Examining SF Giants Randy Rodriguez's Viability As A Starter

About a month ago, before the whole baseball world stood at a standstill, there were tough choices to be made in terms of who to add to the SF Giants 40-man roster. The Giants do love to shove in as much big-league talent as possible and every spot in the 40-man roster is made with the incoming season in mind. And so, when the 40-man protection deadline came and went, three prospects were protected. The first two, Heliot Ramos and Sean Hjelle, were easy and logical choices. Both finished their 2021 season in Triple-A and even though the expectation is that they will be spending most of their 2022 season in Sacramento, both will have a shot in Spring Training and are on the cusp of making the big league roster.

Examining SF Giants Randy Rodriguez's Viability As A Starter

The third addition, however, is rather intriguing. Randy Rodriguez was added to the 40-man roster over other notable top-30 prospects like Diego Rincones, Prelander Berroa, and Seth Corry. Picking Rodriguez over Rincones and Berroa is interesting for a couple of reasons. The first is that in terms of the public view, Rincones and Berroa are ranked higher than Rodriguez in any prospect rankings as Rodriguez was a relatively unknown prospect heading into 2021. The second and more intriguing reason is that Rincones performed well in AA this year and to leave him unprotected where a team could pluck his bat out of the farm system.

As mentioned earlier, every spot in the 40-man roster is made with the incoming season in mind so when Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi commented that Rodriguez might not be put on the fast track and might even have the chance to start unlike the trio of Camilo Doval, Kervin Castro, and Gregory Santos in last season's 40-man roster crunch, it sparked a big question in my mind: can Randy Rodriguez actually be a starting pitcher long-term? Join me as we talk through Randy Rodriguez's 2021 by the numbers, what I saw on the film that made the Giants protect him over other highly-regarded prospects in the organization, and answer the question of whether he can be stretched out in a rotation role in 2022 and beyond.

Randy Rodriguez's 2021 Season

Rodriguez headed into the 2021 season without much of a fanfare. I did not have a good beat of his pitch repertoire before but I did see his mechanics when he was pitching in Rookie ball in 2018. I wrote this report on him in my 2021 Prospects Primer:

"While not much is known about Randy’s stuff, he has a good, strong
physique and deception in his delivery due to him reaching back hard in his throwing arm. Would be interested to see his progress in the next couple of years."

To be fair, his stats on the back fields were not eye-popping to the tune of 4.28 and 5.40 ERA in the DSL and AZL respectively, but he looked like have some bat-missing ability with 34 strikeouts in 27.1 innings in the DSL and 29 strikeouts in 25 innings in the AZL. Rodriguez pitched well from May to July where he posted a 3.21 ERA in his first three months with 51 strikeouts in 33.2 innings. However, he turned it on in August and September with a 28.1 inning scoreless streak with 50 strikeouts to three walks compared to 20 walks that he allowed in the first three months. To put Rodriguez's August and September to an even deeper context, he held hitters to a .143 batting average, struck out 48% of the batters that he faced, induced whiffs at an absurd 42% rate, and threw 71% of his pitches for strikes. He also pitched 1.1 scoreless innings in relief in the post-season as the San Jose squad won the Low-A West title.

All in all, Rodriguez struck out 101 batters in 62 innings, pitched with a 1.74 ERA, 9% walk rate, 67% strike thrown rate, 39% strikeout rate, and a 39% whiff rate. What is interesting is that Rodriguez's 62 innings and 1010 pitches this season were a little less than 2/3 of the number of innings and pitches of what top prospect Kyle Harrison threw this season. People might take that as the lines between starting and relieving are getting vaguer and vaguer. A more logical reason is that the Giants coaches want to give as many competitive reps to every pitcher that they missed out as possible due to the pandemic and pitchers are mostly working in more than one inning stints followed with a couple of days of rest. Rodriguez only pitched with less than three days of rest once this season in an effort to avoid overuse.

Rodriguez was also stingy in any at-bat but especially in the late-innings where he usually ends up pitching for most of the season. He is also nasty with runners in scoring position with a 0.85 ERA, a.132 opposing batting average, and 38 strikeouts in 22.1 innings of work. Simply put, Rodriguez was exceptional for San Jose this year as their Andrew Miller-type fireman out of the bullpen.

Can Randy Rodriguez Work In A Starter Role?

It came as a surprise when Zaidi made the remark that Rodriguez could be stretched out in a rotation role next season. In the 58 pitching appearances that he had done throughout his whole career, he only started twice in 2018 in the DSL. If he ever starts next season, it will be the first time in more than three years that has happened.

In order for Rodriguez to be viable in a rotation role, or any pitcher for that matter, he has to have a third pitch. Not just a show-me pitch, but a pitch that can either induce whiffs or weak contact. In Rodriguez's case, it is a changeup. His changeup is a two-seam circle changeup that he primarily throws against lefties early in the count to give hitters a different look from the usual fastball-slider combination. He did not throw the pitch a lot early in the season but his confidence kept growing and growing as the season progressed and he even features it in two-strike counts. The pitch does not have a big velocity difference compared to his fastball but it does flash late two-seam movement.

If you can get Robert Hassell III to swing in front like what he did in the video, you know it's a viable third pitch. With Rodriguez working out in two or three-inning stints and only facing the lineup once, going full send is not an issue. However, if Rodriguez is to be stretched out, the 94-98 MPH range that he lived with in the bullpen would tick down to likely 92-96 MPH. He could still sprinkle a couple of 98 MPH heaters early in his outings, but he would likely sit in the low-to-mid 90s.

Rodriguez's stuff should not be an issue. There is a reason why his strikeout rate never dipped below 25% after all. He also has had a solid record of strike-throwing this season. His walk rate was not pretty in the AZL a couple of years ago but he's shown this season that he can spot his pitches whenever needed. The only issue that could hinder Rodriguez's stint in the rotation is the violence in his arm action. Rodriguez is a great athlete but the way he loads his rotator cuff is extreme. That gives him the relief-ish vibes and even though I think that Rodriguez will pitch in relief in the big leagues eventually, I would not discount the possibility that he will be a good Minor League starter because of his athleticism and strike-throwing.