Earlier this week the Mets signed Michael Wacha and Rick Porcello. BVW made news by stating that Marcus Stroman was a replacement for Zack Wheeler (despite Wheeler and Stroman being in the same rotation for about half a season) and that Porcello/Wacha give the Mets so much starting pitching depth that it’s a boon to the bullpen by locking Lugo/Gsellman out of the rotation (which was an even odder statement to make, but whatever).
To get a sense of what this all means, we are going to look at the 2019 Mets DRA, DRA- and WARP from Baseball Prospectus and then insert in the Mets new signings.
2019 Rotation:
- Jacob deGrom: 2.27 DRA, 46.5 DRA-, 7.8 WARP
- Noah Syndergaard: 3.40 DRA, 69.8 DRA-, 5.1 WARP
- Zack Wheeler: 3.80 DRA, 77.9 DRA-, 4.2 WARP
- Steven Matz: 4.39 DRA, 90.2 DRA-, 2.4 WARP
- Marcus Stroman: 3.79 DRA, 77.8 DRA-, 4.0 WARP
- Jason Vargas: 5.25 DRA, 107.8 DRA-, 0.8 WARP
- Walker Lockett: 4.96 DRA, 101.9 DRA-, 0.2 WARP (contains relief data)
2020 Additions in 2019:
- Rick Porcello: 6.06 DRA, 124.4 DRA-, -0.5 WARP
- Michael Wacha: 6.25 DRA, 128.1 DRA-, -0.7 WARP
2018 Data for New Additions:
- Rick Porcello: 4.02 DRA, 89.9 DRA-, 2.8 WARP
- Michael Wacha: 3.99 DRA, 89.0 DRA-, 1.3 WARP
Wacha tossed 84.1 innings in 2018, 126.2 innings in 2019 as he’s battled shoulder issues. The shoulder issues for Wacha should be a major asterisk when thinking – well in 2018 he put up better numbers than Matz did in 2019 (which is problematic in a different way – DRA looks at context for ABs, it’s not clear to me how much can be asserted as a claim of better or worst across the seasons, I included the 2018 data to show if you want to look at DRA that way, both Porcello and Wacha took major steps back lat year).
Here’s the main point – Stroman is essentially a replacement for Wheeler. But that statement is only true if Stroman was acquired this off-season. Wheeler leaving makes the rotation significantly weaker. Porcello and Wacha both performed significantly worse than Jason Vargas last year, and do you remember how you felt about him being a key piece of the rotation going into the season.
The good news for the Mets is Porcello and Wacha prevent Lockett from pitching every 5th day. The bad news for the Mets – since they can’t seem to keep prospects, it’s a question mark if anyone will be ready to take a spot in case two members of the rotation go down and the Mets don’t want to dip into Lockett. With Gagnon and Flexen gone to Japan the Mets have a lot less starting pitching depth than they are letting on.
Of course, Wacha and Porcello could pitch a lot better than last year. But they are trending overall downwards and wishing that they outperform what they are heading towards is the same hoping for the best that the Mets have entered each year for the last several years.
