Jeremy Affeldt: Enigma
After deciding to not tender a contract offer to Miguel Asencio (who signed with the Padres), the Royals only have one arbitration case to worry about this year, and that belongs to Jeremy Affeldt. This is his first year of eligibility, and he’s asking for $1.2 million while the Royals are offering $950,000. The two sides seem entirely too close to not reach an agreement before going through the ugly process, but every indication is that the case – for a reason unknown to me – is going before an arbiter sometime next month. The team would have to denigrate the player from every conceivable angle, but the Royals certainly couldn’t blast Jeremy’s sense of humor. When asked recently what the difference really was between $950,000 and $1.2 million, Affeldt quipped, "Two-hundred fifty thousand dollars."
Anyway, this entry isn’t about choosing which 2005 salary most reflects his pitching abilities, or his prospects of becoming a standup comic after his playing days are over. I’m guessing neither topic would be very interesting to anybody, and going in another direction will let me to write about something I’ve been wondering about for some time: Does Affeldt really have the ability to be an upper-tier starter or closer?
On the surface, the answer to that is an emphatic "Yes" for anyone who’s ever seen Affeldt pitch at full-throttle. When he uses maximum effort (which is only in relief appearances), it isn’t unusual to see him touch 97 and 98 mph with his fastball, and display one of the wickedest curveballs in the American League. There’s no question that he has the raw stuff to dominate even the best hitters, but more than a few pitchers with great stuff have flamed out for various reasons. Quite a few failed because their teams rushed them to the majors without allowing a proper development period at each level of the minor leagues, and part of me is afraid that’s what happened to Jeremy.
Looking at Affeldt’s track record in the minor leagues is like watching Basic, or seeing something you expect to be good, only to have it disappoint you with confusing plot twists and a non-cohesive ending. After being drafted out of a Washington high school in the third round of the 1997 draft, Affeldt reported to rookie ball and had a predictable line that included a mediocre ERA, a low hit rate, and high strikeout and walk rates. The following season, he reported back to the Gulf Coast Royals, and showed some major improvements in control, lowering his walk rate from 4.7 to 3.9, and in missing bats, increasing his strikeout rate from 8.1 to 10.8. Because of those improvements, the Royals decided to move him up to Low-A Lansing near the end of the season, and that’s when his career started on this roller coaster that still hasn’t reached its conclusion.
Affeldt struggled horribly for Lansing, allowing 27 hits and 18 earned runs in 17 innings, in addition to walking 12 batters and striking out only eight. He still had a pretty good season between the two levels, as his strikeout-to-walk ratio was over two-to-one that year. Despite his failure at Lansing, the Royals pushed him again, moving Affeldt to Charleston in 1999. His ERA improved to 3.83, but his strikeout rate took a big hit, falling to 7 per 9 innings, as did his walk rate, spiking to 5 per 9 innings. 1999 was the last season before the Allard Baird era began, so predictably, Affeldt was moved up – again – despite the fact that his peripheral statistics didn’t match his somewhat low ERA.
In 2000, he was sent to Hi-A Wilmington, where he had a season that in no way resembled his last one. The hit rate? Up, from 8.8 to 9.7. Strikeouts? Down, from 7 per 9 innings to 5.6 per 9 innings. Often, such a drop in those key developmental categories can be attributed to a 21-year-old facing more advanced hitters, but curiously, Affeldt’s control improved despite everything else, walking a then-career low 3.6 per 9. In addition, he had a horrid 5-15 record.
This is becoming a recurring theme: Even though Jeremy didn’t even come close to mastering Single-A, he was moved to Double-A Wichita in 2001, which was and still is one of the leagues least friendly to pitchers in professional baseball. A reasonable person would’ve predicted that Affeldt would get his butt kicked by a league known for its small parks and big hitters, but he did the opposite. He had a 3.90 ERA while improving his strikeout rate from the previous season to 7.9, lowering his walk rate to a very good 2.9 (46 in 145 innings), and as a result having the best strikeout-to-walk ratio of his career at 2.78-to-1. For a 22-year-old lefty to pitch like that in a known hitters’ league is very, very impressive, but there were still some concerns.
For one, he was entirely too hittable, frequently allowing more than 9 hits per 9 innings of work. The explanation for that is his stuff back in ’01 wasn’t the same stuff he has now. Here’s what the 2002 edition of Baseball Prospectus wrote about a then much less talented Affeldt:
Affeldt is a tall, thin left-handed starter who has been progressing in the shadow of the Royals’ better-known prospects. He only gets up around 90 with his fastball, but he mixes it well with a change-up and slurve. He keeps the ball down and in the park, which is how he succeeds without great strikeout numbers. Affeldt was named to the all-Arizona Fall League team despite being used in an unfamiliar role and having a couple of bad outings inflate his ERA to 7.25. His long-term outlook is as a swing man/spot starter.The only portion of that paragraph that applies now is that he’s tall. The rest of it changed drastically in 2002 when he took full advantage of his Spring Training invitation, flashing a much higher-octane fastball and a filthy curve nobody in the organization had seen before. Rany Jazayerli summed up his performance pretty well:
This year, the kid is Jeremy Affeldt. On March 3, the southpaw took the mound for his first appearance and put on a pitching performance so astonishing that it headlined not one, but two separate columns in the Kansas City Star the next day. Affeldt struck out five of the six hitters he faced, and since these were the Pirates, one or two of them might have even been threats to put the ball in play. One observer, not normally given to hyperbole, told me that Affeldt's outing was, in a word, Koufaxesque. (This from someone who saw Sandy Koufax pitch many times.)And thus began the Jeremy Affeldt era in Kansas City. He posted a 4.64 ERA in ’02 with one of the best strikeout rates on the team, and then followed that up with an even better 2003 campaign that had everyone predicting a 15- or 20-win season for 2004. That season, he almost cut his walks in half (4.3 per 9 to 2.7 per 9), lowered his hit rate (9.9 to 9.0), and continued to do a fantastic job of keeping the ball in the park in what was then Coors Field East. Affeldt was especially dominant out of relief, posting a 2.56 ERA and 35 strikeouts in 31 2/3 innings.
[ . . .]
One great outing doesn't make my heart race... but it's a lot harder for me to dismiss six of them in a row. Affeldt has now thrown 12 innings, getting nicked for a single earned run, allowing just six hits, walking two and striking out 14. His fastball is still getting clocked around 94 mph, and his curveball is still dropping as fast as the jaws of those scouts who watched him in his first outing. Last week he was brought in to face a tough lefty with the bases loaded and two outs, and blew a 2-2 fastball right by Jim Thome. (This sounds more impressive than it is, given that Thome has never been a world-beater against lefties.)
Then 2004 came, and Affeldt fell flat on his face just like the rest of the Royals’ pitchers and hitters. Even after he conquered a persistent blister by having half of a fingernail surgically removed, his performance fell off, but perhaps more concerning was his lack of velocity as a starting pitcher. He only worked at 88-90 mph in Spring Training, which should’ve been a major cause for alarm when he only struck out seven batters in 27 2/3 innings. As the season wore on, hitters seemed to ignore his big curve and focus on hitting the fastball, which had no life or movement. For the second straight season, he was more effective out of the bullpen with a 4.50 ERA, but his strikeout and walk numbers both went in the wrong direction.
If you’re confused by Affeldt’s story, then you’re just like me. His career minor league numbers are less than spectacular: A 3.99 ERA, 7.25 K/9, and 3.94 BB/9 in 559 innings wouldn't scream "Top Prospect" to anybody. I can’t say I’m particularly optimistic that he’s ever going to figure it out because of his extreme inconsistency and the Royals rushing him to the majors, but a team should never give up on a lefty with his stuff. His future’s as a reliever, and hopefully the Royals will get 100 or more innings out of him in 2005.