Orioles Lose Another Veteran Starter To Free Agency

Former Baltimore starter Jack Flaherty has agreed to a deal with another American League team.

Jack Flaherty has a new home, as the former Baltimore Orioles starter has agreed to a one-year deal with the Detroit Tigers, per ESPN.

The Tigers have not made a formal announcement.

Per the report, Flaherty’s base salary will be $14 million and the deal can reach as high as $15 million, with start-based bonuses for his 26th, 28th and 30th starts.

Flaherty is the second veteran starter the Tigers have signed this offseason, with the other being former Twins starter Kenta Maeda.

The Tigers also inherit Flaherty’s durability issues. While he made 29 starts in 2023, entering the season he hadn’t logged more than 30 starts since 2019, which was the best season of his career.

With Flaherty’s deal, the Orioles are now without the two veteran anchors of their rotation from their stretch run to 101 wins and the AL East title.

The other, Kyle Gibson, signed with St. Louis earlier this offseason.

The Orioles acquired Flaherty at the trade deadline from St. Louis, but he didn’t have a great finish to his season. With the O’s he went just 1-4 with a 6.75 ERA in nine games, with seven starts.

He didn’t build on his solid first-half in St. Louis, where he went 7-6 with a 4.43 ERA. Combined, he went 8-9 with a 4.99 ERA.

Before joining the Orioles, he spent his entire career with the Cardinals, where he finished fifth in NL Rookie of the Year voting in 2018 and fourth in NL Cy Young voting in 2019 with an 11-8 record and a 2.75 ERA.

For his career in St. Louis, he went 41-31 with a 3.58 ERA in 122 games (118 starts), with 706 strikeouts in 633 innings.

For his entire seven-year career, the 28-year-old is 42-34 with a 3.75 ERA.

The Orioles have a young rotation returning with talent like Dean Kremer, Kyle Bradish, Grayson Rodriguez and Tyler Wells.