The Cincinnati Reds front office can say one thing about their offseason – they did try to improve their bullpen. Jon Heyman of the New York Post reports that the club has a deal in place with Pierce Johnson, pending his passing a physical. Gordon Wittenmyer of the Cincinnati Enquirer is reporting it’s a 1-year deal. The amount of money has not yet been reported on.
In 2025 Pierce Johnson pitched in 65 games for Atlanta where he posted a 3.05 ERA. During his 59.0 innings with the Braves last season he allowed 52 hits, eight home runs, had 19 walks (two were intentional), and he struck out 59 batters. He had a career low 33% groundball rate during the season, down from a career best groundball rate of 54% that he had with San Diego back in 2022. His walk rate was by car the lowest of his career in 2025, though his strikeout rate was also the lowest of his career among seasons where he was in the big leagues full time (it was lower in 2018 when he threw 43.2 innings for the San Francisco Giants).
Johnson, a 1st round pick in 2012, has had an interesting journey to where he’s at today. He didn’t debut until he was 26-years-old and that season saw him make one appearance. The new year he split time between the big leagues and Triple-A where his ERA with the Giants was 5.56. In the following season he played in Japan. He would return the next year and it was his first one where he was in the big leagues the entire year, but that was also the 2020 season and he threw just 20.0 innings that season. His first full season in the big leagues didn’t come until he was 30-years-old back in 2021.
Since he returned from Japan in 2020 he’s pitched quite well with the long exception of a half of a season with the Colorado Rockies back in 2023 when his ERA was 6.00 in 39.0 innings. He was traded at the deadlnie that year to Atlanta and had a 0.76 ERA in 24 games for the remainder of the season. Since the start of 2020 he’s pitched in 292 games and had an ERA of 3.52 while striking out 341 batters with 118 walks in 271.0 innings.
Last season he was quite good against right-handed hitters, holding them to a .231/.250/.372 line with three walks and 40 strikeouts. Lefties were much better against him as they hit .255/.364/.436 with 16 walks and 19 strikeouts. Two years ago the splits were the other way as lefties managed just a .632 OPS against him with 11 walks and 35 strikeouts, while righties had a .719 OPS with 14 walks and 32 strikeouts. The more recent data is more valuable, but it’s tough to pinpoint why the two years were so different from each other.
For his career, Pierce Johnson has pitched backwards and the last two seasons were to the extreme. In 2024 he threw his curveball 71% of the time. Last season that moved up to 72%. He also threw his fastball less often than ever, not just because he threw the curve so often, but he also added a cutter to the mix every so often (just 5% of the time).
You can see his career stats here.
