Mets360 - Steven Matz’s move to the bullpen won’t stop the homers

By Rob Rogan August 22, 2020

Leave it to the Mets to take a seemingly obvious decision and make it in the most excruciatingly inept way with what appears to be an almost embarrassing lack of forethought. After days of refusing to commit to Steven Matz‘s next start and flirting with the idea of moving Seth Lugo into the rotation, the Mets appeared to announce their decision by keeping Lugo out of Wednesday’s win over the Marlin’s that the unexpectedly Lugo-less bullpen almost blew. Luis Rojas officially announced that Lugo would start in place of Matz the next day, with the added surprise that Lugo’s stay in the rotation would be more than simply a spot start.

To be completely fair, moving your most consistent and arguably best reliever into a role where he will almost certainly go from “borderline elite” to “mostly average” will have ripple effects on the entire pitching staff. The team has no idea what to expect from Lugo as a starter and even less insight into how Matz will perform as a reliever, and this lack of confidence was apparent in their indecisiveness. It’s possible that the move may strengthen a rotation ravaged by injuries while only slightly degrading a bullpen that still has some big names, but the team also runs the risk of both Matz and Lugo imploding in their swapped roles. In such a short season, and with a current record of 12-14, this would have a devastating effect on their postseason chances.

Of course, we can’t undersell just how much of a boon even an average performance from Lugo would be in the rotation considering its current state. It’s a near certainty that Lugo is less valuable as a starter than he has been as a reliever in a vacuum, but in the context of the Mets’ current situation the trade off may be worth it to bolster a rotation hurting for effective bodies. The problem with the Mets’ thinking here, however, is that it’s incredibly shortsighted.

The Mets’ rotation hasn’t performed as hoped, though it was certainly knocked down a few notches in quality with the loss of both Noah Syndergaard and Marcus Stroman. Even so, the overall team results don’t quite match the individual, isolated performances of most of the staff. The table below includes a few key stats for all of the Mets’ starting pitchers so far this season.

Name	IP	HR/9	WHIP	BABIP	ERA-	FIP-	xFIP-
Jacob deGrom	28.0	0.64	0.89	.269	45	49	60
Steven Matz	23.0	3.52	1.57	.318	211	159	97
Corey Oswalt	4.1	0.00	1.15	.385	97	46	85
Robert Gsellman	3.2	2.45	2.45	.400	230	182	160
Walker Lockett	6.0	1.50	1.5	.333	176	117	125
Michael Wacha	14.0	1.93	1.64	.395	151	106	98
David Peterson	21.2	0.83	1.15	.250	68	92	110
Rick Porcello	25.0	0.72	1.64	.402	135	74	95

The numbers above generally paint an ugly picture, but if we look a bit closer we can see two of the main culprits for the rotation’s underwhelming performance so far this season (beyond the injuries): bad luck and suspect defense. The former can mostly be attributed to small sample sizes, but the latter is something the team was well aware of heading into the season. If we look at the differences between ERA- and FIP- for everybody but Jacob deGrom (class of his own) and David Peterson (possible blip), we see that their fielding independent performances have actually run the gamut from about average to quite good. Combine these independent performances with sky-high BABIP for pitchers like Michael Wacha and Rick Porcello, which are much higher than their career averages, and we begin to see why health isn’t the only poor luck that Mets starters have faced this season.

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