Baltimore Orioles Window Shopping For Bargains: Trevor Cahill

The Baltimore Orioles are going to look for bargains this offseason. Is Trevor Cahill a potential target?

If you’re hoping the Baltimore Orioles will open up the checkbook and spend some money this offseason to help improve the roster, prepare yourself now for disappointment. The Orioles will make moves during free agency, but they will involve minor league deals and low-cost options as Baltimore avoids taking on any large increases in payroll.

Since we know the Baltimore Orioles are going to shop in the bargain bin, we ruffled through and found a few names we will look at over the next few days. In each part of this series, we will look at the pros and the cons of signing a specific free agent pitcher and then discuss whether we want the Orioles to pursue or pass.

In no particular order, next year’s starting rotation is likely to consist of John Means, Dylan Bundy, Asher Wojciechowski, and Alex Cobb (if healthy). That leaves at least one open spot. First up in our series of potential additions, Los Angeles Angels RHP Trevor Cahill. Should the Orioles pursue or pass?

It’s been a long time since Cahill started his major league career with four-straight double-digit win seasons, including 18 in 2010 with the Oakland Athletics. During that span, Cahill was worth 6.9 fWAR and logged more than 780 innings. Since then, it’s been a lot of bouncing around from team to team, injuries and more work out of the bullpen than in a starting rotation.

Cahill signed a one-year deal worth $9 million last offseason to play for the Angels and followed that up with arguably the worst season of his career. He made 37 appearances (11 starts), going 4-9 with a 5.98 ERA (6.13 FIP), a 1.47 WHIP, 81 strikeouts, and 25 home runs allowed in 102 innings. He led the Angels pitching staff in IP, which explains how successful LA’s rotation was in 2019.

His 14 wild pitches ranked third in baseball, his strikeout rate dropped for a third-straight year, down to 7.12/ 9 IP, his groundball rate dropped by nearly 8% to 46%, and his home run rate ballooned from 0.65 HR/9 IP to 2.20 HR/9 IP. It was just the third time since 2009 in which Cahill allowed more than 1.0 HR/9 IP.

Trevor Cahill was bad in 2019, there’s no sugarcoating it. However, he is a veteran who won’t demand a large contract and if he’s able to bounce back in 2020, he could become an option to flip at the deadline.

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How about some positives? Cahill was predominately a sinker/changeup pitcher in 2018 but used his sinker much less often and incorporated more of his high-spin curveballs (96th percentile) and 92 mph four-seamer.

The results? Opponents hit .353 off his four-seamer, but according to Baseball Savant, the expected batting average on the pitch was .296. The expected slugging percentage (.529) was more than 200 points lower than the actual slugging percentage against the four-seamer (.765). It also produced a whiff rate about 11% higher than compared to his 2018 results. So, maybe with a little better luck, the pitch can be something for Cahill.

As for his curveball, it produced a .218 average against and a .186 expected average and produced some of the weakest contact of all his pitches.

For what it’s worth, Cahill has made four starts at Camden Yards in his career and has been pretty successful. Across 26 innings, Cahill owns a 2.42 ERA, a 0.85 WHIP, a 16/4 K/BB ratio, and has allowed just two home runs. Of the 16 ballparks he has worked at least 25 innings in, Cahill has surrendered two or fewer home runs in only Safeco, Petco, and AT&T Park.

What do you think? Should the Baltimore Orioles pass or pursue Trevor Cahill? I’m going to say pass, unless he’s willing to sign for no more than $1-2 million for a one year deal. He’s got to be better than Tom Eshelman, Chandler Shepherd, or Dan Straily, right?

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