Aroldis Chapman surrendered a no-doubt home run to Anthony Santander in the bottom of the seventh inning on Friday night, failing to find any sort of rhythm or piece of his former self in a low-leverage spot that quickly called for a high-leverage reliever to avoid a complete collapse.
Those three earned runs in just 0.1 innings of work raised his season ERA to 5.75, raised more questions about his ability to help the team moving forward, and further cemented his spot as one of the least valuable relievers in all of baseball over the last calendar year.
Since June 1 of last season, when a historic start to his 2021 campaign quickly turned upside down with another bout of control issues, Chapman’s -0.8 fWAR (WAR calculated by FanGraphs) is the fourth worst in all of baseball among qualified relievers, equaling the lowly number shared by former teammate Albert Abreu in that span.
Also in that time, Chapman’s 7.31 walks per nine innings is easily the worst in all of baseball, with Philadelphia’s Jose Alvarado coming in second with 6.65 BB/9.
The numbers don’t stop there. Chapman is among the 10 worst relievers in HR/9, has the second worst FIP, and 12th worst ERA in that span. The Yankees will continue to try and find the Chapman of old, but he has shown no signs of rediscovering that form, and it will be hard for Aaron Boone to justify bringing Chapman into anything but mop-up duties if this trend continues much longer.
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