The Trade

Traded: Tristan Beck & Daniel Winkler

Acquired: Mark Melancon

Mark Melancon

You should know Melancon’s name. He’s a three time All-Star (’13, ’15, ’16) who had a league-leading 51 saves in 2015 and won the Trevor Hoffman Award in the same season. He’s pitched in 10 postseason games. Melancon is 63rd in MLB history with 183 saves. He’s a name brand who finished 8th in CYA voting just four years ago.

The Braves probably aren’t getting that pitcher. From ’13-’16, Melancon topped 70 innings every year, posted a 1.80 ERA, 8.3 K/9, 1.4 BB/9, and 0.3 HR/9. From age 32 on, he has averaged 38 innings, with a 3.67 ERA, 8.1 K/9, 2.8 BB/9, and 0.6 HR/9. While that’s certainly worse, it’s also unequivocally still good.

In 2019 specifically, Melancon is 4-2 with a 3.50 ERA and 1 save. FIP may suggest improvement, but the more predictive DRA (4.36) suggests Melancon may be due for some regression. That’s still a competent reliever, but there’s some concern over his performance so far. Melancon’s DRAs have been on the rise every year since 2014, in fact:
’14: 2.09
’15: 2.40
’16: 2.57
’17: 2.75
’18: 3.62
’19: 4.36

But a 4.36 DRA pitcher is still a useful one. Among the members of the bullpen Melancon joined yesterday (and not including other deadline acquisitions), only Luke Jackson (3.20), Sean Newcomb (4.12), and Anthony Swarzak (4.25) had been better. Melancon brings veteran depth to this bullpen, and he’s a welcome addition to the bullpen.

He may be less welcome on the payroll, where Melancon becomes one of the highest-paid Braves. He’ll be due $14,000,000 next season, the last of his deal, and while Atlanta can certainly afford that, the team only has so much money. It decreases the team’s flexibility a tad. And then there’s the $8,000,000 in deferments, which may or may not be Atlanta’s responsibility now (it has yet to be reported, though it’s part of his signing bonus, so let’s keep our fingers crossed SF will pay). There’s a chance Atlanta will have to pay Melancon $1,000,000 a season from 2021-2028. That’s a report to keep your eye on.

Another thing to keep an eye on is Melancon’s health. When he signed with the Giants, it was the largest AAV contract ever given to a reliever, and despite pretty solid performances, Giants fans largely consider the contract a disaster. Granted, every contract the Giants hand out these days is more or less a disaster, so it didn’t stand out, but why was there so much dissatisfaction with Melancon despite him remaining a pretty good reliever? He spent large chunks of both 2017 and 2018 on the IL with arm injuries. Melancon appears to have enjoyed excellent health in 2019, and perhaps ’17-’18 were just blips in an otherwise healthy career, but it’s something Brian Snitker will need to monitor.

Now that we’ve established that Melancon is a very expensive but solid addition, let’s take a look at how he does it. Here are his pitches, their usage rate vs. each hitter type, and their velocity:

Cutter – 56.3% (RH) / 62.6% (LH) – 91.7 MPH

Melancon’s primary pitch used to be one of the most effective in the game. Hitters struggled mightily against the cutter in his best years, but in 2018-19, they’re having less trouble. Melancon has traditionally used the cutter to induce weak contact (~85 mph exit velo), but that contact has grown much harder lately (91 mph EV in 2019), as batters hit .337 against the pitch last year and .315 this season. Every indicator suggests the cutter is slowly on the decline. He’s walking more batters with the pitch than ever. But it’s still a useful primary pitch, mostly because batters tend to hit it on the ground. Melancon has enjoyed good infield defense in 2019, and while he should continue to get solid defensive play from his new infield, it could conceivably be a step down. Either way, the cutter is the reason Melancon has a reputation as a ground ball specialist, particularly this year – a whopping 61% of batted balls have hit the dirt.

He’ll use it to bore in on lefties:

Or tie up righties:

It’s still a pretty good pitch. It’s just no longer in the discussion for game’s best.

 

Curve – 29.0% (RH) / 26.6% (LH) – 82.3 MPH

Melancon’s breaking pitch is a knuckle curve with a 12-6 bend, and it is very hard to hit. Hitters whiff on the pitch 35-40% of the time, and they’re really just hoping to foul it off. That velocity is high for a curveball, making it hard for batters to do much with it as it dives downward out of the zone. As you can see, he’ll use it regularly against any hitter, and it’s a very good put-away pitch. Here he uses it to strike out one of the league’s best hitters, Nolan Arenado:

Four Seamer – 13.1% (RH) / 5.4% (LH) – 91.9 MPH

Melancon keeps his four seamer around to keep righties honest, but the pitch is often hit pretty well, so he has to use it sparingly. It’s a pretty average pitch as far as velocity goes, and it will dip enough to occasionally be mistaken for a sinker. Here it slides below the bat of Melancon’s new catcher, Tyler Flowers:

 

Splitter – 1.6% (RH) / 5.4% (LH) – 82.9 MPH

Melancon’s cutter used to do all the work against left handed batters, so he never really needed a changeup or splitter. As the cutter started to drift from elite to good, Melancon has reintroduced his splitter to his arsenal. While never a major pitch for him, the splitter was a pitch he used regularly until 2013. In 5 seasons from ’13 through ’17, he threw the pitch 16 total times. This year, he’s already thrown it 22 times. That’s still not a lot, but bringing it back has given lefties something new to worry about as they watch for the cutter. Here he brings one of the league’s best hitters, Charlie Blackmon, to his knees:

He’ll also use it against the occasional over-eager righty:

The splitter winds up being wildly successful because of how rarely Melancon throws it. It isn’t a particularly notable pitch in terms of its movement, speed, or his command of it, but when you’re sitting on a 91 mph cutter, the random 82 mph splitter will give you problems. Hitters rarely have success with it, but that’s likely due, at least in part, to its rarity.

What Atlanta Lost

Tristan Beck is a pretty solid pitching prospect, but he was hardly near the front of the line as far as Braves starting prospects went. That made him valuable to San Francisco and expendable to Atlanta. There’s a good chance he winds up in the majors one day, but he still projects to be worse than average when that day arrives. Beck played his college ball at Stanford, so yesterday had to be pretty exciting for the Californian.

The Braves also traded Dan Winkler, but that was mostly for two reasons:
1. To clear a spot on the 40-man roster for Melancon
2. To make this trade just a little bit cheaper

Winkler was making just a drop in the bucket compared to Melancon, but with over $400,000 still owed to the reliever in 2019 and no signs that he would return to SunTrust Park, including him in the deal bought Atlanta both some roster space and just a hint of breathing room on the budget sheet. The Giants immediately DFA’d Winkler earlier today.

Final Thoughts

Melancon may not be the elite reliever he once was, but he’s still pretty good, and this team could use some pretty good relievers. However, he’s awfully expensive at this point in time, and that’s particularly concerning when he’s coming to a team we don’t know the fiscal ceiling for. If this is the beginning of Atlanta moving up into a higher luxury tax bracket, then it’s an excellent sign, and we won’t have to worry about how much money he’s making. But until we have a better idea that’s happening, he’s still probably an overpaid but effective middle reliever on a team that has to watch how many of those it employs.

More importantly, Melancon should bring some stability to the bullpen. He’s a veteran who hasn’t had a below average season in a decade. That’s an incredibly consistent run of success for a reliever, even if he’s in the latter half of his career. Financial wiggle room be damned, this seems like a good pick-up for the Braves. Atlanta has its eyes fixed on the playoffs, and in today’s game, a deep, talented, and experienced bullpen is what you need once you’re there. Melancon absolutely helps that cause.