The Dodgers have shown interest Devin Williams They are pursuing the high-leverage right reliever, according to Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic. They join the Marlins as teams interested in the two-time All-Star.
Williams was one of the three to five best relievers in Major League Baseball during his time with the Brewers. In six seasons in Milwaukee, he averaged a 1.83 ERA. That includes three consecutive games with an ERA below 2.00 from 2022-24. Among relievers with 100 or more innings during that span, Williams’ strikeout rate was just 39.5%, trailing only Edwin Diaz and Felix Bautista. The only real concern was a broken back, which kept him out for the first half of the ’24 season.
Milwaukee traded Williams to the Yankees before his final year of arbitration. He was coming off the worst season of his career in the Bronx. Williams had a 4.79 ERA in 62 innings. He started the year so poorly that he lost his closer role in April. Williams regained the title in June when Luke Weaver went on the injured list, but struggled again in July. The Yankees acquired David Bednar at the deadline, thrusting Williams into the starting job for the remainder of the season.
While this has clearly been an uneven season, there are reasons to expect the team to return to form. Williams fanned 34.7 percent of batters while getting nearly 17 percent of his swinging at-bats. Those grades aren’t quite the same as his days in Milwaukee, but they’re still top-15 MLB numbers. His average fourth-seam fastball velocity is 94.1 mph, which is in line with his career level. Williams continues to make ridiculous moves on the changeup/crazy pitch that has been his signature pitch throughout his career. When runners are on base, opposing batters have a .339 batting average. Some teams may chalk this up to bad sequencing luck and continue to view Williams as a top-10 reliever.
The poor season meant the Yankees were unwilling to risk Williams’ $22.025MM qualifying offer to return to the Bronx. MLBTR ranks his earning potential second among relievers behind Diaz and predicts strong peripherals will lead the club to offer him a four-year, $680,000 contract. That would require a team to ignore an ugly ERA, though, so it’s certainly not out of the question that he would be forced to accept a short-term deal. Robert Suarez, Kyle Finnegan and Pete Fairbanks are other closers on the free agent market.
The Dodgers made the biggest free agent transfer of last offseason. Their four-year, $720,000 investment in Tanner Scott didn’t look good in the first season. Neither did bringing back Blake Treinen on a two-year deal and Kirby Yates on a one-year deal. Among the Dodgers’ traditional relievers, Alex Vesia has been the Dodgers’ only reliable reliever in the postseason.
Converted starters Emmet Sheehan and Roki Sasaki were their top right relievers in October. Both pitchers are expected to be back in the rotation next spring. General manager Brandon Gomez said tonight that the team “absolutely” still views Sasaki as the starter (link via Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register). Still, Gomez said the Dodgers don’t believe they need to bring in a top reliever this offseason. He expressed optimism about Scott’s rebound and that they could get Brusdar Graterol and Brock Stewart back from injuries. Neither Graterol nor Stewart have shown much ability to stay healthy, though, so Gomez may have had a degree of “GM talk” downplaying the need for a high-octane arm.
