Reunion anyone? O's may be pursuing Jack Flaherty

With right-hander Corbin Burnes off to Arizona and no ace pitchers still to be had via free agency, the Orioles may have pivoted toward a pitcher who made nine appearances for them in the 2023 season and one more in that postseason.

That is 29-year-old right-hander Jack Flaherty, coming off a strong 2024 season that began with Detroit and ended with him getting a ring with the Los Angeles Dodgers, his hometown team.

Per The Athletic, “both sides would be open to a reunion after Flaherty’s bounce-back season.”

Between the two clubs last year, he made 28 starts throwing 162 innings – the second-most of his career. He went 13-7 with a 3.17 ERA and 1.068 WHIP. He posted strong walk and strikeout numbers, walking 2.1 per every nine innings (a 5.9 percent walk rate) and fanning 10.8 (29.9 percent).

Among qualified pitchers last year (the 58 that had 162 or more innings) he finished third in the majors in strikeouts/nine, tied for eighth in WHIP, tied for 13^th in batting average against (.223) and 13^th in MLB in ERA.

In the majors, one solid year can really elevate a free agent’s outlook. After pitching to a combined ERA of 4.99 between the Cardinals and Orioles in 2023, Flaherty only got a one-year deal worth $14 million from the Tigers. They traded him to Los Angeles and went on to surprise, I guess, even themselves staying in the race and making the playoffs. Even as they were using openers often in the final weeks at a time when they could have used Flaherty.

But after pitching well in 2024, he now could get the big bucks. MLBTradeRumors.com ranked him the No. 9 free agent at the outset of free agency, projecting a five-year deal for $115 million. ESPN, also ranking him No. 9, projected the exact same deal. The Athletic, however, ranks him No. 17 among free agents and projected a three-year deal for $68 million.

As for me, I see Flaherty as more the pitcher worthy of bucks around that last projection. But now that the aces are gone, Flaherty’s price might go up via teams still needing pitching. It is also a year where it seems most free-agent pitchers are exceeding projections in total dollars.

Flaherty’s track record includes several trips to the injured list during 2021 and 2022, mostly for shoulder issues. In those two seasons, he pitched just 114 innings. But he did not make a single trip to the IL over the 2023 and 2024 seasons, when he threw a combined 306 innings.

O’s fans remember those nine games in the second half of '23 after the O’s sent prospects Cesar Prieto, Zack Showalter and Drew Rom to the Cards in a deadline deal. Flaherty went 1-3 with a 6.75 ERA as an Oriole and was moved to the bullpen for his final two regular season games. He threw two innings, allowing one run, versus Texas in the American League Division Series.

But in fairness to him, he was much, much better in 2024 and also comes without the loss of a draft pick. As a pitcher who was traded during the season, he was not eligible to receive a qualifying offer.

But unlike say Burnes, Flaherty has not been consistently good. Here are some recent season ERAs:

2020 – 4.91
2021 – 3.22
2022 – 4.25
2023 – 4.99
2024 – 3.17

Two of those years he pitched as a No. 2 or No. 3 starter. Three years he did not.

Last year his fastball averaged 93.4 mph but he ranked in the top two percent of MLB pitchers in breaking ball run value. He ranked in the top 28 percent in chase rate and had a strong whiff rate of 43.6 percent on his curveball.

Flaherty could clearly add depth to any rotation and real quality too, pitching as he did last summer. But as always, what is the cost for that and how much risk is a team willing to take?