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Papelbon may have something left in tank for new team
- Updated: August 16, 2016
Now that Jonathan Papelbon is a free agent, there is plenty of discussion about what team he might fit with, both in the bullpen and the clubhouse. The truth, however, is that none of that is going to matter if he can’t still get outs, and that’s an extremely valid question when you’re talking about a 35-year-old reliever with declining velocity who just got released by a team headed for the playoffs.
But, for an essentially zero-cost acquisition, Papelbon doesn’t have to be great, and he doesn’t have to be pitching high-leverage innings. He’s just got to be good, or better than what the team already had. Is that realistic? Let’s find out.
Any discussion of Papelbon has to begin with the simple fact that as team keep adding more pitchers who throw hard, he’s going in the other direction. During his Boston years, Papelbon regularly averaged 94-95 mph on his fastball. With the Phillies, that went down from 93.8 (in his first year, 2012) to 91.1 (last year, before being traded), and this year with Washington, it’s down to 90.9 mph. That’s obviously a concerning trend.
As his velocity has fallen, his ability to miss bats has dropped along with it. Over his last few years in Boston, Papelbon would strike out between 26-34 percent of the hitters he faced, which is very good. With the Phillies, that dropped to a lower — but still acceptable — 21-24 percent range, and in his year-plus in Washington, that dropped to 18.7 percent, which is below the Major League average of 21 percent.
None of this is surprising, of course. He’ll be 36 years old in November, and this is his 12th Major League season, so to expect him to throw as hard and miss as many bats as he did when he was 25 isn’t realistic. But while it’s easy to look at the 4.37 ERA …
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