Before being injured in 2013, Matt Harvey was the league leader in FIP at 2.01. He was incredible in 2015 coming off his first major injury. Then 2016 and 2017 happened. Last year was a disaster for Harvey but as he goes into a walk year, Harvey has a chance to bounce back while the expectations for him are low.
What do the computers think he’ll do?
| Matt Harvey | ||||||||
| Source | Innings | ERA | FIP | WHIP | K | BB | K/BB | K/9 |
| Baseball Prospectus | 114 | 4.23 | 1.35 | 100 | 7.894737 | |||
| ZiPS | 114.3 | 4.64 | 4.31 | 87 | 35 | 2.485714 | 6.850394 | |
| Steamer | 135 | 4.77 | 4.76 | 1.41 | 104 | 47 | 2.212766 | 6.933333 |
| ESPN | 107 | 4.88 | 1.4 | 90 | 39 | 2.307692 | 7.570093 | |
| MLB.com | 110 | 4.58 | 1.45 | 95 | 42 | 2.261905 | 7.772727 | |
| Baseball Reference | 115 | 4.85 | 1.4 | 100 | 41 | 2.439024 | 7.826087 | |
| Average: | 115.8833 | 4.658333 | 4.535 | 1.402 | 96 | 40.8 | 2.34142 | 7.474562 |
| 2017 Stats: | 92.7 | 6.7 | 6.37 | 1.694 | 67 | 47 | 1.425532 | 6.504854 |
Well, that’s a dramatic improvement. it’s not 2012-2015 Harvey, but it’s so much better than 2017 Harvey. The computers see him regressing to mean which in this case, regression doesn’t carry the same connotation that it normaly does. Computers see him losing almost 0.3 points off his WHIP which would also be fantastic.
In 2015, if you showed me that average stat line for Harvey, I would have responded with “that’s garabage!”. Or, “that’s worse than the EPA’s current attempt at cleaning up the Passaic River!”. But after last year, a Harvey with a 4.65 ERA, 4.5 FIP and 1.4 WHIP would dramatically help the Mets. My gut says, because my gut is a hopeless optimist, that Harvey will be better than this average stat line. I have no evidence to back this up outside of desire to see Harvey fly high in what could easily be his last season as a Met.
