Just last week the New York Yankees bolstered their status as one of the American League heavy weights by acquiring Left handed pitching stud, James Paxton, in a block buster with the Seattle Mariners. The trade makes sense for the Yanks as they are in a position to contend for the World Series this year, and had ample amount of talent in their minor league system to get a trade done. Paxton is fresh off a year where he pitched to a 3.76 ERA, a 11.68 K9, and a 1.10 WHIP over a career high 160.1 innings, with a 3.24 FIP that shows he pitched better than his ERA indicates. The K/9 and WHIP figures were also career bests for the Canadian southpaw and his 3.9 WAR ranked 18th among starting pitchers. It’s interesting to note that Paxton had the lowest inning total out of all pitchers that ranked in the top 50 in pitching WAR. In short, Paxton is an ace. But you knew that, I knew that, and I guess with their new owner the Baltimore Orioles probably know that. However, should some of the negative trends in peripherals that crept up on Paxton in 2018 escalate, it could mean a bumpy road for Big Maple.

Taking a look at Paxton’s peripherals in 2018, his hard contact rate was the greatest he has allowed in his entire career, which means hitters were able to square up Paxton more effectively than any previous year. This hard contact rate, paired with a career high 41.7 % fly ball rate contributed to a career worst 1.29 HR/9 for Paxton, which was heavily propped up by 14.4 HR/FB ratio. Granted what we know about HR/FB is that this is figure is most likely unsustainable and should regress back to career norms. However, it’s also important to note that Paxton was pitching at the pitcher friendly confines of Safeco field last season, which is ranked the 4th most pitcher friendly park, whereas now he will be dealing in the Bronx where Yankee Stadium is ranked the 6th best hitter friendly park! So even though the HR/FB should not be as extreme as the previous year, Paxton won’t be benefiting from the friendly confines of Safeco which may limit how much that rate actually regresses.

The next thing that is a little worrisome about Paxton, lies within his pitch mix and pitch info. Over the past two years Paxton’s changeup usage has dwindled from 8.2% in 2016 to 0.2 % in 2018, with the corresponding pitch usage increase being allocated to his curveball. Essentially Paxton has transitioned from a four pitch mix to a three pitch mix over the past two years, which at first glance makes sense. Paxton’s changeup had a pitch value of -5.2 in 2016, and posted negative values again in ’17 and ’18, whereas his curveball which received an 8% usage increase in 2017 had a value of 3.9 in the same year. This same curveball however experienced a significant dip in effectiveness this year dropping from the aforementioned 3.9 value in ’17, to a negative value in 2018. This leads to the question that even though the change up did not provide good results, is it possible that it paved the way for other pitches to have better results? Paxton’s curveball also experienced a 14% dip in K% suggesting that hitters were sitting on that strikeout pitch. Another question is did throwing the change-up create enough worry in the batter’s mind about a velocity change, that it made his fastball even better? Paxton’s fastball was another pitch that experienced a significant dip in effectiveness from the previous year, however it was still Paxton’s strongest pitch. Opponents slugged .428 on Paxton’s fastball this year with a pitch value of 11.2, compared to 2017 in which opponents slugged .353 on Paxton’s fastball while generating over a 22 PITCH VALUE!! Which of course is insanely good. Paxton’s fastball in 2017 ranked the third most effective heater in the Bigs (min 100 innings) behind only Justin Verlander and Chris sale. This year however Paxton’s fastball ranked 20th in the Bigs behind John Gant and Jose Urena.

In Summary, this article isn’t aimed to prove to you that Paxton isn’t an ace because he is. He just has few discouraging peripherals that could threaten his Ace status down the road, if they continue to trend in the opposite direction. And as always there are health concerns with Paxton, who has suffered through a lat strain, bruised elbow, bruised fore arm, strained forearm, strained pec, just to name a few. But to give Paxton some credit he has never had Tommy John, and last years 160.1 innings pitched was a career high for the southpaw. Paxton’s cutter and fastball are both plus pitches and his ability to generate the swing and miss is surely amongst the elite. Despite this, the recently surge in homeruns, hard contact rate, and pitch value point to signs that there might be a few cracks in Paxton’s newly made, pinstripe armor.