Oakland Athletics: Breaking down the trade for reliever Jake Diekman

The Oakland Athletics have officially traded for Kansas City Royals reliever Jake Diekman. Here is a breakdown of the move to acquire the left-handed relief pitcher.

The Oakland Athletics continued their bargain shopping spree on Saturday when they made a trade to acquire left-handed reliever Jake Diekman from the Kansas City Royals in exchange for two low-profile minor-league prospects.

This is the second time in two weeks that the A’s have made a deal with the Royals for a pitcher as on July 14th the two sides agreed to a deal that sent right-handed starter Homer Bailey to Oakland. This time, the Athletics looked to beef up their bullpen.

Diekman, a 32-year-old lefty, has played for a few different teams but found the most success playing with the Philadelphia Phillies and later the Texas Rangers. Interestingly enough, this is the second year in a row that Diekman has been dealt at the trade deadline.

Only the A’s will be hoping that this trade turns out much better for them than it did for the Arizona Diamondbacks last season.

The D-Backs traded for Diekman on the day of the deadline last year after a few good seasons in Arlington. Unfortunately, the left-hander would struggle to a 7.53 ERA in 24 games with Arizona and become a free agent after the season.

While Diekman’s numbers this season are certainly better, they’re nothing to get too excited about either.

The 32-year-old has just a 4.75 ERA in 48 games so far this season with a pretty high 1.34 WHIP. However, his 63 strikeouts in 41.2 innings pitched is among the best ratios in the league as his fastball/slider combination can be deadly at times.

And therein lies what the Athletics see in Diekman.

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With the combination of Blake Treinen, Lou Trivino, and Liam Hendriks already holding down the A’s reliever core, Oakland now hosts one of the deadliest bullpens in the MLB. And by deadly, we don’t necessarily mean lockdown.

But in terms of true stuff and strikeout potential, you’d be hard-pressed to find a nastier bullpen in the major leagues today. Of course, the A’s are going to need Treinen and Trivino to live up to the lofty expectations they set for themselves after last season’s dominance.

And the same goes for Diekman who is going to need to show improvement in Oakland. Fortunately, a deeper dive into his analytics does seem to project future success.

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Diekman’s 3.37 FIP is significantly lower than his 4.75 ERA which would indicate that he’s gotten a bit unlucky this season. On top of that, Diekman has never been one to give up many homers — never allowing more than five in a season — which certainly helps in today’s MLB.

In return, the A’s traded away 20-year-old right-hander Ismael Aquino and 26-year-old outfielder Dairon Blanco. Neither cracked the A’s top-30 prospect list from MLB.com but Blanco could be given a look in the majors due to his natural speed.

But for a return package, it does appear that the A’s gave up very little in the deal.

Diekman’s numbers indicate that he should improve with Oakland which is promising for an A’s bullpen that has simultaneously underperformed and overperformed.