Brandon Woodruff's Overhaul. Is Trevor Rogers' Resurgence Real?
Brandon Woodruff, Joe Boyle, Trevor Rogers
Brewers Brandon Woodruff made his first start of 2025 after undergoing shoulder surgery and missing all of 2024 (6 IP, 2 H, ER, 8 K). A few things have changed. First, his velocity is down. He sat just 93.2 mph yesterday, down from 95.8 in 2023. Second, he didn’t throw his old slider and curveball, instead working with a new cutter and sweeper. The cutter is 90 mph with 14” vertical break and 3-5” glove-side movement. That’s a lot more lift than your average cutter with a touch more glove-side movement (the Brewers lead MLB in cutter usage at 12.9% this season). He mainly used this cutter and his sinker to righties instead of relying heavily on his four-seamer. His lefty approach focused on his four-seam and changeup, with a few new cutters thrown in, which was mostly his approach in 2023. 🍺
Woodruff’s new sweeper averaged 81-82 mph with 4” vertical break and 11-12” sweep. This should grade as an average shape from his high slot. They were all thrown 0-0 or with 2 strikes to righties. These adjustments are an acknowledgement that he’s not working with the same ~96 he used to have. So, let’s push toward heavier cutter usage (a la Chad Patrick and Quinn Priester). I was pretty pessimistic when I saw Woodruff sitting 93 during rehab, but now I’m much more intrigued, even if it comes with a lower strikeout rate than the 25% he ran before 2022.
Rays Joe Boyle returned in a piggy-back role to Drew Rasmussen (5 IP, 2 H, BB, 7 K). He posted a 22% K-BB, a sub-2 ERA, and most notably, a 63% strike rate, up from 56% last season. I wrote back in April that Boyle added a new splitter that had a nasty combination of velocity and drop from his higher-than-average arm angle. It was his best chase and whiff pitch at Triple-A (see below). This was the Rays’ main alteration, as they also took away his sweeper and curveball from 2024, likely because both pitches had poor zone rates. ☀️
Rasmussen will be limited to around 150 innings this season (link), which opens the door up for Boyle to make more of these bulk starts. This high-strikeout, high-walk profile is bound to have some variance outings (think Dylan Cease). With the addition of this splitter, he’s run a 50% ground-ball rate in the minors, nearly double his mark from last season. Perhaps this can help even out some of the contact quality allowed, even if occasional high-walk games feel inevitable. It’s a volatile profile, but one that I think can work. I’ll take a sub-4 ERA rest of the way (bold based on projections).
Orioles Trevor Rogers has a 4.11 xFIP / 13% K-BB over his last four starts after a brief stint at Triple-A. As I mentioned back in late May when he made his 2025 debut, his velocity was back above 93 mph after sitting 92 mph last season. I also thought the Orioles backed him off his sinker to right-handed hitters, after throwing it just two times on May 24, but over these last four outings, he’s used it 19%, mainly as a behind-in-count weapon. One thing that may have changed is his slider. It’s down 1 mph from last year, so given his four-seam velocity increase, the gap to his fastball rose from 9.6 mph to 12.3 mph. His slider also has marginally more drop and sweep, which I expect with the slower velocity. I don’t have a visual of his grip, but I’d guess this is more a cue change than an orientation change. 🧐
Apart from the slider, there isn’t anything strikingly different about Rogers. From a location standpoint, he’s throwing his sinker more down and/or inside to righties than 2024. Yesterday, his four-seam was locked on the outer third of the plate after being more of an inside pitch in his prior three outings. I think the velocity gain is driving a lot of the boost in his production (he got crushed last season—4.70 xFIP in 120+ IP). This isn’t a sub-3.50 ERA arm, but if he hangs around a 4.00 with above-average home-run suppression, he could eclipse 1 fWAR this season for the first time since 2021.