Looking over the Free Agents available in my league, I could go after a guy like (Darren) O'Day.I haven't seen Arredondo pitch this year. But the numbers at Fangraphs tell me that he's been extremely unlucky thus far.
To do so, though, I'd have to cut bait on Jose Arredondo. As much as I hate cutting guys who I protected, I've already gone down that road once (Chris Ray). Is it too early to give up on Arredondo? Any reason to think he's something more then the second-coming of Rafael Betancourt.
Despite the fact that his K/IP rate has jumped from 8.11 in 2008 to 10.71 in 2009, Arredondo's ERA has still jumped up from a 1.62 to a 5.14. He hasn't allowed any HR, and he's getting even more hitters to hit the ball on the ground, so that doesn't explain the spike.
What has killed him is a 422 BABIP. That's the worst rate in the American League in 2009 for pitchers with 20 or more IP, and only Hayden Penn's 436 keeps Arredondo's BABIP from being the worst in the majors.
It's interesting that Anonymous brought up Ray, because Arredondo haters can point to my argument and say that Ray's BABIP of 482 is even worse. While that's obviously true, Ray's BB/IP and HR/IP aren't good and point to a pitcher who has been unlucky but who still wouldn't be good even if the numbers were going his way.
If Fangraphs had existed in 2007, we might have looked at Betancourt's season with a little more built-in cynicism. His 86.4% strand rate, .246 BABIP, and 3.8% HR/FB rate all would have pointed to signs of an aberration. We might not have expected the severity of the crash that occurred in 2008, but we would have expected some sort of crash.
I'd keep Arredondo over O'Day. O'Day has been solid, and maybe he'll continue to be solid. But I think Arredondo still has better stuff, and the potential earn more the rest of the way in 2009.
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