You know, we really should get to work thinking of a good nickname for the New York Mets' starting rotation.
Why? Well, put it this way: Now's a good time to realize it's going to need one before long.
In case you haven't heard, a member of said starting rotation was named the National League Rookie of the Year on Monday. Jacob deGrom claimed the award in a runaway vote over Cincinnati Reds speedster Billy Hamilton, becoming the first Met to win it since Dwight Gooden in 1984.
I'll sneak in my opinion that Hamilton's Rookie of the Year case deserved more respect, but you have to be some kind of silly not to be impressed by deGrom's debut campaign. In 21 starts, he racked up a 2.69 ERA and 144 strikeouts in 140.1 innings. He also provided a dandy of a finishing touch, posting a 1.32 ERA and striking out 43 in his last five starts.
As such, it should go without saying that deGrom earned his honor. But that's actually something that is worth saying, if for no other reason than it demonstrates how far deGrom has come in the last year.
And, in turn, just how much brighter the future of the Mets rotation has become.
If you go back and look where deGrom was this time last year, you won't be impressed. He was a 25-year-old who had started the 2013 season at High-A before managing just a 4.66 ERA in 24 starts at Double-A and Triple-A.
It's no surprise, then, that the prospect gurus didn't see anything particularly special. Baseball America, for example, had deGrom pegged as only the No. 10 prospect in the Mets' farm system. Their full scouting report (subscription required) projected him as a No. 4 starter.
Of course, the bright side of that projection is that the Mets didn't necessarily need him to be any better than a No. 4 starter down the line.
Matt Harvey's Tommy John operation at the end of 2013 was a huge downer, but the immediate future still consisted of a rotation with him at the top followed by two other young fire-balling right-handers with top-of-the-rotation talent: Zack Wheeler and top prospect Noah Syndergaard. If deGrom could even so much as hold his own as the No. 4 starter behind the three of them, the Mets would be dandy.
Obviously, things have changed. What we know about deGrom now is different from what we knew about him then:
He, too, has top-of-the-rotation talent.
The raw numbers make that obvious enough, but it's hard to overstate just how legit those numbers are. They're the product of an arsenal that got a whole lot more lethal in a hurry.
FanGraphs' Eno Sarris dedicated a whole article to deGrom's arsenal back in August. In it, he noted that the 26-year-old righty learned a two-seamer and changeup from the great Johan Santana in 2013 and then tightened up his breaking balls to arrive at the following:
What [his development] has given him is five pitches with different movement and different velocities: two 93 mph fastballs, an 87 mph slider, an 84 mph change and a 79 mph curve. Since his four seam (9.8% whiffs), curve and change are all above-average when it comes to swinging strikes, it’s (finally?) not surprising he has flashed a great strikeout rate...
In averaging more than a strikeout per inning in 2014, deGrom did indeed prove he's capable of overpowering major league hitters with the best of 'em. Throw in a respectable 2.8 BB/9 rate and a 45.4 ground-ball percentage, and you get a fine demonstration of how to go from being a No. 4 starter to being more like a No. 2 or No. 1.
Now that deGrom's pulled it off, the Mets can dream big. Their future rotation is no longer Harvey, Wheeler and Syndergaard, featuring deGrom. It's now arguably deGrom first and then Harvey, Wheeler and Syndergaard.
And yes, that rotation could be just as dangerous as it sounds.
Since it's already been over a year since Harvey underwent his Tommy John operation, he should be good to go for spring training in 2015. And even if he doesn't get back to his 2013 dominance, a less dominant version of a guy who had a 2.27 ERA is still going to be a dominant pitcher.
Wheeler, meanwhile, is another guy who has gone from an iffy future to a brighter future. He was inconsistent in his first 33 big league starts between 2013 and the start of 2014, but then settled down to post a 2.71 ERA and 9.0 K/9 in his final 16 starts of 2014.
Ask Mets pitching coach Dan Warthen, and he'll say that stretch was the result of better mechanics and better demeanor.
“I don’t know which came first but they both have showed up,” Warthen told Mike Vorkunov of NJ.com.
As for Syndergaard, the obvious catch with him is that he hasn't yet cracked the majors. He also had just a 4.60 ERA in 26 starts for Triple-A Las Vegas in 2014. But he's still regarded as one of the best prospects around. He checked in at No. 19 in Baseball America's midseason rankings and at No. 10 in B/R's Mike Rosenbaum's year-end rankings.
"Syndergaard’s command needs further refinement, and he’ll likely begin 2015 back in Triple-A, but the stuff and durability still suggest impact starter once fully developed," wrote Rosenbaum.
Syndergaard should be along early in 2015. If all goes well, he'll immediately follow Harvey's, Wheeler's and deGrom's fine examples and prove he's ready to pitch at a high level in the big leagues.
This is to say it's a realistic scenario that the Mets could have four No. 1-type starters in their rotation as soon as next season, which is indeed is a scary thought for the rest of the NL East.
The merits of the two-year contract the Mets gave Michael Cuddyer on Monday are debatable, but adding him to a lineup that already had David Wright, Lucas Duda, Curtis Granderson, Daniel Murphy and Travis d'Arnaud did make the club's offense better in 2015. That, coupled with a rotation full of flame-throwing right-handers, could turn the Mets into a nightmare opponent.
Even scarier is the thought that said rotation won't be going anywhere for a while. deGrom is only 26 and under club control through 2020. Harvey is 25 and under control through 2018. Wheeler is 24 and under control through 2019. Syndergaard is only 22 and would be under control through 2021.
This doesn't just mean that the Mets aren't far off from having a solid team built around a lethal rotation. It means they're set up to build solid teams around a lethal rotation for years to come.
This was a possibility even before deGrom came out of nowhere to win NL Rookie of the Year. Now that he's along for the ride, it no longer feels like a possibility. It feels like an inevitability.
So then. Anyone got a good nickname?
Note: Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference unless otherwise noted/linked.
If you want to talk baseball, hit me up on Twitter.
Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com
- Login to post comments