Reese Kaplan -- The Starting 5 Has Turned Into the Lucky 7

If anyone had said to Mets fans prior to the season starting, "Oh, by the way, your enviable pitching rotation is going to be without two-time Cy Young Award winner Jacob deGrom and 2021 All Star Taijuan Walker," most folks likely would have thrown in the towel on the entire new season.  After all, Max Scherzer was just one man and Carlos Carrasco started off in Spring Training unfortunately looking like the major league misfit from last year.  Then when Scherzer started off his first start for his new team looking more like Sad Max than Mad Max, it surely could have started off the anger and excessive drinking about the Mets' bad fate in signing free agents.  

About the only good news coming out of the starting gate was newcomer Chris Bassitt trying to demonstrate to the Mets and to all future employers that his numbers in Oakland were not done with mirrors.  The tall righthander didn't really become a stalwart member of the rotation until 2019 during which he turned 30 years old.  During that season he went 10-5 while pitching to a respectable 3.81 ERA.  He was in 28 games and certainly showed the Bay Area folks that he was for real.  

Since then Bassitt has only gotten better.  In the shortened 2020 season he delivered a 2.15 ERA while starting 11 games for the A's, finishing with a commendable 5-2 record.  In 2021 he had a full season to show that these back-to-back efforts were not fantasy but reality.  He started 27 games last year, delivered a 12-4 record and finished with a sparkling 3.15 ERA.  

When the Mets acquired him, they certainly hoped that as he entered his walk year into free agency that he would continue delivering in a big way.  Thus far he has certainly not disappointed.  Bassitt in 2022 has made his first two starts, winning both, pitching a dozen innings with a perfect record and a 0.75 ERA.  During that period he's struck out 14 and walked three, only allowing 5 hits.  That performance is good for a 0.667 WHIP!!!

However, as happy as Bassitt has made Mets fans, the truly shocking developments came from a pair of guys who showed flashes of brilliance in the past mixed with mediocrity.  Tylor Megill entered yesterday's doubleheader with an also perfect 2-0 record and an ERA of 0.00.  In his 10.1 IP he's struck out 11 and not walked a single batter.  With the 6 hits allowed his WHIP bests the remarkable number posted by Megill, sitting Tuesday morning at just 0.581.  While no one can realistically expect him to keep up that level of otherworldly effort for a full season, he's certainly taking a lot of the sting out of missing Jacob deGrom.

Now some folks thought David Peterson was going to be the next big thing based upon some of his starts in 2020 and 2021.  The 6'6" southpaw had run up a combined 8-8 record with an ERA of 4.64.  While not awful, it certainly didn't suggest he had regular rotation reps in his arm.  Then came 2022 and he was forced into duty both out of the pen and once as a starter.  Thus far he has shined, pitching to a perfect ERA, though his strikeout numbers are a bit low and his walk numbers a bit high.  Throw in the 6 hits allowed and his WHIP is an acceptable but not spectacular 1.200.  Still, with Walker down for a few weeks Peterson has stepped up in a big way.  

As the season progresses you know Max Scherzer will be Max Scherzer, Jacob deGrom will return to his usual top-of-the-league command, Bassitt will keep hitters off-balance and Carrasco has been doing a mirror image of everything we've seen from Bassitt.  That means that Megill and Peterson are the in-house answers to depth and it may well be that Taijuan Walker winds up on the outside looking in when it comes to the Mets starting rotation.  That scenario certainly should make fans smile.