Kremer’s performance may be more crucial with Kyle Bradish’s injury
It’s not fair to Dean Kremer, but my current lasting memory of the starting pitcher is of him getting demolished by the Texas Rangers in ALDS, erasing his team’s slim hopes of bouncing back in an instant. I hope he’ll put up a performance in 2024 that will help wipe away that memory and replace it with something happier.
When it was all said and done at the end of the 2023 regular season, Dean Kremer was, by ERA+ anyway, exactly average. His 4.12 ERA doesn’t sound impressive, but it gave him an ERA+ of 100, which indicates the league average. There is value in a starting pitcher who throws 170+ innings of league-average baseball, and even if that’s all Kremer does in 2024, he’ll have a place in Baltimore.
But league average is unfortunate for a few reasons. One is that Kremer had a significantly better 2022, putting up 3.23 ERA and a 3.80 FIP and giving us Orioles fans a reason for hope. It sure would be nice if Kremer could give something more like 2022 instead of league average. This is especially true because the injury to Kyle Bradish and the delay ahead for John Means pushes Kremer from being the number five starter on the team to the number three.
So what was the biggest difference in Kremer’s pitching from 2022 to 2023? Many of his stats were pretty similar, in fact. He walked batters just a touch more often in ‘23 but struck out a significantly larger number. He didn’t give up a ton more hits in 2023. The problem in 2023 was the dingers.
After his 2022 season, the ZiPS system projected that Kremer would have a good 2023 with the following numbers: 3.51 ERA / ERA+122, 136 IP, with a HR/9 of 0.8 and a season fWAR of 2.8. Sadly, Kremer could not live up to those numbers.
One thing he went way over on was his innings pitched. He had never topped 134 IP, which is what he had in 2022 combined between the Orioles and a brief minors stint (9 innings). In 2023 he soared well beyond that with 172.2 IP for the season. Another thing he went way over on was the HR/9 projection of 0.8.
Kremer gave up 27 home runs last year, 10th most in baseball at an HR/9 rate of 1.41. Yikes. That’s a little bit higher than 0.8. Some possible good news on the home run front is that Kremer drastically reduced his homers allowed over the last two months of the season.
In his final 10 regular season starts, Kremer surrendered just four home runs. In that time his ERA was just 2.89 and he dropped his season ERA from 4.66 to 4.12. His walk rate was a little elevated at the time, but you can afford to do that some when you’re not letting the ball fly out of the park. Is the lowering of home runs a trend and if so, can it carry over the long off-season? We shall see.
So what does ZiPS think of Dean Kremer in 2024? It doesn’t hate him at all, actually! It seems that ZiPS still likes him.
Some key ZiPS projections: 3.86 ERA / 4.03 FIP; HR/9 0.99; 28 GS, 154 IP. 2.2 fWAR.
The case for the under
Kremer already showed that he can be better than he was last year over a long period when he did it in 2022. He’s a steady rotation presence and his home run troubles did improve toward the end of last year. If everything goes right for him, an ERA of under 3.86 is within reach.
And if Kremer can match that projection and make himself a solid contributing starting pitcher while averaging 5.5 innings per start, I would be quite happy with that. If he could push that GS to 30+ while maintaining the other numbers, even better.
The case for the over
Kremer couldn’t live up to ZiPS projection in 2023. He’s not a high-strikeout pitcher and he doesn’t get enough grounders to be considered a ground-ball pitcher. His fastball touches mid-90s but he’s not overpowering. I don’t say that to put him down, he’s shown he can be a very good pitcher when is on his game.
Kremer could come close to his ZiPS projection but fall a little short and still be a valuable back-of-the-rotation starter. I just worry that the Orioles will need him to be more than that.
What are your thoughts? Vote in the poll and let us know in the comments.