If anyone could convince a team to ignore the analytics, it would be Madison Bumgarner, because he has defied probability so often.
No baseball algorithm exists that would've predicted Bumgarner would throw more than twice as many innings as any other pitcher in the 2014 postseason. But that's what he did for the San Francisco Giants.
No math would suggest a guy who has never averaged higher than 92 mph with his fastball would excel in an era when premium velocity is a separator. But that's what he has done in his career, generating a 3.13 ERA in almost 2,000 regular-season innings, receiving Cy Young consideration in five different years.
Front offices could run a billion simulations and no computer would forecast anyone like Bumgarner -- a pitcher with two wild-card game shutouts, an ERA of 0.25 in three World Series and five innings of scoreless relief in a Game 7 three days after pitching a shutout in Game 5. No statistical models apply for someone who presented a bull to his bride as a wedding gift, or rode into a championship ceremony on a horse, a pitcher who swings a bat like he's wrestling steers.
It's enticing to bet the over on Bumgarner, and that's what the Arizona Diamondbacks have done, making an $85 million investment other teams ran from because of a trove of foreboding metrics.
Initially, the Diamondbacks were skeptical about what they heard about Bumgarner's desire to pitch in Arizona, but the more background work they did, the more they liked him. Bumgarner is more old school than new school, but he is open to some of the ideas and analytically based suggestions they have for him. Diamondbacks pitching coach Matt Herges, previously the Giants' bullpen coach, provided a lot of feedback and information on Bumgarner as they made this deal happen.
Arizona also has a staff of young pitchers who will now presumably learn from one of his generation's most respected competitors.
Still, based on conversations with evaluators throughout baseball, these are the greatest concerns about Bumgarner:
1. The difference in his home/road splits has been dramatic. The same sort of skepticism with which analysts viewed Colorado hitters has been applied to Bumgarner, who has pitched his entire career in arguably the most pitcher-friendly environment in the game. AT&T/Oracle has had one of the largest outfields in the game, enhanced at night (and on some days) by the cold, damp air of San Francisco -- so much so, the Giants decided to reduce the dimensions for next year to make them fairer for hitters.
Over the past two seasons, Bumgarner allowed 52 earned runs in 189 innings in home games for a 2.38 ERA. On the road, he was a completely different pitcher, mustering a 5.16 ERA. Last season, as the Giants prepared for the possibility of trading Bumgarner, they seemed to work to prop up his performance -- 19 of his 34 starts were at home.
2. His four-seam fastball is more vulnerable than it was in the past. Over the past two seasons, opponents have slugged .506 against that pitch, more than 100 points higher than in the first six seasons of his career. His average velocity has dipped somewhat -- 91.4 mph from 92.1 mph in 2015 -- but it's viewed as a much more hittable pitch. This is why the Giants worked with him to vary his repertoire more last season, to more effectively hide his four-seamer in the weeds of his other pitches. As last season progressed, he threw more curveballs, and he finished the year having thrown 43.1% fastballs, the second-lowest rate of his career. The lowest was in 2018, when he was in his first full season after his motorbike accident.
3. The rate at which hitters have hit the ball hard against him has climbed markedly. When Bumgarner was at his best, hitters never seemed to have good swings against him, maybe because of the funkiness in his left-handed delivery, maybe because of his mound presence -- he has always known he would prevail, and hitters seemed to feel that way, as well -- and maybe because of how hitters have changed the way they do their work.
Whatever the root cause, the swings have been much more aggressive, with more damage. According to FanGraphs, this is the rate at which opponents have hit the ball hard against Bumgarner:
2015: 27.8%
2016: 31.6%
2017: 35%
2018: 41.6%
2019: 43.8%
At 30 years, four months old, Bumgarner is a year younger than Stephen Strasburg, who just got $245 million from the Nationals. Bumgarner, baseball's Paul Bunyan, got about one-third of that, because of all the concerns teams have had about the left-hander. Privately, club evaluators spoke of Bumgarner with a lot of interest before the trade deadline -- but only about how they would love to have him on their terms at greatly reduced risk. Had the Giants ever seriously marketed him for a trade, there were scavengers lined up, but San Francisco wasn't going to give away someone with that much legacy.
Now Bumgarner walks away, to a division rival. The Diamondbacks' offer went beyond the comfort level of some rival evaluators, with Arizona betting there will again be more to MadBum than what the analytics suggest.