Hot Stove Update: Giants Claim Jarlin Garcia

The Hot Stove League officially closes tonight as pitchers and catchers report day is tomorrow to mark the official opening of Spring Training.  As we have come to know, though, the Hot Stove fires never  completely flicker out in Farhan Zaidi's world and he certainly could not let the final official day go by without making a move.  It was actually a pretty significant move and one that could pay big dividends down the road.  The Giants claimed LHP Jarlin Garcia off waivers from the Florida Marlins. They also designated RHP Burch Smith for assignment to make room on the 40 man roster.

While it may seem odd try to upgrade by claiming castoffs from the Marlins, Garcia is actually a pretty darn good pitcher and an even more interesting one for several reasons.  First off all, he had a nice little breakout season last year with a line of 4-2, 3.02, 50.2 IP, 6.93 K/9, 2.84 BB/9.  That line came with 0 Saves but 6 Holds and just 1 Blown Save.  Keeping the new 3 batter minimum rule in mind, Garcia also was slightly better against RH batters despite his left-handedness.

What's really interesting about Jarlin Garcia is his stuff. I am going to summarize an Fangraphs article from 9/11/2019 which I encourage you to read for yourself.  The FB averages 93 which is kind of average for a reliever, but last year it had the highest horizontal movement of among lefthanded pitchers in all of MLB.  The FB moves to the arm side.  What Garcia did that may have caused his breakout last year was dramatically increase both the usage(22.4% to 41.7%) and glove side movement(3.6 inches to 6.6 inches) of his slider.  The resulting movement differential between his FB and slider trailed only Chris Sale for LHP's.

It will be fascinating to see how this plays out, but for now this looks like a major steal for Farhan Zaidi.