The Milwaukee Brewers recently released pitcher Neftali Feliz to free agency. Although he has struggled this year, could a reunion with the Pittsburgh Pirates help him find last year’s success?
Feliz has been awful this year. In 27 innings, the hard throwing righty has given up 18 earned runs on 23 hits. He has 21 strikeouts and 15 walks. Most alarmingly, Feliz has given up 10 home runs which equates to 2.7 home runs given up per nine innings. Woof.
Despite all of that, would a reunion with the Pittsburgh Pirates make sense?
What a difference a year makes
There are two big differences between last year and this year with Feliz. First, he is striking out less batters and walking more. Last year with the Pirates, Feliz struck out 10.2 batters per nine innings and walked 3.5 per nine. This year, he is only striking out seven batters per nine and walking five. Control is obviously the first issue.
Secondly, Feliz has a ground ball rates of 30.3 percent this year, down from last year’s mark of 37.9 percent. His fly ball rate has also skyrocketed from 39.4 percent last year to 50 percent this year. From a bat on ball standpoint, Feliz is actually giving up less hard contact this year (26.6 percent) than last (37 percent). The hard contact of last year has turned to medium contact this year. The problem is, when you give up fly balls half of the time, some of that medium contact will reach the seats at tiny little Miller Park. Feliz has a home run to fly ball ratio of 21.1 percent, a career high.
That being said, Feliz still throws gas. His fastball this year is actually a slight tick faster than last year (96.4 to 96.1 mph). All of his pitches have a very similar velocities to last year. His stuff is still there.
Do the Pittsburgh Pirates take a chance?
In a word: Absolutely. Outside of Felipe Rivero, Juan Nicasio and even Wade Leblanc the Pittsburgh Pirates bullpen is a mess.
Feliz still throws hard and would be the perfect candidate to rekindle some Ray Searage magic. Feliz has always been a fly ball pitcher. It was never going to work in home run friendly Miller Park. The opposite is true of the spacious PNC Park. If the Pirates could find a way to help him regain his control and force a few more ground balls, he would basically be the pitcher he was last year.
With this current bullpen bunch, the club would gladly take a similar version of 2016 Neftali Feliz.
Also, we cannot rule out the fact that Pittsburgh could take Feliz back in, rehabilitate him, hide any warts in his game by putting him into low-leverage situations and then trade him at either trade deadline to maximize return.
From Feliz’s perspective, why wouldn’t he want to come back? He’s had success here. There is an obvious need for both parties. Like it or not, the Pirates are still technically a contender being that they are only five games out of first place in the NL Central. Plus this would be a nice opportunity for Feliz to stick it to the Brewers, a team that gave up on him so early in the season.
Photo credit – Daniel Decker Photogrpahy
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