Weems ascended into more prominent role in Nats bullpen

PLAYER REVIEW: JORDAN WEEMS

Age on Opening Day 2024: 31

How acquired: Signed as minor-league free agent, March 2022

MLB service time: 2 years, 55 days

2023 salary: $720,000

Contract status: Under club control, arbitration-eligible in 2025, free agent in 2028

2023 stats: 5-1, 3.62 ERA, 51 G, 0 SV, 54 2/3 IP, 38 H, 25 R, 22 ER, 9 HR, 28 BB, 60 SO, 3 HBP, 1.207 WHIP, 119 ERA+, 4.90 FIP, 0.7 bWAR, 0.0 fWAR

Quotable: “Definitely the biggest moment I’ve been in, for sure. I just kept taking deep breaths, stepping off, and just kept telling myself: ‘Trust your stuff. Trust your stuff. It doesn’t have to be wipeout stuff. Just throw strikes.’ And I even struggled with that, because there was a lot of adrenaline running out there.” – Jordan Weems, after escaping a bases-loaded jam June 27 to earn his first career win

2023 analysis: Weems began the year in a most precarious position: The ninth man in an eight-man bullpen. Even worse (for him): He had options, which the Nationals took advantage of and sent him to Triple-A late in spring training. The right-hander did well in Rochester, though, with a 3.75 ERA, 1.083 WHIP and 24 strikeouts in 24 innings to earn an early-June promotion to D.C.

Weems’ performance was a mixed bag. His bad outings were really bad: He allowed a run in only 16 of his 51 games, but he allowed multiple runs in six of those. And his trouble usually came via the long ball, with nine homers surrendered in only 54 innings.

But Weems’ good outings were really good. He notched multiple strikeouts 17 times, recording at least three strikeouts six times. He eventually became Davey Martinez’s third-most-trusted member of the bullpen behind Kyle Finnegan and Hunter Harvey, typically pitching the seventh or eighth inning with a lead. And he maintained a sub-3.00 ERA into September, no small feat.

2024 outlook: The Nationals hope to enter next season with a top three in their bullpen of Finnegan, Harvey and a healthy Tanner Rainey. That doesn’t mean Weems can’t still play a significant role within the group.

What Weems offers that the others don’t is the ability to pitch multiple innings on a regular basis, having recorded at least four outs 15 times this year. That’s a highly valuable skill for someone who figures to be a key bridge from starter to the back end of the pen.

The only thing keeping Weems from ascending to an even higher status on the roster are those aforementioned blowups. And to avoid those, he’ll have to cut down on walks (12.1 percent is way too high) and homers (1.5 per nine innings). One problem: He’s a fly ball pitcher, with a 32.6 percent fly ball rate that dwarfs the major league average of 24.9 percent. It may be too much to ask him to suddenly start seeking ground balls.

Weems has an above average fastball, and opponents hit only .198 off it. But they slugged a whopping .523 against that pitch, accounting for eight of the nine homers surrendered. He has the stuff to get away with it up in the zone, but the moment it creeps down to waist-level, he gets into trouble. He gave up far less damage on his slider (.204 average, .323 slugging percentage) and changeup (.125 average, zero extra-base hits), though he threw the latter pitch only 7.7 percent of the time.