A’s Not Discussing Rotation Move For Mason Miller

Last offseason, the Athletics moved Mason Miller from the rotation to the closing job. General manager David Forst said at the time that the A’s were open to building the right-hander back up as a starter after one season in relief. That doesn’t seem to be on the table for now.

“We’re not talking about moving him back into a starting role,” Forst told John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle this week. While that doesn’t preclude having the conversation at some point during the offseason, it appears the likelier outcome is that Miller will remain in the ninth inning.

Stretching Miller back out would be a huge risk-reward play for the A’s. A few teams have had success with converted relievers in recent seasons. Garrett Crochet immediately looked like a budding ace when the White Sox gave him a starting job. Seth Lugo and Michael King have gone from setup relievers to borderline top-of-the-rotation starters. Reynaldo López and José Soriano found success but battled injury issues in their returns to starting. Free agent righty Jeff Hoffman has drawn interest as a potential rotation conversion.

Miller is talented enough that a Crochet arc would be within the realistic range of outcomes. The A’s are concerned that a starter’s workload would weigh heavily on his arm, though. Miller has battled shoulder and elbow injuries and pitched fewer than 40 innings in the minor leagues. He started six MLB games as a rookie in 2023. Miller was pitching well but forearm tightness shelved him between mid-May and the start of September. The A’s used him out of the bullpen for the season’s final month and kept him in that capacity this year.

The 26-year-old’s first full season as a closer could hardly have gone better. Miller’s already elite velocity jumped in short stints. His fastball averaged nearly 101 MPH and routinely got into the 103-104 range. Between that kind of life and a wipeout slider, Miller was almost untouchable. He turned in a 2.49 ERA while striking out almost 42% of opposing hitters through 65 innings. Opponents swung and missed at nearly a fifth of his offerings. Among relievers with 50+ innings, only Josh Hader and Braves’ breakout lefty Dylan Lee got swinging strikes more frequently. Miller locked down 28 of 31 save attempts.

Most importantly, Miller’s arm held up. His only injury this year was a three-week absence due to a small fracture in his non-throwing hand. (He reportedly sustained that injury when he struck a training table in frustration after a poor outing.) It took all of a few weeks for Miller to establish himself as an elite late-game weapon.

Relievers aren’t immune to injury, but the A’s clearly feel better about his chances to stay healthy working in 1-2 inning stints. Assuming they don’t reverse course later in the offseason, he’ll project as one of the best closers in baseball. Other teams called on Miller at the deadline and surely will do so again this winter, but a trade would be a surprise. He’s still a year from arbitration and under club control for five seasons. The A’s are no longer aggressively tearing down the roster. They were relatively quiet at the deadline. Forst has already declared they’re keeping Brent Rooker, their best trade chip aside from Miller.

The A’s will need to add multiple starting pitchers. Their rotation is among the thinnest in the league. Players like JP Sears, Mitch Spence and Joey Estes headline the group. They all look like back-of-the-rotation arms at best. With almost nothing on the books for next season, Forst and his staff should be able to take on money via trade and/or a mid-level free agent strike to add innings.