Each free agent signing is a commerce. For that matter, each job in all places is a transaction. The employer agrees to provide you cash and perhaps even medical health insurance. You agree to provide them your work. You’re buying and selling one thing they need in trade for one thing you need (or a minimum of one thing you want with the intention to not die). However we don’t have a tendency to consider issues this manner. Everyone has to work, so everyone simply will get the perfect job they’ll. For ballplayers who’ve reached free company, that usually means maximizing earnings. That’s what Michael Lorenzen did on Wednesday, when ESPN’s Jeff Passan reported that the muscular right-hander agreed to a one-year, $8 million cope with the Rockies (with a $9 million membership choice for 2027). Nonetheless, this deal is notable for the starkness of the desires on both aspect and the concessions they made to get them. Lorenzen desires to be a beginning pitcher. That’s all he’s ever needed. The Rockies desire a beginning pitcher who’s keen to ply his commerce underneath two opposed circumstances: in Colorado and for the Rockies.
In 2015, towards the tip of a rookie season during which he put up a 5.45 ERA and 5.48 FIP, the Reds relegated Lorenzen to the bullpen. Throughout six subsequent seasons in Cincinnati, Lorenzen wasn’t shy about the truth that he needed to return to beginning and infrequently appeared in line to get that likelihood, however underperformance and accidents – a UCL sprain, a teres main pressure, a shoulder pressure, even a bout of mono – pushed him into reduction roles (and the occasional look as an outfielder). He began simply 5 extra video games in his last six seasons with the Reds. Though he ended on a down word, he ran a 3.65 ERA and three.92 FIP over these six seasons. He’d earned the prospect to pitch the place he needed on his personal phrases, and he did simply that. Lorenzen signed with the Angels, then the Tigers, then the Rangers, then the Royals, and now with the Rockies, all on one-year offers (often incentive-laden ones), and all with the publicly-acknowledged understanding that he can be given the prospect to begin.
Making that half clear up entrance was vital as a result of irrespective of how properly he pitched, it was all too straightforward for individuals to place collectively a desk that confirmed his splits as a starter and a reliever. You’d slightly have the second man, proper? The one whose strikeout price is inside shouting distance of the league common and who possesses some means to maintain the ball within the yard?
The Splits Michael Lorenzen Can’t Escape
| Function | Ok% | HR/9 | ERA | FIP | wOBA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | 18.8 | 1.26 | 4.27 | 4.71 | .325 |
| Reliever | 21.1 | 0.86 | 3.75 | 3.93 | .295 |
However Lorenzen endured. He’s 34 now, and he made probably the most of his seven-pitch starter’s arsenal. Over the previous 4 years, he made 93 begins for six completely different groups. And he pitched high quality! He ran a mixed ERA- of 99 and FIP- of 110. He was a mean pitcher, a fascinating sufficient arm that playoff-bound groups traded for him on the deadline in two of the previous three seasons. In 2023, he threw a no-hitter. In 2024, because of luck within the type of a low BABIP and excessive strand price, he ran a 3.31 ERA. In 2025, he wasn’t so lucky, working a 4.64 ERA that matched his 4.59 FIP. Over the previous three years, he’s been proper across the prime 50 by way of video games began and innings pitched. Nonetheless, when issues bought actual, when the season wound down, when Lorenzen discovered himself within the playoffs, he additionally discovered himself again within the bullpen. He received’t have to fret about that in Colorado.
Lorenzen has discovered the hardest pitching setting in baseball, however he’s additionally discovered a state of affairs the place league-average numbers would put him in rarefied air. In 2025, Colorado’s beginning pitchers ran a 6.65 ERA. That’s the worst mark ever. And after I say ever, I imply ever. It’s the best beginning pitching ERA in AL/NL historical past. Fourth place belongs to the 1899 Spiders. (Though the 2025 bullpen didn’t set a file, Colorado does personal the best mixed bullpen ERA of any franchise at 4.81.) RosterResource pegs Lorenzen because the Rockies’ no. 2 starter, behind lefty Kyle Freeland and forward of Chase Dollander, Tanner Gordon, and Ryan Feltner. Freeland was the one one of many 4 incumbents with an ERA under 6.00 or a FIP under 5.00.
However this can be a new period. Lorenzen would be the first main leaguer to signal with the Rockies within the Paul DePodesta period. He may also be the staff’s first funding in beginning pitching of any substance in any respect since 2015, once they signed Kyle Kendrick for $5.5 million. In some way, Lorenzen is just the fifth beginning pitcher to signal a cope with the Rockies previously seven years. I went by means of Colorado’s RosterResource free agent tracker to verify. The tracker goes again to 2020, and the 4 starters I discovered put up a mixed -0.1 WAR with the Rockies. They received a mixed 11 video games. Chad Kuhl ran the perfect ERA. It was 5.72.
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Rockies Beginning Pitcher Free Agent Signings
It’s scary to consider what number of homers Lorenzen may hand over within the skinny Denver air, however he’d should crash spectacularly laborious so as be something lower than a major improve for this rotation. Everyone will get what they need right here, and all it took to get it was a pair further hundreds of thousands on one aspect and a willingness to pitch on a mountain on the opposite. The Rockies get to take their first step on the lengthy highway to reputability, they usually get to signal their first first rate beginning pitcher in years. Lorenzen will get his cash – virtually definitely extra money than he would have gotten anyplace else – and he will get what should have been his final likelihood to stay a beginning pitcher. If he defies the percentages and pitches properly, perhaps he can hold the streak going and signal an analogous deal subsequent yr.