Affeldt signs with San Francisco

The Giants have signed left-handed reliever Jeremy Affeldt to a 2-year deal

Affeldt was relatively effective with the Reds in 2008, although he failed in his quest to crack the Reds' rotation. Upon the signing last year, Wayne Krivsky said the Reds were hoping he'd be a starter, then Affeldt didn't seem to get much of a shot at starting and had an awful spring training (8 games, 4 starts, ERA of 10.69).

Affeldt's a bit of an enigma. In 2007, he was a hard man to get hits off of (BAA of .226, 47 hits in 59 IP), in 2008, he was much more pedestrian in that category (.260, 78 hits in 78.1 IP), but still dropped his WHIP by .05 by not throwing so many walks. He's had three good years in his entire career (one of which was as a starter in 2003), but he's timed the last two well.

So why could this be a good signing for the Giants? Affeldt's not just useful against left-handed batters. In fact, last season lefties hit .269 against him, righties mustered only a .255 average (although Affeldt has a tendency to walk right-handed batters -- 20 of them in 49.2 IP, none intentional). And most of all, Jeremy Affeldt hated pitching in Cincinnati's Great American Ball Park, to a tune of 4.64 ERA, 1.55 WHIP, .302 BAA in 42.2 IP. On the road, he pitched 35.2 innings, but put up a sparkling ERA of 1.77, 1.04 WHIP, and .203 BAA.

That said, Affeldt hasn't fared too well on the road in his prior trip through the NL West. In 2007, he was dominant at Coors Field (1.74 ERA, 1.03 WHIP, .160 BAA), but got lit up on the road (5.46, 1.71, .294). He also hasn't pitched well in AT&T Park (6.43 ERA), though the sample size of 7 innings is pretty meaningless.

What does the signing really mean for the Giants? Probably not much. To me, it means Alex Hinshaw may get a shot to unseat Brian Wilson as the Giants' closer (or at least split duties with him), leaving Affeldt and Jack Taschner as the "situational" lefties in the Giants' bullpen. Maybe Affelt is now a designated 8th-inning guy regardless of who is at the plate because of his relatively even splits and maybe it means Taschner gets sent to AAA, but I'd be kind of surprised if that move were on the horizon after 178 major league games for the Giants.

Projected Giants bullpen:
CL Brian Wilson
LHP Alex Hinshaw
RHP Sergio Romo
LHP Jeremy Affeldt
RHP Keiichi Yabu
RHP Billy Sadler
RHP Osiris Matos