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Insider piece from ESPN's Keith Law. For once I actually agree with him.
"Bronson Arroyo barely made my Top 50 free agents, which meant I saw him as a candidate for a low-dollar, one-year deal, not the substantial two-year deal Arizona just gave him in spite of all of the red flags in his recent history.
Arroyo does two things well: Stay healthy and throw strikes. Those are valuable skills, although one's ability to stay healthy declines with age, and Arroyo just signed for his age-37 and 38 seasons. They're also increasingly overshadowed by the things Arroyo doesn't do well: throw hard, keep the ball in the park or get left-handed hitters out.
Arroyo's fastball averaged just barely higher than 87 mph over the last three seasons, according to Fangraphs, more than 2 mph below his peak years. While some of that is a function of him attempting to throw a sinker, the pitch doesn't have great sinker movement, and he's not a ground ball pitcher. What often happens is Arroyo throws a below-average pitch without much life somewhere in the zone, which a good major-league hitter would politely refer to as a “BP fastball.”
Arroyo has long been homer-prone because he pitches with below-average velocity and doesn't have great movement or sink on whatever we want to call his fastball. While pitching in Cincinnati, one of the majors' most homer-friendly parks, hasn't helped, the reality of Arroyo's recent history is that he's not homer-prone because of Great American Ballpark -- he's homer-prone because he has below-average stuff. Over the last three years, his home run allowed rates have been nearly equal at home and on the road, whether we go by home runs per 9 innings pitched (1.59 at home versus 1.51 on the road) or by home runs per 30 batters faced (1.26 at home, 1.22 on the road). Any further loss of velocity will only exacerbate the issue, and his gopheritis is already one of the worst cases in the majors. This means he’s a few more homers a year away from being nonviable as a major-league starter.
Arroyo has also long had problems with left-handed hitters, another issue that isn't improving with age and that could intensify quickly with any loss of stuff. Over the last three years, lefties have hit .299/.339/.534 against Arroyo, and opposing managers have caught on to this weakness in his game, sending slightly more left-handed batters to the plate against him than right-handers. And it all came without Arroyo facing three of the NL's best left-handed hitters in Votto, Bruce and (in 2013) Choo. At best, Arroyo is vulnerable against teams that lean left-handed or have good pinch-hitting options for the second and third time through the order. At worst, it's a third red flag for guaranteeing Arroyo a second year or this kind of money.
The oddest part about the signing is that the D-backs already had a player a lot like Arroyo last season and gave him away for 50 cents on the dollar: Ian Kennedy. Kennedy was also a homer-prone, fringy-fastball, strike-throwing innings eater type, but didn't have Arroyo's platoon-split issues and will make just $6 million in 2014. IPK did infuriate Arizona management with his makeup, a question that arose when he was still with the Yankees in 2008, something you'll never hear about Arroyo. But is the difference between these two pitchers likely to be $5.75 million over this next year, plus the added risk of Arroyo given his age and stuff? It looks as though the Diamondbacks got more expensive without getting substantially better -- at most about two wins over what they might have gotten from Randall Delgado, less if you assume about half of those starts would have gone to Archie Bradley -- and took on an unnecessary financial risk."
"Bronson Arroyo barely made my Top 50 free agents, which meant I saw him as a candidate for a low-dollar, one-year deal, not the substantial two-year deal Arizona just gave him in spite of all of the red flags in his recent history.
Arroyo does two things well: Stay healthy and throw strikes. Those are valuable skills, although one's ability to stay healthy declines with age, and Arroyo just signed for his age-37 and 38 seasons. They're also increasingly overshadowed by the things Arroyo doesn't do well: throw hard, keep the ball in the park or get left-handed hitters out.
Arroyo's fastball averaged just barely higher than 87 mph over the last three seasons, according to Fangraphs, more than 2 mph below his peak years. While some of that is a function of him attempting to throw a sinker, the pitch doesn't have great sinker movement, and he's not a ground ball pitcher. What often happens is Arroyo throws a below-average pitch without much life somewhere in the zone, which a good major-league hitter would politely refer to as a “BP fastball.”
Arroyo has long been homer-prone because he pitches with below-average velocity and doesn't have great movement or sink on whatever we want to call his fastball. While pitching in Cincinnati, one of the majors' most homer-friendly parks, hasn't helped, the reality of Arroyo's recent history is that he's not homer-prone because of Great American Ballpark -- he's homer-prone because he has below-average stuff. Over the last three years, his home run allowed rates have been nearly equal at home and on the road, whether we go by home runs per 9 innings pitched (1.59 at home versus 1.51 on the road) or by home runs per 30 batters faced (1.26 at home, 1.22 on the road). Any further loss of velocity will only exacerbate the issue, and his gopheritis is already one of the worst cases in the majors. This means he’s a few more homers a year away from being nonviable as a major-league starter.
Arroyo has also long had problems with left-handed hitters, another issue that isn't improving with age and that could intensify quickly with any loss of stuff. Over the last three years, lefties have hit .299/.339/.534 against Arroyo, and opposing managers have caught on to this weakness in his game, sending slightly more left-handed batters to the plate against him than right-handers. And it all came without Arroyo facing three of the NL's best left-handed hitters in Votto, Bruce and (in 2013) Choo. At best, Arroyo is vulnerable against teams that lean left-handed or have good pinch-hitting options for the second and third time through the order. At worst, it's a third red flag for guaranteeing Arroyo a second year or this kind of money.
The oddest part about the signing is that the D-backs already had a player a lot like Arroyo last season and gave him away for 50 cents on the dollar: Ian Kennedy. Kennedy was also a homer-prone, fringy-fastball, strike-throwing innings eater type, but didn't have Arroyo's platoon-split issues and will make just $6 million in 2014. IPK did infuriate Arizona management with his makeup, a question that arose when he was still with the Yankees in 2008, something you'll never hear about Arroyo. But is the difference between these two pitchers likely to be $5.75 million over this next year, plus the added risk of Arroyo given his age and stuff? It looks as though the Diamondbacks got more expensive without getting substantially better -- at most about two wins over what they might have gotten from Randall Delgado, less if you assume about half of those starts would have gone to Archie Bradley -- and took on an unnecessary financial risk."
