Monday afternoon, news broke that the Detroit Tigers had moved to acquire RHPs Chris Paddack and Randy Dobnak from the Minnesota Twins for switch hitting catcher Enrique Jimenez. Paddack is a rental starting pitcher with 4.95 ERA/4.39 FIP. He will likely slot into the backend of Detroit’s rotation as other arms progress in their rehab.
The rationale wasn’t clear until it was reported by Dan Miller of FOX Sports and Evan Petzold of the Freep that starter Reese Olson will be shut down for the rest of the season
with a shoulder injury. This is the second straight season that shoulder trouble has wiped out most or all of the the second half of the season for him.
Obviously this is a huge blow to the Tigers’ starting rotation, which was already struggling recently. Paddack isn’t an ideal replacement but he should be able to give the Tigers some solid starts in Olson’s absence.
The main piece in the deal, Paddack is a flyball pitcher with strong command of an underpowered arsenal. He averages around 94 mph and throws the kitchen sink at opposing batters; his four seamer, changeup, slider, curveball and slider all feature at least 10% usage, and he’ll occasionally toss in a sinker too. None have rated well this year, but the four seamer has been useful in the past. Paddack is listed at 6’5” and leverages that into a top-tier 7’ even of extension, which should help his fastball play up.
Stat-wise, Paddack is a fairly typical backend arm. His career walk rate is a tiny 5.2%, but his strikeout rate has hovered around 18% the last two years. When he came back from injury late in 2023, his stuff played up in a big way out of the bullpen, and that’s surely what Detroit’s banking on. As you’d expect from a crafty, underpowered starter, his third time through the order splits are horrendous. Using Paddack in more of a hybrid role to limit that third look and let his stuff play up could, theoretically, get him closer to the 36.4% K rate he flashed down the stretch in 2023.
As mentioned earlier, Paddack is in his final year before free agency. This year, he receives $7.5M, so he’s still due approximately $2.5M. That’s pretty insignificant in today’s game.
Dobnak is likely there for salary balancing purposes. He signed a small extension to buy out his arbitration years back in 2020 when he looked like a solid backend starter, then immediately flamed out and was DFA’d earlier this year. At his best, he was a control-driven righty, he just doesn’t have the stuff to get outs. His 7.12 ERA in AAA for Minnesota speaks for itself. He’s owed the remainder of his $3M salary this year, a little under $1M. In total, that means Detroit took on approximately $3.5-4M in salary for these trades.
Jimenez is a bit of a surprise to be going the other way. The 19 year old is still in the Complez League, which isn’t that damning considering the slow pace of promotions in Detroit’s system. He’s small, listed at 5’9”, but had a strong hard hit rate last year, and is generally regarded as a solid receiver for his age. As a switch hitting, young catcher, it’s safe to assume his offense will be very slow to develop, which makes his .250/.339/.450 slash line this year a bit more encouraging than the basic stats suggest. He isn’t a particularly exciting prospect yet, not unless or until he puts the ball in the air better against real minor league pitching, but as far as lottery tickets go, he’s one of the better ones.
If Fetter can tune Paddack’s fastball back into an above-average offering, everything starts to look a little rosier. With pinpoint command of a strong fastball, he could be a useful weapon in shorter starts, especially against right handers. Unless or until that happens, Paddack looks like another depth arm, and will Olson out the Tigers really need to find a real impact pitcher before the deadline.
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