One of the better moves this winter was seeing that the Arizona Diamondbacks won the Corbin Burnes sweepstakes. This is a rotation that finished 27th in ERA during the 2024 season and definitely adding Burnes makes them better. Well, the Diamondbacks sit 22nd in ERA for starting pitching, which a better than last year but not great overall. The offense is stellar, and they need to play on the mound to improve. Burnes himself has not had the strongest start to the season. It is not time to panic, but the signs are there.

The Case for Burnes 

So, when it was time for Burnes to receive his big payday, there were growing concerns regarding his output. There is no denying the caliber of pitcher that he is. Heck, Burnes was an ace in his tenure with the Brewers and he was quite dominant as the ace of the rotation for the Orioles. His ERA went from 3.39 to a 2.92 and it was great to see the Burnes of old on the mound. But, when it comes to trends and looking into the future, there were growing concerns with Burnes, particularly when it comes to the strikeout rate.

Over the last five seasons, Burnes has seen a notable trend downward in strikeout rate, which is not good. He is not a pitcher that notably is a ground ball pitcher, so if you aren’t going to get the punch outs, something has to give somewhere. Here are the strikeout rates for Burnes over the last five seasons:

2021: 35.6%

2022: 30.5%

2023: 25.5%

2024: 23.1%

You don’t love seeing that. To make matters worse, you are now seeing in 2025 that his strikeout rate is 18.5%, which is almost 5% lower. The trend was always there, it just has continued. Furthermore, there are other concerns early on that are eye opening.

Not only is he not getting the strikeouts, but he walking batters 13.9% of the time, which is not great. Also, he is allowing a lot of hard contact this season and his average exit velocity ranks him in the 4th percentile. Yikes.

Last season, Burnes finished in the top 7% for hard hit rate at 31.6% and has seen that almost double at 50.1%. His cutter has seen its velocity drop and has seen batters have a slugging percentage of .639 when facing it. They are slugging way above its expected rate, which is concerning. Batters this season are also having better success in general against his pitches, primarily the cutter, curveball, and slider. There are concerning things regarding Burnes, but there’s no need to panic.

It Is Still Early

Crazy to say not to panic after laying out all that information. But it is still early and there is always time to turn things around. It is just a tough go for Burnes at the start of his Diamondbacks tenure. The trends are not in a positive direction, but the good ones turn it around and figure it out. Burnes will.