There’s paint on the subject, bunting on the metal, and hoopla in our feels. It’s Opening Day little question. Well, the third one, at the very least.
The most iconic trapping of Opening Day is the fleet of excellent starting pitchers who take the mound. Each group sends their finest, or at the very least, their healthiest. For some, it’s the reigning Cy Young winner. For others, it’s a precocious prospect. These starters, true to their title, carry the burden of the new season of their shoulder.
Few carry a burden better than Luis Severino’s.
The Athletics are on the cusp. They rank twentieth in FanGraphs Depth Charts projected WAR and enter Opening Day with a couple of 16% likelihood of creating the postseason, per our playoff odds. It appears unlikely that that is their yr, however they’re certainly younger and proficient and rising. It wouldn’t be too shocking in the event that they stayed in the playoff image nicely into September.
If they do, it’ll be due to their lineup. It’s good. They completed tenth by wRC+ final yr and have returned largely the similar group. In his rookie season, Nick Kurtz made a case for being the sport’s subsequent nice slugger. Shea Langeliers completed with the second-highest wRC+ by a catcher at 131. Brent Rooker notched his third straight 30-plus house run season. Jacob Wilson and Tyler Soderstrom every performed nicely sufficient to earn early-career extensions, and Lawrence Butler received one the yr earlier than.
Our Depth Charts venture the A’s batters 14th general by WAR, however they’re lower than a win from breaching the high 10, proper in that subsequent tier behind the Dodgers and the handful of actually nice lineups all through baseball. It’s a playoff-worthy group.
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The problem? The A’s are lopsided:
Their pitching is dangerous. They completed final yr in the backside 5 by WAR, and we venture them no higher in 2026: Their starters ranked 24th in our positional energy rankings, whereas their bullpen ranked 26th. I don’t know that I’d name them horrible — they’re nonetheless a transparent rung or two above the Rockies — however there’s not a lot there to differentiate them.
To be truthful, it’s tough to venture teams of pitchers over a season, as accidents and small samples spur attrition. The backside of the A’s workers doesn’t look a lot completely different than the backside of many staffs in the mushy center of our projections. I might completely purchase Luis Morales having a breakout season, identical to I might purchase Jeffrey Springs and Aaron Civale being respectable backend guys. And, you already know, bullpens are bizarre, typically in ways in which works in your favor! Still, there isn’t somebody who’s an apparent candidate to put up above-average worth and carry this group to that subsequent, bare-minimum degree.
Except perhaps Severino. He’s accomplished it earlier than.
Severino was as soon as a giant deal, albeit almost a decade in the past. He was a extremely touted prospect, and a top-five pitcher by WAR in 2017 and 2018. He had the easy, traditional arsenal of a man with massive time stuff: a 98-mph four-seam fastball, a wipeout slider, and a changeup simply to maintain you trustworthy. Nobody threw more durable, and few struck out extra batters. In 2018, he was solely 24.
Then, as these items go, he received harm. Severino missed virtually all of 2019 with a shoulder damage. Then he missed all of 2020 and most of 2021 with Tommy John surgical procedure. He pitched fairly nicely for half a season in 2022 earlier than being sidelined with a lat pressure, then pitched fairly poorly for a half a season the following yr whereas coping with the lat pressure and an indirect pressure. He threw simply 209.1 innings over 5 years.
Severino signed a prove-it cope with the Mets earlier than the 2024 season, and he proved to be… nicely, ok to sign a three-year deal with the A’s that December. It was a shocking transfer as a result of the A’s are notoriously stingy. But it was additionally form of an ideal transfer as a result of the A’s wanted somebody who might probably be a frontline starter to steer the workers. And there simply aren’t many pitchers accessible in the A’s value vary who’ve confirmed able to posting five-win seasons, particularly ones prepared to play in a minor league ballpark.
That minor league ballpark, after all, was a giant a part of Severino’s first season in Sacramento. He actually didn’t like pitching there, and he told The Athletic as a lot in June.
“It’s not the same atmosphere. We don’t have a lot of fans. Our clubhouse is in left field. So, when we play day games, we have to just be in the sun. There’s no air conditioning there, too. It’s really tough.”
Now, I’m not going to name Severino a liar. I’m certain he actually didn’t like pitching in Sacramento. When he provided that quote, he had a 6.79 ERA in 10 begins at house and a 3.04 ERA in eight begins on the highway. That’s a giant cut up! But Severino additionally had a 4.36 FIP at house and a 4.34 FIP on the highway over the similar stretch — his elementary capacity wasn’t a lot completely different. As the season progressed, so did he; he posted a 4.26 ERA and 4.28 FIP in 5 begins at house from July onward, in comparison with a 3.00 ERA and three.20 FIP on the highway. I’m prepared to chalk up a lot of Severino’s early-season house efficiency to poor luck: His .342 BABIP and 58.2% LOB fee had been bottom five amongst starters via June. That appeared to self-correct as the season wore on.
In different phrases, sure, Severino was typically worse at house, and we’d anticipate him and the remainder of the Athletics’ workers to be worse whereas working in opposition to what ended up being the fifth-highest park factor in the majors final yr. It’s a minor league park, it’s very heat, and the wind blows out — it isn’t straightforward to pitch there. But there’s perhaps a bent to magnify the extremity of Sutter Health Park. What we noticed in 2025 was nowhere near Coors Field, and I feel I’d classify it as being extra of a nuisance, slightly than a barrier to a season of high quality pitching.
No, Severino’s merely respectable efficiency in 2025 was his personal doing. He posted the lowest strikeout (17.6%) and whiff (18.3%) charges of his profession. It’s a part of a years-long downward pattern in both class.
Why?
A fantastic pitcher who declines after damage is usually coping with some kind of velocity dip. That’s kind of the case with Severino, but in addition not likely. Again, he was as soon as the hardest-throwing beginning pitcher in the sport, averaging 97.6 mph on his four-seam fastball in 2018. He was right down to 96.1 mph on his four-seamer in 2025. That’s a significant distinction, however he nonetheless boasted one in all the 15 quickest four-seamers in baseball final yr. In reality, Severino’s whiff fee on the pitch jumped from 20.2% in 2018 to 21.9% in 2025 (although nonetheless shy of his 24.0% mark from 2017).
But he isn’t simply throwing four-seamers anymore:
Severino now has a up to date arsenal. He nonetheless throws a variety of fastballs, however a few of them at the moment are sinkers to righties and cutters to lefties. These are usually a bit slower. If we take a look at his common velocity on all fastballs, he was really right down to 95.4 mph, or 2.4 mph decrease than 2018; his complete fastball whiff fee final yr was simply 16.7%. Severino additionally ditched his sharp, biting slider in favor of a slower, looping sweeper. The pitch produced a mere 22.8% whiff fee in 2025. It’s nonetheless pitch general, and it does appear to provide poor contact (specifically popups and weak fly balls). But it’s simply not “2018 Luis Severino 37.6% whiff rate” good.
Now, perhaps these tradeoffs are value it. It’s not fully truthful to check Severino in 2025 to himself from seven years in the past. It’s attainable that persevering with to throw the similar three-pitch combine wouldn’t have the similar impact at present because it did when he had that additional, tip-top gear. But the sum complete of those modifications is a slower, extra contact-oriented strategy. Severino final yr struggled to get forward in counts and end off batters.
If that is who he’s going ahead, that’s positive. He stays an average-ish pitcher value giving 30 begins a season to in nearly any rotation. Still, I can’t assist however really feel there’s room for one thing extra. He throws exhausting, he has good command, and he’s nonetheless Luis Severino. He appeared electrical for the Dominican Republic at the World Baseball Classic, pumping upper-90s fastballs and dominating the fearsome Team USA lineup.
What will we get in 2026? Well, we’re about to search out out. Severino will start his eleventh season in the majors Friday at age 32. The odds of him posting one other ace-level season are rising longer, however he wouldn’t be the first and even the very unlikely pitcher to have a late-career resurgence. If he can discover that subsequent degree once more, the A’s are certain to observe. Such is the magnificence — and burden — of Opening Day.
