LA Angels Need Cam Bedrosian to Go From Good to Great in 2020

Before 2019, there might not have been an LA Angels player who fans despised more than Cam Bedrosian. After a breakout 2019 campaign though, the Halos need the 28-year old to take another step forward.

For the first half of the 2019 season, the LA Angels bullpen was one of the best in the entire MLB. They had a dynamic group of pitchers who were able to shoulder the load as the rotation wound up being one of the worst groups of all-time. However, the relievers began to become visibly overworked, and the second half of the season was a forgettable one for that group.

This same narrative wasn’t true for Cam Bedrosian. In his first 40 games of the season, Bedrosian appeared to be back to the 2016 version of himself, posting a 2.41 ERA in those games. He was using each and every one of his pitches brilliantly. Most importantly, Cam Bedrosian’s confidence was back.

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Then his ERA rose a full run over his next two appearances. Angels fans everywhere were ready to regress back to blaming Bedrosian for the team’s misfortunes and were fully prepared to step off the Cam Bedrosian Hype Train. After all, it seemingly only took one poor outing for Bedrosian to lose all confidence.

However, that isn’t what happened in 2019. Those two awful games in Houston (some trash can shenanigans perhaps?) were simply a blip on the radar for Bedrosian. In the next 17 games to close out the year, Bedrosian was the same pitcher he was in his first 40 games, owning a 2.45 ERA.

This was the most consistent season Bedrosian has had from start to finish in his entire career. Two poor outings against the best offense in baseball kept him from having a sub-3.00 ERA, but 2020 could be the year that Halo fans have been waiting for from Bedrosian.

The biggest key to Bedrosian’s breakout was the increased usage of his slider. He has always been a pitcher who used a fastball/slider combination, but for the first time in his career he threw his slider more than 50% of the time. It was by far the best he has used his pitches throughout his career, and he needs to keep those two pitches just as effective going into 2020.

What could end up making him a truly, truly elite reliever in 2020 is adding one more pitch. He used a splitter very sparingly at the beginning of the season, but if Bedrosian can refine that pitch and use it wisely, it could be just the pitch he needs to induce even more soft contact, as his hard hit percentage in 2019 was above his career average.

One thing is for certain: Cam Bedrosian was a phenomenal reliever outside of two bad outings in Houston in July. One more thing is also true: The Angels need Cam Bedrosian to take one more step in 2020, and be an even more devastating pitcher on the mound as they set their sights on the playoffs.