Ricky Romero Ends Impressive Season On High Note

2010 was a great year for Toronto Blue Jays’ LHP Ricky Romero both on and off the field. He signed a five-year, $30.1 million deal back in early August and on the field, he was impressive throughout the 2010 campaign.

Making his final start of the season last night against the Minnesota Twins, Romero ended his season on a high note.

Romero allowed just six hits and two runs in eight outstanding innings of work. He didn’t walk anybody and struck out five in the process. Romero used a combination of two-seam and four-seam fastballs, along with a curve and a changeup to befuddle the Twins.

Romero improved to 14-9 on the season and finishes with a 3.73 ERA in 210 innings. Overall, Romero showed improvement across the board from 2009 in 2010.

Take a look at Romero’s improvement in the key pitching categories from 2009 to 2010:

The question is — why has Romero improved so much in 2010?

For one, his fastball has improved tremendously. Last year, hitters were teeing off on his fastball. His -11.8 wFB was one of the worst in baseball in 2009. This year, Romero’s fastball produced a 7.2 wFB, which a vast improvement from last year.

Romero also stopped throwing his slider in 2010. Romero’s slider was a terrible pitch for him in 2009. He was throwing it around 13 percent of the time and was producing negative results (-2.1 wSL). Romero only threw his slider around five percent of the time in 2010 and replaced that pitch with a cut fastball and he decided to use his curveball more, which is a plus-pitch for him..

Considering that Romero pitching in the AL East and pitches on the fourth best team in that division, his 2010 has been quite impressive. There is no reason to think that Romero can’t continue his success in 2011 and beyond.

If he does, the $30.1 million the Blue Jays gave Romero will look like a steal.

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