Reinaldo Oliveros | @ReiOliveros
Ángel Zerpa came to the Milwaukee Brewers in a three-player trade with the Kansas City Royals and his new role could be as a starter.
Zerpa was a starter for the first three years of his career, although he was then moved to the bullpen where he was a great piece for the Kansas City Royals in the last two seasons.
Matt Arnold, Milwaukee’s director of baseball operations, commented in a interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel The organization believes that he can return to being a starter and contribute with his experience.
“We have some scouts who think he can do it. He’s done it in the past,” Arnold said. “This guy also has postseason experience, which we obviously value a lot. Having a guy with that kind of versatility and big-game experience is something we think will really help us.”
Angel Zerpa wouldn’t be the first case of pitchers going from relievers to starters in recent years. There are other cases such as Garrett Crochet, Clay Holmes, Michael King, Seth Lugo, among others.
“We have been trying to access it through an exchange for a long time. I think our group felt that this was a very powerful arm, with excellent qualities. AND“We are very excited to have him with our coaches, who have done a great job leveraging arms like this for several years,” Arnold said.
Ángel Zerpa will take his skills to the National League
Zerpa has played five seasons with the Royals. He has 12 wins, 7 losses, a 3.97 ERA and 150 strikeouts.
The 26-year-old Venezuelan left-hander has a 20.8% strikeout rate and a high ground ball rate of 60.4%. He also has a walk rate of 8.0% and is coming off his highest number of innings in 2025 with 64.2 innings.
His best pitch is the sinker, which reaches 96.6 miles, and his slider, which he uses 31.9% of the time. The team hopes to increase his use of change to be more effective.
