Rangers Lean Into Volatility, Sign Andrew Heaney

A few days after signing Jacob deGrom to lead their rotation, the Texas Rangers continued to bolster their pitching staff, signing Andrew Heaney to a two-year contract that could be worth up to $37 million total. The base salary is $25 million with up to $12 million in additional incentives; the deal also includes an opt-out after 2023.

After limping to a 5.83 ERA in 2021 while pitching for the Angels and Yankees, Heaney signed a one-year, bounce-back deal with the Dodgers, and bounce back he did. With a 25.4% career strikeout rate, he’s had no problems sending batters down on strikes over the years. He took that ability to new levels in 2022, pushing his strikeout rate to a career-high 35.5% while also logging career bests in ERA (3.10) and strikeout-to-walk ratio (5.79).

However, that penchant for Ks comes with a really nasty habit of allowing far too many home runs. Over the last five seasons, his 27.2% strikeout rate ranks 28th among all qualified starting pitchers, while his 1.64 HR/9 ranks 12th. He was able to offset some of that damage with his improvements this year, but it’s a real sticking point that has held him back from becoming one of the premiere starters in baseball.

The Rangers are hoping that the adjustments Heaney made to his repertoire while with the Dodgers can stick beyond this year. This spring, he adopted the pitch the Dodgers had made famous last year, a sweeping slider to replace his curveball. Well, it looked like a sweeper and it might have been called a sweeper, but the characteristics of the pitch make it seem like a pretty standard slider. Heaney’s curveball had around seven inches of horizontal break; the raw break on his slider was around half of that:

With such an average amount of horizontal break to it, is his new breaking ball truly a sweeper? He called it a sweeper in the spring, and it acted like a sweeper as it crossed the plate, but the data doesn’t back up the moniker. The reason it looks like that kind of Dodgers slider is because of where Heaney releases the pitch. He has one of the most extreme horizontal releases in baseball, giving him a unique angle to the plate; sweepers have an extremely high horizontal approach angle. Michael Ajeto explained all of this for Baseball Prospectus back in April, writing, “To achieve sweep, [Heaney] doesn’t need a pitch that sweeps itself. It’s his angle to the plate, created by his release point, that helps him create sweep.”

The biggest difference between the two breaking balls beyond their movement characteristics was an increase in velocity, from just below 80 mph to nearly 83 mph. The spin profile of the slider also improved via improved seam-shifted wake effects. Those additional tweaks helped him post some very impressive results with his breaking ball.

It should be noted that Heaney’s curveball wasn’t a bad pitch that needed to be overhauled; it regularly returned fantastic whiff rates and his slider only improved on those rates by a few points. Instead, his new slider plays well off his fastball and changeup, both of which have above-average arm-side movement. That cohesion helped him push the whiff rates on those two pitches up over 30%, career highs for both pitches.

Despite the uptick in swinging strikes, Heaney was still frustrated by the long ball. After returning from his second stint on the injured list in late July, he allowed 13 homers in 13 appearances through the end of the season, a rate of over two home runs per nine innings. This sizable wart seems to be part of who Heaney is on the mound, no matter how much he tinkers with his pitches or approach. That gives his results the potential for a lot more volatility; he could wind up repeating his success from this year or he could blow up like he did in 2021.

And that’s not the only source of risk for the Rangers. The reason behind all the provisos in Heaney’s contract is likely related to the health of his shoulder and elbow. He underwent Tommy John surgery in 2016 and has had two separate stints on the injured list for elbow inflammation afterwards. This year, he was placed on the IL twice for a shoulder issue that limited him to just 72.2 innings pitched for the Dodgers. As structured, the contract has numerous safeguards that seem to protect both the Rangers and Heaney. If he’s healthy, he’s likely to hit many of the performance bonuses; if he’s really healthy, he can hit the open market again after the season; and if his arm issues recur, the potential outlay for the Rangers is fairly reasonable considering the high cost of free agent pitching in the offseason thus far.

Adding both deGrom and Heaney to their rotation raises the ceiling of that group considerably. Our Depth Charts currently project Texas to enter the season with the fourth best rotation in the majors and the best in the American League, assuming healthy seasons from both deGrom and Heaney. But doubling down on another starter with significant injury concerns and the potential for volatile results while he’s on the mound is a bold strategy with significant risk. After spending half a billion dollars in new free-agent contracts last year and continuing that spending spree this year, the Rangers are trying to put themselves in position to really challenge the Astros and Mariners in the AL West. If deGrom and Heaney are reasonably healthy, the Rangers very well may give those two teams a run for their money. Still, it seems likely that one or both of deGrom and Heaney will deal with some sort of injury during the season. If so, the lack of depth behind them could really hurt the Rangers’ chances of competing in 2023.