Reese Kaplan -- No More Charlie Browns on the Mound!

Have a chat with your fellow Mets fans and to hear them build up a passionate viewpoint you would think that the club was struggling to score runs.  It seems that memory is not what it used to be and they quickly forgot that the team had the best average in the entire league last year, yet they finished at the bottom of the standings not due to hitting but as a result of pitching.  While most folks are laser focused on the contract that should be offered to George Springer, the fact is that adding another bat isn’t going to make a dramatic difference in the standings.

On the pitching side, I’ve dwelt several times on the poor value for dollars spent that Trevor Bauer would add to the team.  As a quick refresher he is seeking a contract to exceed his former college teammate Gerrit Cole who suckered the Yankees into a nine-year deal last season worth $36 million per season.  Behind that haul comes the Washington Nationals hurler Stephen Strasburg at $245 million.  Not coincidentally, both are clients of Scott Boras.  In Strasburg’s case he must struggle on a tad below $36 million per season for eight years.  

Now as a point of comparison, they are both fine pitchers.  Cole and Strasburg coincidentally both sport career ERAs of a very respectable 3.19.  That performance certainly ranks as premium class pitching, though fall below the pauper Jacob deGrom who owns a 2.61 career ERA and somehow has to survive on a mere $31 million or so for that paltry effort.  

Bauer is not in the class of these three pitchers.  His career ERA even after last season’s stellar 1.73 ERA is a rather pedestrian metric of 3.90 that came DOWN to that number after his one Cy Young worthy abbreviated year.  He’s looking for something in the $37 million or more per season for multiple years.  There’s no way to slice it.  That kind of offer would even embarrass the Yankees who have done similar foolish contracts in the past.  

Ironically, the weekend was full of derision for the prospect of adding pitcher Tomoyuki Sugano who has been posted by the Yomiuri Giants after spending eight seasons helping them win ballgames.  During that time period he has a record of 101-50, a 2.34 ERA, a great WHIP of 1.034 and remarkable control.  He’s an 8 strikeout per 9 IP hurler, but also offers up fewer than 2 walks during the same span.  All of those numbers are indeed enviable and would fit well on any of the 30 major league rosters.

Of course, Mets fans were dead set against including Sugano as a part of the new roster.  “He’s another Ryota Igarashi!”  True, Igarashi was a mediocre player with a 6.41 ERA in the major leagues after pitching to a 2.93 Japanese ERA.  Others countered he was no better than Masato Yoshii who offered up a losing record to go along with a better but still mediocre 4.62 ERA in the majors.  

These same folks quickly forgot all about other Asian-born ballplayers like Hyun-Jin Ryu, Hisashi Iwakuma, Yu Darvish, Hiroki Kuroda or even Hideo Nomo, all of whom performed at much higher levels than anyone on the Mets except deGrom.  What you hear then is, “They are the exception to the rule!  Foreign born players almost never succeed!”

Hmmn, doesn’t that same logic apply to American-born, Central American-born and South American-born ballplayers as well?  How have stunning prospects like Corey Oswalt or Mel Rojas or Butch Metzger?  It would seem that the vast majority of players from the Americas also fail to perform at a star level, too, but no one has problems going back to that poisoned well again and again.  I’m not suggesting Asian born players are better, but they aren’t worse.  

As it stands right now the Mets rotation for 2021 includes deGrom, Marcus Stroman and David Peterson.  After that it’s a major set of question marks.  Do you want more of the great reliever who cannot start in Seth Lugo?  Ditto Robert Gsellman (though calling him great at anything is a major stretch)?  The team needs pitching and a free agent with no player compensation attached to his contract seems the recipe the club is seeking.  Pitchers with good control can win in the majors.  Remember a guy named Greg Maddux?  

I would like to see the Mets make some significant strides in the starting rotation which will enable them to return the outstanding Seth Lugo to reinforce the bullpen.  But hey, maybe I’m crazy.