Zach Eflin is living up to the Orioles’ hopes. He’s become their most consistent starter since he was acquired via a trade with the Tampa Bay Rays last month and has assumed an even more important role as Baltimore’s pitching injuries continue to mount.
Behind Eflin’s success with his new team are some repertoire tweaks — throwing some pitches more, others less, and in different counts. So far, that’s turned the right-hander into the pitcher he was a season ago when he earned American League Cy Young Award votes.
And it came with help from his former club.
Rays pitching coach Kyle Snyder called his Orioles counterpart, Drew French, in the days following the deal on July 26. They exchanged data, more than coaches of division rivals typically do, and Snyder gave the Orioles a head start in planning how to deploy their new right-hander. Since the call, Eflin has surpassed expectations.
“It’s Kyle Snyder, man,” Eflin said. “He does such a great job, not only on the baseball aspect of things but personal relationships, caring for his players so much that he’s willing to share information, especially in [the] division. I’m forever grateful for my relationship with Kyle Snyder.”
The Orioles proposed changes to the right-hander immediately upon his arrival. He started for the first time with them two days after the deal. The tweaks were on immediate display.
Top among the differences in how Eflin attacks hitters is an uptick in his cutter usage, particularly against right-handers. He threw his cutter to righties just 16% of the time in Tampa Bay. In Baltimore, that’s risen to 35.8%.
He’s used the pitch in two-strike counts more with the Orioles than he did before and, against right-handed batters, is locating it primarily low and away as a putaway offering. That’s led to a substantial improvement in Eflin’s strikeout rate against righties — 16% with the Rays to 29.7% — and a better swing-and-miss and chase rate. He’s also nearly tripled his changeup usage and throwing fewer curveballs and four-seamers.
“They really like my cutter,” Eflin said of the Orioles. “So it’s, wanting to start throwing it a little more and see if it was like my sinker and things that are moving the other direction. We’ve done a pretty good job in the last couple outings of using it more.”
Eflin didn’t face nearly the analytical leap his new teammate Trevor Rogers did when he came from the Miami Marlins: “The information is a lot more than what I’m used to, in a good way,” Rogers said after his first start with the Orioles. Eflin instead came from an organization with a reputation for maximizing their pitchers, which he said is because the Rays don’t tend to acquire proven, expensive pitchers.
That’s where Snyder comes in, sometimes even after the pitcher departs.
“Kyle’s a real professional,” Orioles manager Brandon Hyde said. “He’s all about the player, and that’s really refreshing. It’s more about the player’s career than anything else, and so that just shows you what kind of person Kyle is, the kind of coach he is. To have that relationship with Zach, that meant a lot to him to do well.”
Whenever the Orioles trade a player to a team or coach that Hyde knows well, the manager calls to discuss the move. But that’s usually only an introductory-level discussion. Snyder offered a much more detailed rundown of Eflin to French, and the 30-year-old has since turned in three of his best starts of the season.
Eflin’s 2.33 ERA with Baltimore is second-best in the rotation since he was acquired, behind only Albert Suárez. He’s delivered on his anti-walk promises, allowing just two free passes to 17 strikeouts. He’s gone at least six innings and given up no more than three runs in each of his starts and leads the team in innings with 19 1/3 since his arrival.
The right-hander, who spent the first seven years of his career with the Philadelphia Phillies, is early in his Baltimore tenure but has already become a key figure in his new team’s division title race. He’ll make his fourth start with the Orioles on Thursday in their series opener against the Boston Red Sox. Through his first three, Eflin has been the prize of the deadline — with an assist from a rival.
“Both these organizations are very forward-thinking,” Eflin said. “I wasn’t really in analytics until last year when I signed with Tampa. Understanding me, not being able to throw too hard and have power stuff, having to learn how to manipulate the ball better and understand what the numbers mean. That’s exactly what these guys do here.”