Ryan Romano: Three interesting things about new Oriole Wade Miley

For most of the 2016 season -- and a fair amount of the time before it -- the Orioles have needed a starting pitcher. On Sunday, they finally got one in the form of Wade Miley. Seattle shipped the 29-year-old lefty to Baltimore in exchange for Ariel Miranda; for more general information on Miley's background, check out my Camden Depot colleague Matt Perez's analysis. What I'd like to do in this space, as I've done for past Orioles transactions, is focus on a few esoteric observations about Miley's profile.

Miley has done much better lately: Miley's mediocre full-season numbers -- a 4.98 ERA and 4.75 FIP -- bely a fascinating trend. Over his first 11 starts, Miley was nothing short of terrible, limping his way to a 5.85 ERA and 5.00 FIP. His respectable strikeout and walk rates couldn't negate a boatload of quality contact (32.9 percent hard-hit rate) and an absence of grounders (42.6 percent groundball rate). His subsequent eight outings, though, have reversed that. He's maintained similar clips of punchouts and bases on balls, while lowering his hard contact rate to 30.1 percent and pumping up his groundball rate to 52.5 percent. In short, he's been much more difficult to square up, as his 3.80 ERA and 4.40 FIP during that span illustrate.

Like many pitchers who shoot for ground balls, Miley tends to live low in the zone. Unsurprisingly, he's become more extreme in that tendency as of late. During the last eight games he's pitched, 64.1 percent of his pitches have gone to the bottom two-fifths of the strike zone, compared to 60.4 percent of his pitches in the prior 11 contests. This, along with some random variation, has brought about his recent improvement. Playing in front of an Orioles infield that excels at every position, Miley should continue to prosper if he sticks by this recipe.

Miley pitches righties much differently than lefties: Like many southpaws, Miley has had some difficulty with retiring right-handed hitters, who have touched him up for a .267/.329/.428 slash line in 3,163 career plate appearances. He's held lefties down to a .246/.297/.374 line, but since they've stepped in just 837 times against him, that doesn't count for as much. Right-handed batters to face Wiley have a similar strikeout rate to their left-handed counterparts, along with a somewhat higher walk rate. The most significant disparity comes with balls in play -- righties own a 45.8 percent groundball rate and a 30.3 percent hard-hit rate, compared to respective figures of 58.9 percent and 24.6 percent for lefties.

Against lefties, Miley relies heavily on his four-seamer and slider; he tends to pitch them away, placing only 28.2 percent of his pitches in the inner two-fifths of the plate. Righties, on the other hand, receive a diet heavier in sinkers and changeups, which Miley hasn't mastered to the same degree. 38.3 percent of his pitches to righties have been on the inner two sections of the zone, where those hitters have done the most damage. This split won't relegate him to the bullpen, but it's nevertheless troubling. If he can't progress against righties -- and at his age, he likely won't -- Miley will remain a back end starter at best.

Miley catches runners leaning: For his career, Miley has stranded 72.7 percent of the runners to reach base against him, a solid level. He's accomplished that despite pitching much worse with men on (.264/.336/.438) than with the bases empty (.261/.312/.402). How has he prevented so many opponents from scoring? By picking them off. Miley's pickoff move -- so deceptive it once fooled his own catcher -- has nabbed 22 baserunners over his six seasons, a mark that just five other pitchers have beaten.

This carries over into basestealing as well -- Miley has kept the runners close, which has made them hesitate before taking off. In his career, baserunners have had 1,415 chances to steal (per Baseball-Reference: "Plate appearances through which a runner was on first or second with the next base open). They've tried to do so just 42 times; that 3.0 percent attempt rate is about half the major league average. Since his 2011 debut, he's saved 13 runs via stolen-base prevention, which ties him for second in the majors. With an Orioles club that prides itself on limiting steals, Miley should fit right in.

All statistics as of Monday, Aug. 1.

Ryan Romano blogs about the Orioles for Camden Depot. Follow the blog on Twitter: @CamdenDepot. His thoughts on the O's appear here as part of MASNsports.com's continuing commitment to welcome guest bloggers to our little corner of cyberspace. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.