This was seemingly Reid Detmers‘ last chance in the rotation. After four years of being a starter in Anaheim, the Angels converted him to a full-time reliever in 2025 — making 61 appearances with a 3.96 ERA.
They went back on that decision ahead of the 2026 season, and Detmers started the year in the rotation as the Angels’ third starter. While the stuff was always there, the execution and results didn’t exactly live up to the hype for the former first-round pick. His 4.90 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, and 15.7% K-BB% in four years as a starter were an Angels’ level of baseball purgatory: good enough underlying numbers, but frustrating and debilitating results.
His start to 2026 has been similar, but, under the hood, it looks stronger and more sustainable.
Detmers is still unlucky in the topline earned runs department, but everything else looks great. The biggest question for Detmers coming into the season was how the stuff would carry over from relieving in 2025. When consolidating his arsenal, he was able to generally make it work. Going back to starting, however, would require a change that makes success stick.
The changes to his arsenal have driven changes in his usage, showing that his confidence across the arsenal has shifted.
| Year | FF vL | SL vL | CH vL | CU vL | SI vL | FF vR | SL vR | CH vR | CU vR | SI vR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 36.5% | 25.7% | 6.0% | 14.6% | 22.0% | 41.0% | 29.5% | 6.6% | 20.6% | 1.1% |
| 2024 | 38.9% | 32.8% | – | 13.8% | 14.5% | 43.8% | 21.2% | 19.7% | 14.9% | 0.4% |
| 2025 | 50.5% | 31.2% | 0.0% | 11.4% | 6.9% | 51.3% | 23.2% | 0.1% | 25.2% | 0.1% |
| 2026 | 38.7% | 38.1% | 1.8% | 11.3% | 10.1% | 44.7% | 30.1% | 15.3% | 9.6% | 0.2% |
Against righties, the biggest change has been embracing the changeup, a pitch he completely turfed in 2025. This has come at the expense of curveball usage, the breaking pitch he was most known for as a prospect and early in the majors.
Having a changeup is a necessity for a lefty in order to succeed, as the bar to be a fastball/breaking ball only lefty is incredibly high. Detmers’ changeup usage oscillated year-to-year, as he struggled to either find the zone or let it get crushed. This year, the changeup is performing the best we’ve seen. It has a 46.8% zone rate, 35.1% whiff rate, and 42.4% chase rate. He’s getting whiffs just about anywhere he’s throwing it, with his zone contact rate being 10% lower than in 2024.
The changeup’s shape has changed over the years, but Stuff+ grades only started liking it this year.
It’s actually holding more vertical movement than ever, but he’s finally found a way to kill velocity, and the increase in extension has helped as well.
Where he’s found success with the changeup is a bit confounding. It’s a whiff pitch that works best when behind or even in the count. He’s throwing the changeup 12.0% of the time when behind to opposite-handed hitters, compared to the league average 8.2% — its 44.4% whiff rate in those situations is almost ten percent higher than the league’s rate too.
Hitters are gearing up for the fastball and are caught off guard.
When Detmers is turning to the pitch in two-strike counts, he’s also getting great results with it, putting away 25.0% of batters. The locations have been a bit all over the place, but the increased gap in velocity has allowed the pitch to perform better than it ever has.
While the curveball’s usage has been hurt the most by the changeup against righties, it’s become a more effective pitch too. Even though the curveball has been a strong pitch for him generally, it’s a pitch that works better in a vacuum. At sub-75 mph, it’s a big looping pitch that does great on its own (30% CSW% or better every year) — the profile is just so unique that it takes away from some of the other stuff.
At just 9.6% usage to righties, it’s a carefully deployed weapon that is getting absurdly good results.
He’s doubled the swinging strikes and increased the chase, all while still getting a slight increase in called strikes. While I don’t think a gaudy 48.7% CSW% is going to stick, he’s avoiding the heart of the plate like never before and harnessing the true power of this slow curve.
Just over the last three years, there’s been a clear shift in getting the curveball into better locations. Part of that is he’s not throwing the pitch as frequently early in the count: the rate of pitches thrown early in the count has decreased 17.4%, and that’s gone squarely to two-strike usage.
All of these help Detmers be effective against righties — his fastball is a league-average pitch that has seen poor results. Despite doing all of the things you’d like to see with a fastball — increasing extension, dropping arm angle three degrees, maintaining 17 inches of iVB — it’s lost over ten percent of zone rate and eleven percent swinging strike rate. The slider has maintained effectiveness from the last time he started, emphasizing that the changes for the changeup and curveball are driving his success.
His 17.2% K-BB% is a strong figure, driven by his lowest walk rate against righties in his career.
While all of this looks good, the struggles with the fastball have led to some “unlucky” damage. Righties have a .256 average and .317 wOBA against him. But the changes he’s made to his approach and the hope that the fastball can earn more strikes should make this work out in the long run.
Historically, Detmers has been a reverse splits pitcher. His success against righties has ebbed and flowed, but he’s been worse against lefties consistently. Among the 53 left-handed starters with at least 300 innings since 2021, Detmers .329 wOBA against ranks tenth worst.
Detmers heavily relied on the fastball/slider combination against lefties, but he often tried to use the slider as a called strike pitch. This resulted in a ton of sliders that were left over the middle of the plate, which led to a majority of his struggles.
Now, he’s succeeding in getting the pitch gloveside more. Even though there’s a tiny heat spot up-and-away, there’s a lot less a hitter can do with that than the previous locations.
Despite an 11.5% decrease in zone rate, the pitch is still getting the same amount of strikes, thanks to a near 50% chase rate. It’s finally morphed into the slider he wants and is much like his time relieving.
Additionally, in the theme of taking pressure off his fastball, Detmers is turning to his sinker more than ever.
He threw a sinker during his first two seasons — never more than 7% of the time. It was decent in a small sample, but he turfed it for the next two seasons and brought it back last year at 6.3% usage. He’s throwing it 10.1% of the time, and, despite poor shape and location, it backs hitters off in a way that he desperately needs.
Because lefties have been able to stay in and lean over the plate to hit the slider, he needed something to back them up — even if not great. Look at this two-pitch sequence against Michael Harris.
Albeit an extreme example, he has to give way to an inside pitch, then isn’t able to get the bat on a slider that doesn’t have the best location. He’s executing in a way that makes the overall approach to lefties sustainable, because he’s not having to put the slider in danger as frequently.
Detmers has a 23.8% K-BB% against lefties this year, and they’re hitting just .135 against him. It’s been dominant in a way we haven’t seen from him against lefties.
These minor tweaks in location and usage overall set Detmers up to be a better pitcher than we’ve seen this year or any other than 2022. He’ll still have to battle against the league-worst Angels defense, but this is arguably the best we’ve seen Detmers.
