The Detroit Tigers have added to their starting pitching rotation. On Wednesday, the Tigers signed Framber Valdez to a whopping three year contract worth $115 million according to Tim Stebbins of mlb.com. Valdez now joins two-time Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal of Hayward, California as a strong 1-2 punch on a team with lofty aspirations.
Valdez is a two-time American League All-Star who has spent his entire Major League Baseball career with the Houston Astros. He was a two-time American League All-Star in 2022 and 2023, and won a World Series with the Astros in 2022. During the 2022 postseason, Valdez was outstanding on the mound for Houston. In 25 innings, he only gave up four earned runs and had a sensational WHIP (walks and hits per innings pitched) of 0.88.
What is most impressive of Valdez’s pitching ability is his durability. He has pitched a minimum of 175 innings per season in each of the last four seasons. In 2022 during the regular season, Valdez led the American League in innings pitched (201 1/3), batters faced (827), complete games (three) and shutouts (one). Valdez in fact has nine complete games in his career, including three shutouts. Valdez’s most impressive career performance came on August 1, 2023, when he threw a no-hitter in a 2-0 Astros win over the Cleveland Guardians. What was so spectacular about this no-hitter is the fact that Valdez threw to the minimum number of 27 batters. He did give up one walk, but he got out of the inning because of a double play.
This past season, Valdez had a record of 13 wins and 11 losses, with an earned run average of 3.66 and WHIP of 1.25. During 192 innings, Valdez gave up 171 hits, 78 earned runs, 15 home runs and 68 walks, to go along with 187 strikeouts and two complete games.
