{"id":16196,"date":"2018-12-21T16:57:11","date_gmt":"2018-12-21T21:57:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/\/?p=16196"},"modified":"2024-12-28T10:56:14","modified_gmt":"2024-12-28T15:56:14","slug":"joakim-soria-signs-oakland-athletics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2018\/12\/21\/joakim-soria-signs-oakland-athletics\/","title":{"rendered":"Joakim Soria Signs with Oakland Athletics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>After losing <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/f\/familje01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jeurys Familia<\/a><\/strong> to the New York Mets, the Oakland Athletics were in need of additional help bridging the gap to All-Star closer <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/t\/treinbl01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Blake Treinen<\/a><\/strong>. A two-year, $15-million dollar deal with <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/s\/soriajo01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Joakim Soria<\/a><\/strong> does just that, bringing an experienced veteran to the Bay Area.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">&#39;Tis the season!<br \/>We&#39;ve agreed to terms with RHP Joakim Soria on a two-year contract. Last season, Soria struck out a career-high tying 75 batters in 60.2 innings and walked just 16 while holding the opposition to a .225 batting average. Welcome to Oakland, Joakim! <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/UtGk38hFnZ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/UtGk38hFnZ<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Athletics (@Athletics) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Athletics\/status\/1076173806786379776?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">December 21, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h1>Joakim Soria Signs with Oakland Athletics<\/h1>\n<p>Soria pitched well for both the Chicago White Sox and the Milwaukee Brewers in 2018 (3-4 with a 3.12 ERA and 1.14 WHIP), picking up 16 saves for the South Siders before heading north at the trade deadline. His 29.4% K% was his highest since 2009 and he excelled at making batters miss on his outside offerings (34.3% O-Swing%, 14.4% SwStr%).<\/p>\n<p>Advanced looks at his 3.12 ERA (2.44 FIP, 3.35 xFIP, 2.88 SIERA) are very positive, and he limited walks, posting his lowest BB% (6.3%) since 2014. Opposing hitters struggled to square up on Soria as well, posting a 25.9% Hard% against him (Fifth-lowest in 60+ IP). In addition to Soria&#8217;s 16 saves in 2018, he has an extensive record of successfully closing out games, posting 220 saves for his career (fifth-most among active players).<\/p>\n<p>Soria joins an Oakland bullpen that excelled last season, posting the third-lowest ERA (3.37) and sixth most strikeouts (627) in the league. His addition gives manager <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/m\/melvibo01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Bob Melvin<\/a><\/strong> another strong end of game option that should keep this unit among league-leaders in 2019.<\/p>\n<h2>Verdict<\/h2>\n<p>The Soria signing is an excellent signing by the Athletics, bringing an experienced pitcher into the fold for half the money given to the departed free agent Familia (three-years, $30 million). Given their statistics over 2016-18, Oakland did well to replace Familia&#8217;s production on such an affordable contract:<\/p>\n<table width=\"573\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td width=\"90\">Name<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">K%<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">BB%<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">WHIP<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">ERA<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">FIP<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">xFIP<\/td>\n<td width=\"69\">SIERA<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/f\/familje01.shtml?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jeurys Familia<\/a><\/td>\n<td>26.20%<\/td>\n<td>10.10%<\/td>\n<td>1.25<\/td>\n<td>3.05<\/td>\n<td>2.67<\/td>\n<td>3.38<\/td>\n<td>3.38<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Joakim Soria<\/td>\n<td>26.50%<\/td>\n<td>8.10%<\/td>\n<td>1.28<\/td>\n<td>3.63<\/td>\n<td>3.07<\/td>\n<td>3.44<\/td>\n<td>3.29<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>The reliever market has certainly heated up in recent days with\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/search\/search.fcgi?pid=millean01,miller014and,miller011and&amp;search=Andrew+Miller&amp;utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Andrew Miller<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>among those to sign recently. The move to sign Soria looks to be a solid one while not breaking the bank for Oakland.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<br \/>\n<a id=\"YDNtA8VdSwZDFNWWOooCVw\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1052328082\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'YDNtA8VdSwZDFNWWOooCVw',sig:'RVNqMdRmW2sxANmz_-Jnn4GzYWwBska5bHlYfMc6nTs=',w:'594px',h:'426px',items:'1052328082',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Joakim Soria signs with the Oakland A&#8217;s, bringing veteran experience to Oakland&#8217;s bullpen. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2868,"featured_media":16203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10,15,27,1071,35],"tags":[68,281,69,2262,652],"class_list":["post-16196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-whitesox","category-athletics","category-brewers","category-mlb","category-news","tag-baseball","tag-joakim-soria","tag-mlb","tag-mlb-free-agency","tag-oakland-as"],"modified_by":"Michael Kovacs, ADMIN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2868"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16196"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16196\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}