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How a move to the bullpen may affect Yariel Rodriguez’s performance

Because the Toronto Blue Jays‘ low season has marched on, the workforce’s intention of including to its beginning rotation has emerged as a throughline.

Thus far, the rumblings haven’t resulted in something concrete, and the provision of credible starters is dwindling to the purpose that the Blue Jays might not make good on this concept. Nonetheless, the thought stays interesting primarily as a consequence of two generally held beliefs about Yariel Rodríguez:

It’s powerful to be completely assured in what he can supply as a full-time beginning pitcher, and it appears fairly probably that he may make a distinction within the bullpen.

The primary thought is troublesome to refute. Rodríguez had some good moments throughout an unorthodox rookie season that required extreme workload administration, however he’s nonetheless a high-variance choice in a beginning position. 

The notion that a part of the rationale including one other starter is smart is that he can thrive out of the bullpen is price interrogating. All through his skilled profession, Rodríguez has been primarily used a reliever simply as soon as (2022 in Japan).

He was glorious that season (1.15 ERA in 54.2 IP), however it was in a special league a while in the past. Rodríguez may in all probability survive in an MLB ‘pen, however it’s price asking how a lot of a difference-maker he could be.

To reply that query, we checked out pitchers who break up time between beginning and reduction within the final 4 full seasons for the reason that shortened 2020 marketing campaign to see what could be honest to anticipate of Rodríguez.

Our pattern consists of 39 pitchers who pitched not less than 100 innings in one of many 4 seasons with 10-plus begins and 10-plus reduction appearances. Selecting pitchers’ outcomes from inside particular person seasons makes it much less probably pitchers have reinvented themselves in a approach that might mess with the outcomes or expertise important velocity jumps.

Blue Jays followers probably recall the speedy turnaround of Bowden Francis in the course of the 2024 season, however there are all the time outliers. In every of the final 4 seasons, the enhancements pitchers see when understanding of the bullpen are notable:

In each case, these pitchers utilized in twin roles noticed a median lower of their ERA between 1.23 and 0.57 factors, a leap in Ok/9 between 0.16 and 1.13, and a velocity bump starting from 0.5 to 1.7 mph. 

If we take the midpoint of all these enhancements and apply them to Rodríguez’s rookie season, the change appears to be like like this:

That’s a consequence the Blue Jays may in all probability reside with, however to take issues a bit farther, we are able to discover some pitch comparisons in our pattern — particularly for Rodríguez’s four-seam fastball and slider, which he threw 68 per cent of the time in 2024, and would probably lean on much more in reduction.

Of our 39 pitchers, the participant whose fastball most resembles Rodríguez’s is 2022 Brad Keller when he was with the Kansas Metropolis Royals. His velocity as a starter that season (94.3 mph) carefully matches the Blue Jays right-hander. Like Rodríguez, Keller’s four-seamer was additionally extraordinarily straight, breaking two-plus inches beneath common vertically and horizontally. Rodríguez is much more excessive on this space at four-plus inches beneath common every approach, however that may be a uncommon profile.

Right here’s how Keller’s fastball fared as a starter and reliever in 2022:

Getting a velocity enhance on a straight fastball out of the pen significantly benefited Keller. Though Rodríguez may not be capable of match a acquire of 1.4 mph, that is an encouraging comp for a pitcher whose fastball had a run worth of minus-5 final season.

On the subject of the slider, Rodríguez’s has an roughly common vertical break (0.5 inches beneath common) and robust horizontal motion (3.7 inches above common) and is available in at 84.8 mph. As soon as once more, there wasn’t an ideal one-to-one. 

However a latest instance of a right-hander with a slider that sees way more spectacular horizontal than vertical motion is the Athletics’ Mitch Spence final season. His slider velocity as a starter (84.3 mph) is comparatively near Rodríguez’s, and his horizontal motion (9.3 inches above common) dwarfs the vertical drop (2.2 above common). 

That’s extra spectacular than the uncooked motion on Rodríguez, however its strengths are the identical, and never many sliders in our pattern are near the Blue Jays righty’s from a velocity/motion standpoint.

As a bonus, Spence has a lesson to show us — breaking balls don’t essentially get the identical enhance from a transfer to the bullpen that fastballs do.

Spence threw the very same pitch as a starter and a reliever with the very same outcomes. This isn’t assured to occur with Rodríguez, however it’s useful to know that an consequence like that is completely on the desk and the upside of a transfer to reduction is extra about fastball positive factors — and pruning much less efficient tertiary pitches from an arsenal — than discovering a brand new gear atop his breaking ball. 

Till we see Rodríguez pitch out of an MLB bullpen, there will likely be some uncertainty about his efficiency in that position. However he appears more likely to not less than give the Blue Jays above-average manufacturing, and any starter the workforce provides ought to give the squad the twin rotation-bullpen improve it has been searching for all low season. 


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