Alex Reyes Is a Great Buy-Low Candidate for the Bullpen

The hard-throwing, yet oft-injured reliever could be a great low-cost signing for the back-end of the Diamondbacks bullpen.

The St. Louis Cardinals made the interesting decision to non-tender hard-throwing reliever Alex Reyes last week. Reyes had spent the previous ten seasons in the Cardinals system, debuting in 2016 as a starter before injuries moved him to the bullpen. He was projected to earn $2.85 million in his third and final year of arbitration eligibility by Matt Swartz.

Over his career, Reyes has flashed back-end of the bullpen stuff but has had trouble staying healthy. His injuries include a torn ulnar collateral ligament that required Tommy John surgery in 2017, back surgery in 2018, lat and finger problems in 2019, and finally surgery to repair a torn labrum in his right shoulder in 2022. When healthy he's been a stopper in the Cardinals bullpen, with a career 2.86 ERA and a 28.4% strikeout rate in 145 career innings. 

Despite all the health problems in his career, Reyes was able to put together one healthy season in 2021. Serving as the Cardinals closer, he went 10-8 with a 3.24 ERA and 29 saves in 72 appearances. His fastball averaged 96.6 MPH to go with a wipeout slider that baffled opposing hitters as his main secondary pitch. Reyes struck out 30.0% of hitters, limited the amount of loud contact with a 34.5% hard-hit rate. According to Statcast, his .185 xBA and .304 xSLG were amongst the best in baseball that season. 

There were also some concerns about his 2021 performance to take a look at. He walked 16.4% of opposing hitters, one of the highest rates in the game, and saw his home run rate spike to 2.8%. His FIP, which takes only into account home runs, strikeouts, and walks before adjusting to an ERA scale, was over a full run higher than his ERA at 4.40. xFIP, which normalizes a pitcher's home run total to be league average home run rate times the number of fly balls allowed, estimated his true ERA to be 4.56. Both those metrics are more predictive towards future ERA than past ERA, so the Diamondbacks need to avoid handing out too much guaranteed money.

Despite the injury risk and concerns about his performance, the D-backs should take a flier on Reyes. They've already been adding more power arms to the bullpen, trading for Carlos Vargas and adding Justin Martinez to the 40-man roster last week. If the medicals check out, the D-backs should offer a one-year deal with a base salary of $2.5-3.0 million plus incentives based on the number of appearances for 2023 and a club or vesting option for 2024. That would allow Reyes to get what he was projected to earn in arbitration plus the chance to earn more. If it works, it would allow him to have a strong platform season going into free agency. If not, the deal itself would not create too much risk for the team.