DETROIT – It’s always hard to know what to expect from a bullpen year over year, but it sure looks like this could be a secret weapon for the Detroit Tigers.
There aren’t any superstars -- no Josh Hader or Devin Williams or Emmanuel Clase. But the Tigers have several quietly effective relievers who fill important roles for A.J. Hinch.
Assuming the Tigers take five starting pitchers and four bench bats north from spring training, that leaves eight bullpen spots on the 26-man roster.
Here’s my best pre-spring training guess of what that group will look like on Opening Day:
Alex Lange
- Projected role: Closer.
- 2023 stats: 3.68 ERA, 1.33 WHIP, 79 strikeouts/45 walks in 66 innings (67 games).
I think there’s an elite pitcher in here somewhere, and we saw it at times throughout the past two seasons. But man, those walks have just gotten completely out of control.
In 2022, Lange survived an elevated 4.4 walks per nine innings by averaging 11.7 strikeouts. But last year, that walk rate ballooned to 6.1 -- he issued free passes to 15.6% of the batters he faced.
Nobody can survive that forever. It’s a testament to Lange’s stuff that he kept his season-long ERA under 4.00.
Through the first two months of 2023, Lange looked like a potential AL Reliever of the Year candidate. He struck out 34 batters across 24.1 innings while allowing just 22 base runners. Batters hit .136 against him with a .427 OPS. His swinging strike rate was 18%.
But over the next 14 appearances, Lange allowed 15 earned runs and a .934 OPS. He had as many walks (14) as strikeouts, and the swinging strike rate plummeted to 13%.
His ERA jumped from 1.11 to 4.30 over that span, and even though he was mostly excellent again down the stretch, the full-season numbers never recovered.
Lange posted a 2.86 ERA over the final 29 appearances, with 31 strikeouts in 28.1 innings. He also walked 20 batters, but nine of those came over a three-appearance stretch from Aug. 2-7. Otherwise, the walk rate was a much more manageable 3.8 per nine over those final two and a half months.
If Lange can just be a bad control pitcher and not a disastrous control pitcher, he’s going to be excellent. He ranks in the 99th percentile with a 39.1% whiff rate, which is potentially the most important stat in determining pitcher upside. He also limits hard contact and keeps the ball on the ground -- a critical combination for a late-inning reliever.
Walks have certainly derailed many a promising MLB career, but Lange has a chance to be special in the ninth inning. He should open 2024 as the Tigers’ closer, and fans should feel pretty good about that.
Jason Foley
- Projected role: Late relief.
- 2023 stats: 2.61 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, 55 K/15 BB in 69 innings (70 games).
I don’t want to pigeonhole Foley to the “setup man” role, because Hinch isn’t afraid to bring him in early to get out of a jam or in the ninth if Lange is unavailable.
Last season, Foley was excellent in the eighth inning, posting a 2.48 ERA and 1.24 WHIP. But he was even better in the seventh -- a 0.00 ERA and a 0.73 WHIP.
To the naked eye, Foley looks overpowering, but I think we’ve seen enough to safely assume strikeouts will never be his strength. He struck out a career-high 7.2 batters per nine innings last season, and the 17.9% whiff rate suggests he’s lucky it was even that high.
Foley makes up for that low strikeout rate with elite control and a high ground ball rate. For two years in a row, he’s ranked in the 89th percentile or better in both categories. And that’s why it’s hard to do damage against the 28-year-old righty.
Foley averages 97.2 mph on his sinker and throws it nearly 70% of the time, so it’s easy to see why he’s more of a contact specialist. That velocity and predictability does lead to some hard contact against Foley, but since that hard contact is so often on the ground, it rarely does much damage.
In 139.2 innings during his MLB career, Foley has allowed just five home runs and 31 walks. If you’re going to rally off of him, you’re going to have to do it by stringing multiple hits together.
Tyler Holton
- Projected role: High-leverage relief.
- 2023 stats: 2.11 ERA, 0.87 WHIP, 74 K/18 BB in 85.1 innings (59 games).
The Tigers picked up Holton off waivers from the Diamondbacks last offseason, and that move paid immediate, major dividends. Holton was by far the Tigers’ most-used reliever in terms of innings -- pitching 16.1 more than Foley, who finished second.
Holton recorded more than three outs in 33 of his 59 appearances. He pitched in every single inning at least once, but was primarily used in the sixth, seventh, and eighth.
Left-handed batters had no chance against Holton last season, hitting .147 with a .182 OBP and four extra-base hits (all doubles) in 116 at-bats. He simply does not allow lefties to get on base or hit for power.
Right-handed hitters were quite a bit better, but Holton still held them to a .262 OBP and .642 OPS. They did hit nine home runs in 187 at-bats -- perhaps the one knock on his 2023 season.
The underlying numbers back up Holton as an excellent reliever. OK, so maybe he won’t ever have a 2.11 ERA again, but he should remain a key part of Hinch’s late-inning arsenal.
Holton had some of the best batted ball metrics in the league -- 93rd percentile in average exit velocity allowed and 88th percentile in hard-hit rate. He also got hitters to chase 31.8% of his pitches out of the zone (81st percentile) and posted a 45.9% ground ball rate (70th).
Oh yeah, and he doesn’t walk anybody, either. That’s backed up by his minor-league track record.
The Tigers basically got Holton for free, and he’s looking like a bonafide top lefty reliever.
Andrew Chafin
- Projected role: Late relief.
- 2023 stats (with Diamondbacks and Brewers): 4.73 ERA, 1.42 WHIP, 63 K/28 BB in 51.1 innings (63 games).
Remember this guy? The Sheriff is back in town, and the Tigers are happy to have him.
They say distance makes the heart grow fonder, and that was certainly the case for Chafin after he opted out of the second year of his contract with Detroit and headed back out West for a season. He was a bit unlucky, but still solid, for the Diamondbacks over 34.1 innings before being traded to the Brewers.
Everything completely fell apart in Milwaukee. His strikeout rate dropped from 12.8 to 7.4 o, and the rest of the numbers followed suit. Something was just off.
But Chafin still had excellent strikeout numbers for the season, fanning 63 batters in 51.1 innings. He maintained excellent whiff and chase rates while limiting hard contact (88th percentile in both average exit velocity and hard-hit rate).
The primary differences for Chafin after he left Detroit: His walk rate ballooned from 3 per nine innings to 4.9, and his ground ball rate plummeted from 52.6% to 40.2%.
If he can land somewhere in the middle of both this upcoming season, he’ll be a very valuable lefty option for the Tigers.
Chafin owns a lifetime walk rate of 3.7 per nine, which is much closer to 2022 than his career-worst rate in 2023.
He’ll turn 34 in June, so maybe it’s age-related decline, but that’s not what the numbers suggest. Chafin’s velocity was right on par with each of the previous two seasons, and again, he was still missing bats and limiting hard contact.
Chris Fetter has a knack for getting pitchers in the strike zone, so Chafin is a prime bounce-back candidate in 2024.
Shelby Miller
- Projected role: Middle relief.
- 2023 stats (with Dodgers): 1.71 ERA, 0.91 WHIP, 42 K/19 BB in 42 innings (36 games).
I’m not entirely sure what the Tigers are getting in Shelby Miller.
They signed him to a one-year deal with a team option for 2025 this offseason after Miller completed the closest thing he’s had to a full season since 2016, when he was 25 years old.
Since making 20 starts for the Diamondbacks that year, Miller has managed just 22, 16, 44, 0, 12.2, 7, and 42 innings over the last seven seasons -- this after he made 95 starts and pitched 561.2 innings across three seasons from 2013-2015.
Miller was very effective for the Dodgers last season, allowing just eight runs in 42 innings. He was extremely lucky to have a 1.71 ERA, but the underlying numbers still suggest he was solid -- a 3.25 expected ERA and .188 xBA.
It’s not worth diving too deep into the numbers for Miller since he’s offered such small sample sizes for almost a full decade. But there’s certainly some strikeout potential, and while he gives up fairly hard contact on average, a lower hard-hit rate suggests there’s weak contact in there, too.
In the end, Miller gives the Tigers a veteran presence alongside Chafin who should be mostly reliable in the middle innings. I suspect Hinch will use him as a bridge between starters to the likes of Chafin, Holton, and Foley.
Beau Brieske
- Projected role: Middle relief.
- 2023 stats: 3.60 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 31 K/12 BB in 35 innings (25 games).
I’m pretty excited about Brieske’s potential as a reliever, particularly because his average fastball velocity jumped a full 2 mph when he moved to the bullpen.
Brieske flirted with 100 mph at times last season, and that was coming off a major injury to his pitching arm. That velocity didn’t translate into great strikeout numbers, but they were vastly improved from his rookie campaign.
Brieske’s calling card is throwing strikes and inducing weak contact. If he had enough innings to qualify last season, he would have ranked among the top 20% of MLB pitchers in average exit velocity and hard-hit rate.
He still has to earn a spot in this bullpen during the spring, especially since he’s not a dominant strikeout guy. But on the surface, Brieske is a valuable middle relief option with impressive raw stuff, solid control, and the ability to go multiple innings.
Reese Olson
- Projected role: Piggyback starter with Casey Mize.
- 2023 stats: 3.99 ERA, 1.12 WHIP, 103 K/33 BB in 103.2 innings (21 games, 18 starts)
I feel pretty confident about the first six names on this list, but here’s where my confidence starts to waver a bit.
I’m going with Olson as a member of the “bullpen” because I think he has a good chance to be a piggyback starter behind Casey Mize early in the season.
Mize is essentially coming back from two lost seasons due to Tommy John surgery. The Tigers are going to be careful with the former No. 1 overall pick, and that means he’s a prime candidate for a piggyback duo.
Ideally, the Tigers would love to pair Mize with a left-hander to put opposing managers in a bind while filling out their lineups, but how far are they willing to go to make that happen? The only real left-handed option would be Joey Wentz and he was one of the very worst pitchers in all of MLB last season.
So before seeing any spring training action, I’m going to make a prediction based off of what I saw last year: Olson is much more deserving of a spot, handedness be damned.
Now, there’s a very good chance someone in the starting rotation gets injured and Olson is called on to fill that hole, but if everyone remains healthy, this could be his early path to Detroit.
Olson was excellent as a rookie, giving the Tigers 103.2 much-needed innings while posting a 3.99 ERA and 1.12 WHIP. Was he a bit lucky? Sure, but Olson has two legitimate swing-and-miss secondary offerings (slider and changeup), and he seemed to be developing a third (curveball) late in the season.
Even if he begins the season in relief, Olson’s future is as a starter. His pitch mix is too deep and his first stint in the big leagues was too successful to banish him to the bullpen for good. This projection is simply due to early season circumstance.
Will Vest
- Projected role: Middle relief.
- 2023 stats: 2.98 ERA, 1.10 WHIP, 56 K/13 BB in 48.1 innings (48 games).
Vest is scary because he was so bad with the Mariners in 2021 and he got shelled in Triple-A last season, but the MLB numbers in Detroit speak for themselves: He’s been rock solid.
Even though he was pretty reliable for most of the 2022 season, Vest started last year at Toledo for a few weeks before moving back to Detroit. He also had a short stint in Toledo coming off the injured list.
In 13 innings with the Mud Hens, Vest allowed 12 earned runs and 20 base runners. Considering his track record with Seattle, those minor-league stats seemed pretty concerning.
Nope. Nothing to worry about. Vest quietly put together an elite season for the Tigers, posting a 2.98 ERA, 3.11 xERA, and 1.10 WHIP across 48.1 innings. He struck out 10.4 batters per nine and walked just 2.4.
Vest has an interesting profile because he allows consistent, hard contact and doesn’t get a ton of swings and misses, but he knows how to make hitters chase out of the zone with two strikes, so his strikeout rate is higher than the metrics suggest.
If Vest continues to throw strikes this spring, there’s no reason to believe the Tigers would go north without him for a second year in a row.
The Joey Wentz situation
I want to expand on my earlier Wentz comments a little bit, because the Tigers would absolutely love to see him pitch well this spring and form a duo with Mize.
More and more MLB teams are realizing that it’s a lot cheaper and easier to find two platoon players -- one who hits righties well and the other who hits lefties -- to share a position than a star who can hit both. So if the Tigers could run the right-handed Mize out to the mound for three or four innings and then replace him with the left-handed Wentz, it would be a nice little built-in advantage.
Wentz got crushed by right-handed hitters last season, allowing a slash line of .301/.362/.563 over 370 plate appearances. Basically, every right-hander turned into a Bryce Harper-caliber hitter when they faced Wentz.
He was still bad against lefties (.278/.361/.435), but decidedly less bad. So if he could inherit a left-handed-heavy lineup designed to combat Mize, he would presumably be more effective. The opponent would only be able to counter by starting a more righty-friendly lineup against Mize, which would also count as a win for the Tigers.
But for the Tigers to even consider this plan, Wentz has to pitch a lot better.
The Tigers let Wentz start 19 games last season. He racked up 105.2 innings despite earning every bit of a 6+ ERA and 1.60 WHIP. Wentz didn’t limit hard contact. He didn’t miss bats. He didn’t keep the ball on the ground.
Unless he shows major improvement this spring, it would be borderline irresponsible for the Tigers to keep him on the MLB roster just for some additional same-handed matchups.
Another complication: Wentz is out of minor-league options. So if the Tigers don’t keep him on the roster, there’s a chance he’ll be snatched up by another club.
That could be the determining factor in the Tigers deciding to give Wentz one last shot this April, perhaps at the expense of Olson or Matt Manning. But based on the organization’s actions this offseason -- targeting win-now veterans like Mark Canha and Chafin and all but committing to Colt Keith as an everyday starter -- I don’t think they want to dig another early hole.
Other options on 40-man roster
In addition to Wentz, the Tigers have five pitchers on their 40-man roster who will compete for bullpen spots during spring training but did not make my projected list. Here’s a short breakdown for each.
Miguel Diaz:
The Tigers signed Diaz as a 27-year-old during the spring of 2021. He was coming off a strong season with the Padres, but the underlying numbers didn’t back up that success at all.
He was elite for Detroit last season, but in just a 14-inning sample size. He allowed one run while striking out 16 batters and walking five.
Why might the Tigers be hesitant to give someone like that a chance? He posted a 5.05 ERA and 1.40 WHIP in Toledo last season, a year after putting up a 4.29 ERA and 1.37 WHIP at that same level.
Diaz showed something last September, but he’s absolutely going to have to validate it during the spring.
Mason Englert:
The Tigers probably didn’t want to rely on Englert as much as they did in 2023, but they had no choice but to keep him on the MLB roster after selecting him in the Rule 5 draft.
Englert’s problem was susceptibility to the occasional disastrous outing. He pitched in 31 games last season -- he allowed one or no earned runs in 25 of those outings, but the other six went for five, three, three, three, three, and nine.
Englert didn’t do anything particularly well other than throw strikes. He faces an uphill battle to make the roster.
Alex Faedo:
I haven’t completely given up on Faedo as a starter yet, but I’m close. And I think his path to an Opening Day roster spot runs through the bullpen.
Faedo’s second taste of MLB action went much better than the first, but he still got completely derailed by injuries. He made five starts in May, then missed all of June. He gave up seven runs on July 7 and then tossed six shutout innings in his next MLB appearance 16 days later. He pitched reasonably well in four August starts, but then moved to a relief role in September.
Faedo’s success in those four September outings -- three relief appearances and one shortened start as an opener -- could be what ultimately lands him in the bullpen for good. He struck out 11 batters in 8.2 innings while allowing just one run, four hits, and three walks.
The frustrating thing about Faedo is he was mostly fine as a starter last season, too. He imploded for 13 earned runs in two outings, but if you remove those, he would have had a 3.37 ERA as a starter.
Faedo’s slider could be legitimately special. It had a whiff rate of 41.3% last season and held batters to a .179 xBA and .230 xSLG. In other words: Hitters struggle to even put his slider in play, and when they do, it results in weak contact.
In a relief role, the need for Faedo to develop pitches beyond his slider is greatly diminished, and there’s a chance he can flourish behind that one elite pitch. There’s a wide range of possible outcomes for him over the next couple years.
Kolton Ingram:
The Tigers added Ingram off waivers last week and shipped Nick Maton off to Baltimore to make room on the 40-man roster. They wouldn’t do that unless something caught their eye.
Here’s what they saw: a 2.95 ERA and 77 strikeouts in 61 minor-league innings last season.
Ingram had a nice 2021 season across three levels in the lower minors, striking out 67 batters in 46.2 innings while posting a 3.47 ERA and 1.24 WHIP. His strong follow-up last season validated those numbers.
This is a reunion of sorts for the Tigers, who drafted Ingram in the 37th round back in 2019. He’s 27 now, and if he starts to show some of that minor-league dominance in the spring, the Tigers will have something to think about.
Brendan White:
The surface numbers didn’t quite do White justice in 2023. He had nice strikeout numbers that were backed up by a 31.6% chase rate and a 29.2% whiff rate. He’s always been a strike-thrower in the minors and posted a 51.3% ground ball rate during his first taste of MLB action.
But the best part was White’s 35.7% whiff rate on the four-seamer. Combine that with a 35.8% mark for his slider and you’ve got a good enough two-pitch combo to make it in the big leagues, especially since he also has a sweeper with a 28.2% usage to change the pace.
All those factors combine to paint a pretty attractive picture, but I’m not sure White will have room to crack the crowded Opening Day bullpen.
Non-roster options
There are enough solid relievers on the 40-man roster that the Tigers probably won’t go outside that group to fill out their bullpen, but there are two other spring training invitees who deserve a mention.
Trey Wingenter was mostly fine for the Tigers last season after returning from a mid-April injury. All of his underlying strikeout numbers were elite in a small 17-inning sample size, but he isn’t a great strike-thrower and he allowed very hard contact.
Detroit snagged Andrew Vasquez off waivers in August and gave him a short tryout before the end of the season. It did not go well.
Vasquez is a left-handed soft contact specialist with a solid ground ball rate, but a combination of low strikeouts and high walks will always limit his upside.
Final thoughts
Fetter has been so consistent in getting the most out of relief pitchers over the past few years. Look at Jose Cisnero, Kyle Funkhouser, and Michael Fulmer in 2021, or Joe Jimenez, Wily Peralta, Foley, Lange, and Chafin the last two years.
This time around, Fetter doesn’t need to rehabilitate anyone for the Tigers to have a nasty bullpen. A few tweaks here and there -- keeping Lange and Chafin in the strike zone, for instance, or getting Brieske settled into his new role -- would be enough.
In the worst-case scenario, there’s plenty of downside for this bullpen, but I don’t see any reason to expect that sort of regression. With good health, it could be Detroit’s strength.
