A's Sign Former Pittsburgh Pirate to Big-League Deal
The Oakland A's announced that they have signed 28-year-old right-hander Osvaldo Bido to a contract for the 2024 season. Robert Murray is reporting that it's a big-league deal.
Bido signed out of the Dominican Republic at the age of 21, which is on the older side for an international signing. In 2023 he made his MLB debut with the Pittsburgh Pirates, getting into 16 games (nine starts) and putting together a 5.86 ERA with a 1.50 WHIP across 50 2/3 innings.
Unlike most of Oakland's pitching additions of late, Bido hasn't had huge command issues, putting up an 8.9% walk rate, which is roughly league average. He also struck out 20.3% of the batters he faced, also right in line with the league's average.
With the relocation drama surrounding the A's and the team having MLB's worst record at 50-112 in 2023, it's going to be tough for the team to find people that want to play on this club. That said, Bido does offer some intriguing upside.
While he put up a 5.86 ERA in his first stint in the big leagues, his FIP was a solid 4.10. Four of the ten runners he left on for the bullpen came around to score and he held a left on base percentage of just 62.5%. That 4.10 FIP is right in line with what he produced at Triple-A last season where his LOB% was 70.9%. His ERA may have been the product of a little bad luck in Pittsburgh.
Bido also excelled in two factors per Baseball Savant: Average exit velocity and barrel percentage. Any time you see a pitcher limiting hard contact, it's easy to be reminded of the success Chris Bassitt had with the A's. For Bido, his exit velo ranked in the 80th percentile and his barrel% in the 92nd.
He is primarily a slider (35%), fastball (28%), sinker (23%) pitcher, but also mixed in a changeup (10%) with a cutter also getting a few tosses. His four-seamer and his sinker both sit in the mid-90's while his sinker averaged 84 miles per hour. His changeup is pretty hard at 89 miles per hour and it had a 34% whiff rate.
One interesting tidbit is that Bido's fastball seems to have a very similar shape to the fastball JP Sears throws from the left side. Both pitchers get 1.8 inches more than average horizontally, with Bido getting 0.1 extra inches on the vertical plane and Sears at 0.2.
In fact, Bido's arsenal all moves along the horizontal plane more than average. He's going to be an interesting addition, and with this being a big-league deal it'll be intriguing to see what kind of a role the A's have in mind for him.