1:45pm: The Athletics have formally announced the signing.
1:21pm: The Athletics and free-agent lefty Jake Diekman have agreed to a two-year contract with a club option for a third season, ESPN’s Jeff Passan reports (Twitter links). The Beverly Hills Sports Council client will be guaranteed $7.5MM over the life of the pact.
Diekman, 33 next month, inked a one-year, $2.75MM pact with the Royals last winter and was traded to the A’s prior to the July 31 deadline. The veteran southpaw pitched to a 4.43 ERA with 21 strikeouts but 16 walks and three hit batsmen through 20 1/3 innings with the A’s, continuing control problems that have plagued him for much of his MLB tenure. Diekman clearly made a strong impression on the Oakland organization, though, and he’s now in line to call it home for the next two seasons.
Control issues notwithstanding, the appeal in Diekman is easy to see, as his raw stuff is tantalizing. His 95.8 mph average heater is one of the fastest among all left-handed relievers in baseball, and Diekman’s overall 16.1 percent swinging-strike rate ranked 18th among 158 qualified reliever this past season. He’s averaged better than 11 strikeouts per nine innings pitched in his MLB career and fanned 28.2 percent of the hitters he’s faced in the big leagues. A look at his Statcast profile reveals that Diekman was one of the best in the game at limiting hard contact — specifically in allowing opponents to barrel up his offerings.
Diekman will pair with lefty T.J. McFarland, whom the A’s claimed off waivers last month and inked to a one-year deal to avoid arbitration yesterday, giving manager Bob Melvin multiple lefties to deploy in 2020. The Oakland ’pen will once again be anchored by emergent closer Liam Hendriks, with Yusmeiro Petit, Joakim Soria and rebound hopeful Lou Trivino adding to the setup corps as well.
The move to add Diekman comes just a day after Oakland traded Jurickson Profar to the Padres and non-tendered Blake Treinen, Ryan Buchter and Josh Phegley — substantially reducing payroll in the process; that quartet had been projected to earn a combined $17.6MM on a perennially low-payroll A’s club.
Some of those funds will be immediately reallocated to Diekman, it seems, but the Oakland payroll still projects to come in north of previous levels. Last year’s $92MM Opening Day mark was a club record, and the A’s projected to come in around $95MM even before bringing Diekman aboard. It’s always possible that they’ll move some veteran contracts, but the A’s at the very least appear poised for a second season above the $90MM mark, which is unheard of territory for the organization.
Glad to know the name of the unheralded signing who will kill the Angels next year and likely outperform our big money one.
I like this signing. I know Jake has some control problems but his fastball gets a lot POF strikeouts too…
The only guarantee every off-season… the A’s will sign some relivers.
and maybe some relievers for good measure
Other than balfour i dont remember many free agent rleievers that have worked out for them. I hated watching deikman pitch, great stuff has no clue where its going
Honestly surprised he got 2 years with his inability to throw strikes consistently. If they can iron that out; he’s a good reliever.
I saw him over the first few months with the Royals last season. Awful. Over and over and over again.
But he’s a lefty and he’s still breathing…..
Yeah I would not want this guy pitching big innings for me in October. It’s almost a foregone conclusion he’s going to walk someone when he steps foot on the mound. He’s not homer prone so I suppose that helps him avoid the big inning but that’s certainly not a guy I want pitching w the game on the line.
The guarantee isn’t huge or anything; I’m just surprised to see a team commit to him for multiple years at this point. After 7 years in the bigs, it’s hard for me to believe he’ll start consistently throwing strikes. Considering he was significantly worse at throwing strikes once he came over from KC.
happy to see he’s not back 9n Philly. Diekman has absolutely no control.
he actually had 21 SO with 16 BB
Agh, thank you. I flipped the wording on that around somehow. Fixed now.
7.5 million for a .1 WAR. I guess the collusion case is out the window.
i figured it was after Pomz. i mean we all know early offseason signings are more often overpays, but some of these deals are beyond crazy.
That looks like about $50K per inning in 2020.
This guy can’t throw strikes for the life of him.
When this guy is around the plate, he’s unhittable. The problem is, it’s a rare occurrence.
Another nice move by the A’s. Good week so far for Oakland.
BIG move for the Oaks!
Great, now let’s get a solid veteran LH bat for either 2B or LF
Grossman is their guy in LF, they seem set with him and pinder platoon. 2b will be among neuse, baretto, mateo. Their roster seems pretty set if you expect allen as backup catcher and the rotation is set if you project puk and luzardo in it. Maybe they add some cheap veteran reliever depth. Or if they want to have canha and laureano everyday, piscotty would be the odd guy out, but his contract is porbanly umtradeable and struggled last season
Considering how much relievers go for in today’s game — this isn’t a bad move by the A’s. Diekman’s floor is basically a “garden-variety” middle reliever, but the upside is nice.