors in projected WAR (7.5), however at this writing they’re nineteenth (5.7). Among AL groups, their 4.48 ERA ranks eighth and their 4.47 FIP tenth. A serious space of concern is that three of their beginning pitchers, particularly Dean Kremer, Tyler Wells, and Grayson Rodriguez, have both already set profession highs in innings (main league and minor league mixed) or will achieve this very quickly:

That doesn’t give the Orioles numerous headroom in the event that they’re enjoying into October, and what’s extra, in including Flaherty they now have three starters who’ve already surpassed final yr’s workloads. Fatigue might already be an element for Wells, who after totaling simply 9 innings and permitting 11 runs in his first three second-half begins was demoted to Double-A Bowie on Sunday. Said supervisor Brandon Hyde of the demotion, “We feel like he needs a little bit of a break… [R]eally the last three or four starts, there’s been some things in there that were uncharacteristic.”

Said Hyde of the pitchers heading into uncharted territory, “All these guys are going to go through things for the first time, honestly… It’s part of development, and it’s part of why they’re going to be really good down the road, too. We’re trying to win right now. We’re going to try to win down the road.”

Here’s normal supervisor Mike Elias on the topic, from Sunday as properly:

“We’re trying to be mindful of indicators that they might be exhibiting that that might be reason to pull back, other than just sort of the academic concept of, like, ‘Oh hey, look at how many innings this guy’s thrown. Let’s back that off,’” Elias mentioned. “There’s really not a ton of science, or any science, there. We try to use common sense, we try to use our expertise.”

Touché. Still, one would have anticipated a workforce within the Orioles’ place to come back away from the commerce deadline both with increased high quality or higher amount than simply Flaherty, who at this stage is a quasi-LAIM (League Average Innings Muncher), albeit one with merely a modest urge for food for innings primarily based on his spotty observe file for well being. If a contact-oriented Cardinals starter about to hit free company was the order of the day, why couldn’t the Orioles land the extra sturdy and dependable Jordan Montgomery, who was as an alternative traded to the Rangers? Maybe a change of surroundings will assist Flaherty, however an AL East the place all 5 groups are above .500 is hardly essentially the most hospitable touchdown spot for pitchers in want of a brand new backdrop.

As for the returns, Eric Longenhagen has a separate column dedicated to them you possibly can learn right here, however right here’s a quick rundown. Prieto is a 24-year-old infielder who has hit a mixed .349/.393/.475 (132 wRC+) with an absurd 7.4% strikeout price cut up between Double-A Bowie and Triple-A Norfolk; he was twenty seventh on the Orioles Top Prospects record in February as a 40 FV prospect, and is now 18th on the Cardinals’ record. Rom is a 23-year-old lefty who has pitched to a 5.34 ERA and 4.21 FIP with a 25.1% strikeout price in 86 innings at Norfolk; he was twenty ninth on the O’s prospect record within the spring as a 40 FV prospect, and is now twenty fourth on the Cardinals record. Showalter — no relation to the previous Orioles supervisor, alas — is a 19-year-old righty who has posted a 2.37 ERA and three.20 FIP with a 31.8% strikeout price in 30.1 innings cut up between the Florida Complex League and A-level Delmarva. He’s not but on The Board, however Eric indicated he shall be added quickly.

All advised, it doesn’t look as if any of the prospects the Orioles gave up are more likely to be affect gamers. While Elias sees this workforce as one whose aggressive window is simply beginning to open, maybe he and the Orioles will look again and need that they had dug a bit — or lots — deeper to spherical out their rotation in pursuit of October success.