Size your Andrew Heaney offer

[Just Regular]

Last offseason one of the very first transactions was the LAD snapping up Andrew Heaney.

He did not attain 100 innings, as 140 MLB Arms did last year.    The six Orioles who did so, by K-BB%, ranked 87th, 91st, 97th, 102nd, 115th and 133rd.    In other words, no 2022 Orioles SP was near even the Top Half of MLB Arms by that metric*.     I feel sure if he can get the 100 IP Grayson will be one next year; like Adley's OBP it is more just a question of how high it will go as long as he's himself.     2021 John Means was about 70th percentile here.

Heaney did throw 14 starts, and put out (70 innings minimum) a better K-BB% than everyone in MLB except Spencer Strider, including Shohei Ohtani, Carlos Rodon and Justin Verlander.     He isn't going to get $100mm, and will be more affordable for any team willing to stomach the risk.    Heaney has been trying to be a MLB SP his whole career, and in nine seasons has completed 30 starts once, despite his teams generally hoping he would.    He's basically the anti-Jordan Lyles, the kind of pitcher a stronger team not desperate to fill 1425 innings might want.

This is probably the Sell Highest moment of Heaney's career, time for him to sell all the rest of his early 30's.     You in for 2/30 or 3/40?

*I don't really follow NL in season anymore, but reviewing MLB-wide numbers was surprised to discover even the Nationals in Paolo Espino and Josiah Gray had two guys better than the best Oriole.

[LookinUp]

Why do we want this guy? I'm not asking to be a jerk. Just wondering what role you see him in?

He's basically a FB/SL guy at this point. He used to rely on the sinker but I guess he shelved that. Only 5% change ups. Throws ~93 mph FB. Not overpowering. Rarely over 100 IP.

The pitch type changes coincided with him going from a GB pitcher to a FB pitcher (71.4% in 2022). That's roughly twice the FB% of most of our pitchers. I guess that's not the problem it used to be in Camden Yards, but it's very different than anyone else I can find on our staff.

You have to figure that he's doing what the O's have asked others to do with a high FB and big slider. That's cool, but I'm not sure what I see here other than the K/BB ratio that says he's worth a big contract. 

[Sports Guy]

Used to really want this guy and then injuries really hurt him.  I would be interested in him but as more of a fall back guy.  
 

He has some excellent statcast numbers but they also hit the ball harder off of him than practically any pitcher in the league.  That would worry me.

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/andrew-heaney-571760?stats=statcast-r-pitching-mlb

[nvpacchi]

Wow hadn't realized Heaney put up such a strong season!

Looking at his pitching profile, it looks like he scrapped his changeup, which historically looked like a meh pitch for him.  That has me leaning that the Dodgers fixed him a little bit, but given that the Dodgers aren't too deep with pitching the O's would have to outbid some of the deepest pockets in baseball.

Injury risk concerns me, but given that he may have figured it out, I'd take more a flyer with a 2 yr deal probably up to 2/35, if the O's aren't looking to play for some of the primo free agent guys.

[nvpacchi]

7 minutes ago, LookinUp said:

Why do we want this guy? I'm not asking to be a jerk. Just wondering what role you see him in?

He's basically a FB/SL guy at this point. He used to rely on the sinker but I guess he shelved that. Only 5% change ups. Throws ~93 mph FB. Not overpowering. Rarely over 100 IP.

The pitch type changes coincided with him going from a GB pitcher to a FB pitcher (71.4% in 2022). That's roughly twice the FB% of most of our pitchers. I guess that's not the problem it used to be in Camden Yards, but it's very different than anyone else I can find on our staff.

You have to figure that he's doing what the O's have asked others to do with a high FB and big slider. That's cool, but I'm not sure what I see here other than the K/BB ratio that says he's worth a big contract. 

Ditching the changeup is an actual pitch mix change to stop throwing a below average pitch.

 

You can't argue with 35% K rate last year, even if it was with just two pitches.

[jamalshw]

This seems to be primarily based on the K-BB% stat, which I agree is a useful one, but it's not the only useful one. I get that we have more options now and don't necessarily need an replacement level innings eater so you're looking for an undervalued asset somewhere else. I wouldn't be opposed to Heaney as an option, but I'm not targeting him either. I'd like a higher end option to add to the collection we have in place in Rodriguez, Bradish, Kremer, Voth, Wells, and eventually Means and maybe Hall. 

Heaney, to me, is more of a back-end/depth option.  Sure, there's some upside there, but the dude is going into his age 32 season and while he had a nice 5.79 K:BB ratio last year spared on by a 13.6 K:9, he is a year removed from a 5.27 ERA/4.85 FIP season where he had a 3.66 K:BB which is much more in line with his career average. Did he find something this year that allowed him to increase his K rate from a 9.7 average to the 13.6 he had this year? Maybe. But I'm not sure I'm convinced his 72.2 innings this year is indicative of what we can expect going forward over the other 90% of the innings he's thrown in his career. 

If he can be had for a cheap 1-2 year deal would I take him if he's not the only SP we add? Yes. Is he my pitching target for this offseason? No. 

[Frobby]

You look at Heaney’s career, the big problem for him has been giving up the HR ball.   He’s given up 1.6 HR/9 IP in his career.   Otherwise, all his rate stats look pretty good.   

He’s a guy who could be a steal if he figures out a way to stay on the field and reduce the homers a little.  Or, he could throw 85 innings, which is what he’s averaged in his career.   I would not offer a guy like that a multi-year deal.  Maybe a slightly more pricey Lyles-like deal with one year guaranteed and a somewhat more expensive team option.   
 

[LookinUp]

This is a guy who's profile has changed a ton, so I'm not sure career averages account for much. According to FG, he ditched the sinker after 2020, when he threw it 57.8% of the time! After 2021, he ditched the curveball, which he threw 22.6% of the time.

He was always in the 30s-40s for fly ball %, but that jumped to over 70% last year.

I was very interested to notice that most of the O's pitchers are in the 30's. Tyler Wells was the highest I could quickly find, and that was mid 40's. The ML average is 64.4%, [EDIT: THIS IS WRONG. LOOKING UP THE RIGHT STAT NOW]so maybe I stumbled on something meaningful to Elias? That definitely argues for good infield defense.

Edited October 20, 2022 by LookinUp

[LookinUp]

Sorry. In 2022, the MLB fly ball % was 37.2%. Not to be confused with the fast ball (FB%), which was 64.4%, lol. Heaney's an extreme fly ball pitcher, for what that's worth.

Edit again: and Heaney had a HR/FB% of 20%. The ML average was 11.9%.

So he gives up dingers or strikes guys out.

Edited October 20, 2022 by LookinUp

[Just Regular]

Heaney is interesting to me as someone whose talents might mesh well with Walltimore.

In a league where the Trey Mancini and Austin Hays type hitter has a tough time clearing, it feels like Heaney could safely chuck strikes in OPACY, the same way many a less dominant pitcher did in 2022.

Separately, he's interesting in the evolution of pitching from quantity to quality.    Sharp teams want guys like him, and don't care if they are hurt sometimes because they can backfill with coaching up Evan Phillips or the Driveline student of the week.   I'm thankful for Lyles 2022 performance, but ruthlessly I believe only Clubs expecting to lose 90 games chase guys like him.    I hope that's not what we are anymore.

As a pedigree snob, I believe the pie chart of 2022 performances LAD curated from Heaney and Phillips has a little bigger slice for the Player in Heaney's case.    Maybe not a ton, but some, and 2-pitch, twice through the order guys are just how baseball has been trending since forever, so I don't ding him a ton for the near zero chance he's pitching 33 * 6 innings because virtually no one does.     Unless you are as good as Justin Verlander, please Grayson Rodriguez or at least Framber Valdez, no one like Mike Elias or Matt Blood wants your innings 130-200.

We've got this CBA for the majority of the Adley years, so I don't think Manfred or Theo can mandate 10 pitcher limits anytime soon enough to matter for the competitive environment the next few teams will face.

[btdart20]

Heaney has been an analytics darling for years.  His metrics always seem to outperform his ERA.

He really ramped up his SL usage in 2022 - 30% vs. 1% in 2021 (21 pitches).  Pitcher List calls it a 'sweeper' (which reminds me of the slider Holt has been teaching our guys).  He also stopped throwing CB and uses the CH much less (5% vs. 15%).  I suspect he listened to the LAD analytics guys to change his pitch mix.  What @nvpacchi said...

Pros - He's a lefty which plays to the strengths of OPACY.  2022 RHB OPS was .726 and LHB OPS was .670.  Good K%, BB%, WHIP which means when he gives up HRs there aren't many baserunners.  

Cons - He gets hit hard.  Really hard.  He's a flyball pitcher which would historically be dicey at OPACY.  (But his xHR was less at OPACY than his actual HR allowed.)  Plus his K/9 did spike by 3 Ks in 2022 (so maybe some regression).  It could be related to the sweeper/SL instead of the CB. 

He was paid $8.5m for 2022 (which happened to be the $/WAR for 2+ WAR players.  He only pitched 72 IP, but he posted a 1.1 WAR in 2022.  The Dodgers had a good contract, except...  injury.  But Heaney has only pitched 180 IP once in his 9-year career.

What Are Teams Paying Per WAR in Free Agency? | FanGraphs Baseball

Pegging a $/WAR trend is really hard this year.  2020 messes with the trend line.  But it seems to be on a slight down trend.  Toss in 2022-2023 macroeconomic uncertainty plus inflation.  How does that impact projected entertainment dollars for consumers?

Heading into 2022, Elias focused on quantity of IP with Lyles.  

For 2023, does Elias pivot to quality of IP vs. quantity of IP?  That's the crux.  Of course, there's a balance but in the end we have quantity of IP already.  

I have to think he'll sign for more than the $8.5m last year.  My guess is in the $11-14m per year range.  If we're not going full top shelf, then we could be creative with player or club options.  

From my understanding, Elias has mentioned that players we bring in will likely have warts (don't recall how long ago that comment was though) that will make them cost effective.  If they aren't in on or miss on the TOR SPs, then Heaney has warts with upside who would be helped at OPACY.

[btdart20]

Clearly @Just Regularis in my brain...