The Los Angeles Dodgers signed starting pitcher Noah Syndergaard this week to a one-year deal worth $13 million.
He can earn an extra $1.5 million in performance-based bonuses and incentives.
That’s a sizable downgrade from the one-year pact he signed with the Los Angeles Angels last season, at $21 million.
Angels signed him for $21 million a year ago. https://t.co/bxCQgkwHDE
— Bill Shaikin (@BillShaikin) December 14, 2022
Even with a clearly inflated market, questions about Syndergaard’s fastball velocity and upside affected his 2023 salary.
When he signed with the Angels last year, he was just returning from Tommy John surgery and hadn’t accumulated enough innings to judge his stuff, velocity, and command.
Now that he pitched a full season, teams probably didn’t like the fact his fastball averaged between 94-95 mph, down from the 97-98 mph he used to pump before hurting his shoulder in 2020.
Syndergaard’s ERA and WHIP weren’t bad at all, as he finished with 3.94 and 1.25 between the Angels and the Philadelphia Phillies.
The most troublesome stat in his case is his strikeout rate.
Regaining His Strikeout Potential Is A Priority
His career K rate is 24.8 percent, and he checked in at 16.8 percent in 2022.
That’s not encouraging at all.
If there is an organization willing to dig deep and help Syndergaard regain his velo and strikeout potential, it’s the Dodgers.
They have done it with many pitchers in the past.
‘Thor’ certainly presents a challenge for them, which is the fact his surgery may have sapped some mph permanently.
That’s still yet to be determined, though, and even if that’s the case, there are other ways to strike out more people: better command, a pitch mix change, working on the shape of secondary pitches, increasing spin rate, etc.
Syndergaard landed with the perfect organization for what he is looking for at this stage of his career.
NEXT: Dodgers Insider Reveals Noah Syndergaard Contract Details