Impressions of the Orioles' (minor-league) Free Agent Signings - Part One

The Baltimore Orioles have avoided making a major splash in the 2014-2015 off-season - the big moves were the signing of well-traveled left-handed spot relief pitcher Wesley Wright, the selection of two players in the Rule 5 draft, and the trade acquisition of Travis Snider. But they haven't been completely inactive; they've signed a fair number of minor-league free agents. Most of the players signed to these contracts hope to be minor league roster filler - the lucky ones get to spend a year in Frederick or Salisbury while the unlucky ones get released in spring training. (Think Zane Chavez.) A smaller number are higher-level roster filler, who will likely help Bowie and Norfolk compete and who, if they play well, might earn a week or two in the big leagues as a bench player. (Think Cord Phelps.) And a few are players with real chances to make the Orioles out of spring training but who were signed to minor-league contracts because there just wasn't room on the 40-man roster. (Think Delmon Young, 2014.)

Most fans don't pay attention to these signings (unless the player is like Delmon Young) until the player is promoted to the Orioles. However, I think it's at least worth going through the signings to see in advance if there is anyone who might wear an Orioles' uniform or put up impressive numbers for one of their affiliates. This article won't analyze anyone in depth; it will be a very superficial look at these players. Some have played on or against Norfolk, and so I'll be mixing in some of my individual observations with a review of the stat lines. And as you read this, remember that it's very unlikely that anyone will be more than a mop-up relief pitcher or benchwarmer.

The Orioles signed three minor-league free agents to major-league contracts, putting them on the 40-man winter roster. A team will generally sign a minor-league free agent to a major-league contract if they perceive him to be in demand or that another team might take him in the Rule 5 draft. (Players newly signed to a minor-league contract can be selected in the Rule 5 draft, and occasionally such players are selected.)

It's easy to see why the Orioles signed Rey Navarro to a major-league contract. He's 25, a middle infielder, and played well in both 2013 and 2014. The Diamondbacks drafted him out of Puerto Rico in 2007 at a very young age - he didn't turn 18 until December of 2007. As a result, he was overmatched at the plate in his first seasons and was traded to the Royals in 2010. He took his time to get through the minor-leagues, and he had a promising 2013 season at age 23. However, because he signed so young, he had then completed his first six-year professional contract. The Royals didn't add him to their 40-man roster; he was granted free agency; and he signed with the Reds. He split 2014 evenly between AA and AAA and hit .282/.343/.435, playing shortstop and second base in a 60/40 split. Unfortunately, while Navarro had been a good defender early in his career, he doesn't appear to have been a good defender in 2014. Still, it's easy to see that Navarro may have been in demand and he should be a serviceable utility infielder if the Orioles need him. And, he's still young enough that it's probable that he hasn't reached his peak.

The Orioles also signed two of their own minor-league free agents to major-league contracts. Oliver Drake is an interesting story, and it's possible that he too was in demand. He was drafted out of the Naval Academy as a draft-eligible sophomore; he signed instead of returning to Navy and acquiring an armed services commitment. He has always had good control, but his stuff improved after he became a full-time relief pitcher. Over the past two seasons, he has averaged 11.7 strikeouts per nine innings; in 2014 he led the Eastern League with 31 saves. He'll pitch at age 28 in 2015, and is a good, low-cost candidate for a middle-relief role right now. He will probably start 2015 at Norfolk and might step into a twelfth-man bullpen role. At the very least he should be able to handle the Norfolk-to-Baltimore shuttle role.

Eddie Gamboa. Photo courtesy of Les Treagus / Norfolk Tides.

Eddie Gamboa is another pitcher with an interesting backstory, although it seems doubtful that he was in high demand as a minor-league free agent. His signing a major-league contract seems to be as much a vote of confidence as anything. Gamboa was a late-round college senior draftee who signed for a $1000 bonus. He started his career as a roster-filler arm and was reached Double-A in his first full season simply by pitching very well. His role changed to swingman in 2010 and he continued to pitch well, but by 2012 it was evident that he didn't have the sheer stuff to become a major-league pitcher. In the 2012-2013 offseason, he decided to become a knuckleball pitcher and pitched some excellent games in a generally solid season split between Bowie and Norfolk. He was supposed to begin 2014 as the Norfolk spot-starter/long relief pitcher, but when Kevin Gausman was hurriedly promoted to Baltimore Gamboa became the Tides' opening-day starter. When T.J. McFarland was promoted to Baltimore for good, Gamboa moved into the Norfolk rotation and pitched fairly well.

In June, however, Gamboa's season and career suffered a setback when he was suspended for testosterone use. Reading between the lines of the statements of both Gamboa and the Orioles, I conclude that Gamboa most likely was entitled to a therapeutic use exemption and failed to get one. It also would be hard to imagine the Orioles signing Gamboa - or any other ordinary minor leaguer - to a major-league contract if they felt he was unfairly using testosterone. This signing appears to be an endorsement of Gamboa's character as much as anything, and I expect him to be removed from the 40-man roster as soon as it becomes necessary.

These are the three minor-league free agents the Orioles signed to major-league contracts. In my next post, I'll look at a few free agents the Orioles signed to minor-league contracts.

Making the Orioles a Champion in 2014: Right Handed Relievers

This post is part of the Making the Orioles a Champion in 2014 Series.  Below you will find links to the other articles.  We will do our best to make sure the links go live with each new update.

C | 1B | 2B (1, 2) | 3B | SS | LF | CF | RF | DH | Bench | SP (1, 2) | RHRP | LHRP | Conclusion

Courtesy of masnsports.com

Looking Back

Despite the nearly 50/50 split of team pitching fWAR between them and the lefthanders, the right side of the Baltimore Orioles bullpen enjoys the lion's share of accolades for their pitching prowess. Whether it's Jim Johnson leading the American League in saves (50) for the second year in a row or finishing second in the AL among relievers with 40 shutdown appearances, Tommy Hunter amassing the second most innings for an AL reliever (86.1 IP) or ranking 10th in the AL for holds (21) on a fastball that averaged 96 miles per hour -- good for sixth-best along AL relievers) -- or the steady stream of outs generated by submariner Darren O'Day, the right side of the 'pen grabs headlines and narratives for their conspicuous methods of productivity.

At first glance, the right side of the bullpen doesn't appear to share too many similarities with its lefthanded brethren. Paced by the bowling ball sinker of Jim Johnson and the pure high-90's heat of Tommy Hunter, the Oriole righties display more dominant 'stuff' as compared to the lefties, who generally use location and change of speeds to do their job.

As we did for the lefties, let's look at how the righties went about generating their fWAR, broadly; again, we are limiting our evaluations to pitchers who threw at least 20 innings and rank their seasons by fair run average:

Name	G	IP	ERA	FIP	xFIP	RE24	FRA	fWAR
Jim Johnson	74	70.1	2.94	3.45	3.38	7.2	4.12	0.9
Francisco Rodriguez	23	22	4.5	4.28	2.31	-0.72	4.14	0.0
Darren O'Day	68	62	2.18	3.58	3.59	9.67	4.19	0.7
Tommy Hunter	68	86.1	2.81	3.68	3.63	17.40	4.20	0.7
Kevin Gausman	15	23	3.52	2	2.33	4.99	4.75	0.6
Pedro Strop*	29	22.1	7.25	5.51	4.1	-15.21	6.98	-0.3

*Traded to CHC 7/2/2013

Looking at FRA, we find that, Pedro Strop notwithstanding, the righties of the 'pen performed admirably, living in 'good, occasionally great' territory; however, when using Value Added (RE24), we find that Hunter was a top-10 AL reliever, coming in with the sixth highest RE24 for 2013. Comparing FIPs to xFIPs and ERAs, we also see that, aside from midseason acquisition Francisco Rodriguez, the righties of the bullpen performed as expected, with Hunter having a modicum of luck or defensive talent helping him out throughout the season (ERA < FIP).

Let's now discuss lefty/righty splits:

Lefty splits:

Name	IP	AVG	wOBA	BABIP
Francisco Rodriguez	12.1	0.213	0.282	0.296
Jim Johnson	36	0.275	0.324	0.324
Kevin Gausman	23.2	0.263	0.347	0.313
Tommy Hunter	42	0.294	0.369	0.300
Pedro Strop	9	0.300	0.384	0.379
Darren O'Day	20	0.298	0.394	0.328

Name	LOB%	LD%	GB%	FB%	HR/FB
Francisco Rodriguez	98.0%	26.9%	57.7%	15.4%	50.0%
Jim Johnson	79.5%	19.8%	56.8%	23.4%	11.5%
Kevin Gausman	56.0%	28.8%	36.4%	34.8%	21.7%
Tommy Hunter	79.3%	22.7%	35.5%	41.8%	18.6%
Pedro Strop	48.2%	28.6%	53.6%	17.9%	20.0%
Darren O'Day	88.5%	24.2%	35.5%	40.3%	20.0%

While his results are skewed by a small sample size, we see that K-Rod fared reasonably well against lefties, with only a couple of long balls really sullying an otherwise stellar showing against lefties. Another surprising and encouraging sign comes from O'Day, who does well against lefties in spite of his submarine arm angle; a batting average against slightly under .300 that is slightly buoyed by a relatively high BABIP shows that while he is best suited for same side match ups, he is able to get the occasional lefty out, usually via the fly ball out. Looking back at his use of O'Day, we do see manager Buck Showalter using O'Day a little more generously than managers typically use their submariners. Johnson's lefty splits are no real surprise, showing his sinker/curve offering to be suitable for getting lefties out without much issue. Hunter historically suffers from poor splits, with his propensity to have problems against lefties exemplified in 2013 by his inflated wOBA against lefties this last season, showing similar trends as O'Day.

Courtesy of csnbaltimore.com

Righty splits:

Name	IP	AVG	wOBA	BABIP
Tommy Hunter	44.1	0.140	0.162	0.189
Darren O'Day	42	0.154	0.206	0.200
Jim Johnson	34.1	0.266	0.292	0.330
Kevin Gausman	24	0.280	0.335	0.343
Pedro Strop	13.1	0.204	0.364	0.216
Francisco Rodriguez	9.2	0.349	0.490	0.400

Name	LOB%	LD%	GB%	FB%	HR/FB
Tommy Hunter	86.7%	18.2%	43.6%	38.2%	0.0%
Darren O'Day	89.7%	20.8%	37.6%	41.6%	4.8%
Jim Johnson	78.2%	21.3%	59.6%	19.1%	11.1%
Kevin Gausman	71.9%	21.5%	47.7%	30.8%	15.0%
Pedro Strop	73.0%	27.8%	44.4%	27.8%	30.0%
Francisco Rodriguez	72.5%	28.1%	34.4%	37.5%	25.0%

Right away, we can see how effective and nasty Hunter is on righty hitters; no home runs to go with a minuscule batting average against and wOBA all led credence to Hunter's top-10 RE24 showing for relievers. We also see the similarities between both Hunter and O'Day shine through, with O'Day also showing himself to be a tough at bat for righthanded hitters. Again, we also see the Swiss Army knife style of pitching coming from Johnson's repertoire and a big reason why he excels in the closer's role -- regardless of batter handedness, he has a way to get them out. As effective as K-Rod was against lefties, sans the homer runs, he is ineffective against righties, showing the largest swing in stats when comparing and contrasting effects of batter handedness.


Moving Forward

Much like the southpaws, there aren't too many things to fix on the right side of the bullpen when looking to 2014. While each of the big three -- Johnson, Hunter, and O'Day -- displays a particular weakness that could use shoring up, each of them are effective enough to remain in their given roles for next year without it grossly impacting the team.

For Johnson, a potential key to an improved 2014 will depend on his curve ball and in particular, the location of the pitch. While it still pairs exceptionally well with his two-seam/sinker as a change of speed and change of eye plane, 2013 saw him leave it up in the zone a little more than he did in 2012:

In response, hitters did a little more damage against it:

Year	AVG	BABIP	SLG
2012	0.143	0.263	0.200
2013	0.182	0.462	0.242

Overall, Johnson appears to be in decent shape for 2014, and with a little more snap and location to his curve, can improve upon a successful 2013 campaign.

For Hunter, room for improvement lies in his ability to effectively and consistently get lefties out; while he probably won't do it with the flair and panache he does it against righties, his ultimate fate and success depend upon him to develop a wrinkle against lefties. Looking at his repertoire against both lefties and righties, it appears he uses his change up -- easily his least effective pitch per his PITCHf/x pitch linear weights -- exclusively against lefties and is one that hitters have fared well against, in the form of a .624 batting average against and 1.500 slugging percentage. Hunter might find more effectiveness against lefties by scrapping the change and utilizing his curve ball -- hit at a .265 batting average and .588 SLG clip by lefties -- more against lefties, essentially becoming a three pitch pitcher against lefthanders. Given his success with a three pitch repertoire against righties, the idea that less is more might prove fruitful for Hunter in 2014.

The outlook for O'Day is tied to his health. After suffering from some hand issues later in 2013 that ended up being carpal tunnel syndrome, it appears that with an offseason of rest and possibly a cortisone injection, the submariner will be fine for the start of spring training. Beyond the hand issue, given O'Day's submarine mechanics, an increased propensity for hip and back issues arising from the delivery are possible issues that the medical staff could be on the look out for as the season progresses. Injury predilections aside, O'Day's success with his mechanics and ability to get the occasional opposite handed hitter out on occasion bodes well for him to continue to be an effective reliever for the Orioles in a number of roles and situations, primarily against right handers.

Other Options

One glaring omission from the discussion of the 2013 bullpen has been Kevin Gausman and for good reason -- he won't be in the 'pen for 2014. However, this segues well into a potential Gausman replacement for the spot starter/long inning guy that the Orioles are intimately familiar with: Jason Hammel.

Spending most of September in the bullpen after returning from a flexor mass strain in his pitching elbow last year, Hammel did show the ability to come out of the bullpen and pitch effectively. He is no stranger to relief appearances, having logged close to 100 innings in relief as a major leaguer, most of them coming earlier in his career with the Tampa Bay Rays. After a couple of seasons that saw him off to encouraging starts only to scuffle down the stretch while starting, combined with the logjam of starters at the major league level and on the free agent market along with the development of Gausman as the starter the team has always envisioned him to be, Hammel is behind the eight ball with respect to any hopes of starting in Baltimore. While he will garner a modicum of interest on the free agent market as a starter, the quality of free agent starters might put him in a place where a team friendly deal as a reliever might be conducive to his return to the squad in 2014.

Other internal options that could log time in the bullpen also include starter types such as knuckleballer Eddie Gamboa and swingman Steve Johnson, who will look to fill the spot start/long man role with the like of Hammel and lefty T.J. McFarland.

The free agent market for righthanded relievers is similar to the one seen for lefties -- old and injured, but with a few familiar faces. While the Orioles would do well do stand pat with what the current roster provides on top of what is down on the farm, a couple of names on the free agent market do stand out as potentially cheap, incentive laden signings who are looking to bounce back after injuries -- Jesse Crain, Ryan Madson, and Kyle McClellan. Crain, whose 2013 season was one of the more productive ones seen from a non-closing reliever in recent years, will look to return from a shoulder strain that kept him off the mound for the entire second half of the year. He could provide an additional power arm for the seventh and eight innings alongside Hunter, but without the severe left/right splits. Madson, recovering from Tommy John surgery, has had previous experience as a closer an set up man. McClellan, who pitched less than 10 innings in the bigs last year, is a favorite of general manager Dan Duquette and would be a low cost, low risk signing that could get reps in Class AAA Norfolk before joining the club. While McClellan in recent seasons has shown a propensity to give up the occasional homer, both Crain and Madson post career sub-1.0 HR/9 stats, with Crain also enjoying some success in limited innings as a visitor to Camden Yards.

What to Do in 2014

Much like their lefty counterparts, the right side of the bullpen doesn't suffer from too many holes. Should Hunter prove to be too susceptible to the big inning arising from his left/right splits, Johnson again leave too many pitches up in the zone, or O'Day fall victim to injury of ineffectiveness, there are enough arms in the minors and on the free agent market for a low cost solution to be pursued to fill the gaps. Overall, the right side of the Baltimore bullpen is well rounded as they stand. With keeping Hammel as a reliever or signing the likes of Crain or Madson to take the spots left by Gausman's move to the starting rotation and the unlikely return of Rodriguez, the right side of the pen has the potential to be even stronger in 2014.


All data courtesy of FanGraphs and Brooks Baseball. 

Courtesy of arcamax.com

 

Eddie Gamboa - the Good and the Not-So-Good

After five seasons in the Orioles' minor-league system, pitching primarily as a swingman, Eddie Gamboa took the chance in 2013 and determined to become a full-time knuckleball pitcher. The Orioles didn't have many options for upper-level starting pitchers, and so put Gamboa full-time into the AA Bowie rotation. On July 10, Gamboa was promoted to AAA Norfolk and has remained there even as the Tides have accumulated seven starting pitchers.

While he was with Bowie, Gamboa made the milb.com front page twice in late June - once for pitching 7 1/3 innings of one-hit ball and once for pitching a seven-inning no-hitter. While with Norfolk, Gamboa impressed observers with a two-hit, seven-inning performance. Unfortunately, I wasn't fortunate enough to see those games and have to rely on others' descriptions of Gamboa's games.

 On the other hand, I have seen Gamboa pitch three times - once for Bowie and twice for Norfolk. And those games were not so good, as you'll see. This article will compare Gamboa's three great games to the three not-so-great games I saw, and see the difference between Gamboa pitching well and Gamboa not pitching well.

Here are the basics of Gamboa's great games:

Date	Opponent	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K	Game Score
June 23	Altoona	7 1/3	1	0	0	3	7	80
June 30	Harrisburg	7	0	0	0	3	5	79
August 5	Gwinnett	7	2	1	0	1	6	76

And the basics of the games I saw Gamboa pitch:

Date	Opponent	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K	Game Score
June 5	Harrisburg	6	9	4	4	1	6	43
July 24	Pawtucket	5	9	4	4	2	3	34
August 11	Rochester	4 2/3	7	4	4	1	1	34

We'll start by looking at Gamboa's pitches in each game. I'll record the percentage of pitches with each result. First, the great games:

Date	Balls	Called Strikes	Swing Strikes	Fouls	In-Play
June 23	44.8%	15.9%	11.2%	14.0%	14.0%
June 30	43.3%	16.3%	12.5%	11.5%	15.4%
August 5	30.0%	23.8%	20.0%	11.2%	21.2%

And the other games:

Date	Balls	Called Strikes	Swing Strikes	Fouls	In-Play
June 5	35.1%	14.9%	14.95	13.8%	21.3%
July 24	35.2%	20.9%	4.3%	18.7%	20.9%
August 11	41.5%	18.1%	4.3%	17.0%	19.1%

I had hoped that there would be some large, obvious difference between the great games and the ordinary games, but nothing jumps out. The great game on August 5 is completely different than the others; for whatever reason, Gamboa controlled his knuckleball substantially better than in his other games. To the extent any conclusion can be drawn, in Gamboa's bad games batters made contact with his pitches (fouls + in-play) more often than in his good games.

From this limited data, it's dangerous to draw any conclusions. I expect that if we looked more closely at a bigger data set we'd find some pattern that would correlate with Gamboa's success. It's also possible that whether or not Gamboa has a good game depends upon the opponent or some other factor he has no influence on.

In an earlier post, I dismissed Gamboa (and Zach Clark) with two sentences. At the highest level, those comments remain valid - he's a previously-stalled pitching prospect trying to salvage his career with the knuckleball. However, his three outstanding starts make him slightly more interesting, and there's a better chance that he'll develop into a major-league pitcher.