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Poll: What Should The Mets Do With Matt Harvey?

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Since allowing just one hit across five innings of work against the Phillies in his season debut, Matt Harvey has seemingly reverted back to his 2017 form. He’s allowed at least four earned runs in each of his last three starts, lasting just five innings in two of them. While it’s a good sign that Harvey’s walk rate is down, he’s been prone to the long ball (four homers allowed so far) and hasn’t been particularly impressive in the strikeouts department (7.29 K/9).

It’s an unfortunate extension of Harvey’s recent track record. Since coming off the disabled list in September of last season, the righty sports a cataclysmic 8.72 ERA, and there aren’t any real reasons for optimism surrounding the 29-year-old’s performance. He’s struck out just 30 batters across 43 1/3 innings of work since that time, and he’s allowed at least four runs in six of his nine starts while lasting more than five innings just once. For those interested in pitcher records, Harvey is 1-6 during that time.

It’s becoming more and more clear with each outing that Harvey seems unlikely to turn things around. He was once among the games elite arms and seemed likely to earn nine figures in his then-distant free agent foray, and although a late-2013 Tommy John surgery put that in serious question, he managed to bounce back with an outstanding 4.4 fWAR campaign in 2015. 2016, however, was the start of a tailspin, and Harvey managed to pitch just 92 2/3 innings in both 2016 and 2017 with just 143 total strikeouts and 119 earned runs allowed. With this season’s terrible start, we’re almost to the point where it’s worth asking the question, “Will Harvey pitch himself out of the majors this season?”

While that seems a bit extreme, the subject of bumping Harvey from the rotation has certainly been broached. Jason Vargas is set to return to the rotation soon, and Harvey’s the obvious candidate to give up his spot if performance is the determining factor. Reporters recently asked Harvey if he’d give his consent to be optioned to the minors (he can’t be optioned without his permission due to his five-year MLB tenure), but he wouldn’t comment on the subject.

A more likely scenario would be for the 14-5 Mets to make Harvey a reliever. For his part, Harvey isn’t thinking about a move to a bullpen, and recently told reporters that he considers himself a starting pitcher. In reality, what Harvey considers himself to be doesn’t really matter if he can’t get outs, so the Mets will have a big decision in the impending days.

Many struggling starters have benefitted greatly from a move to the bullpen, and it doesn’t seem likely at this point that Harvey will revive his career as a starter. However, a miraculous return to his 2013/2015 form would provide the Mets with a huge boost to their seemingly strong playoff chances. What do you think New York should do in regards to their former ace? (Poll link for app users)

Should The Mets Move Matt Harvey To The Bullpen?
Yes 82.97% (4,771 votes)
No 17.03% (979 votes)
Total Votes: 5,750

 

Quick Hits: BLA, Hernandez, Napoli

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Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic recently did a deep dive into the company known as Big League Advance, whose business model involves lump sum payments to minor-leaguers in exchange for a percentage of their future earnings. MLBTR readers might best know BLA as the company entrenched in a legal battle with top prospect Francisco Mejia of the Indians. Rosenthal’s piece goes into detail far beyond Mejia alone, and he notes at one point that BLA claims to have recently signed its 100th player. Players such as Fernando Tatis Jr. and Jose Osuna have benefitted from the lump sum payments BLA offers; the former is using the money to invest in his health, nutrition and conditioning, while the latter claims the money allows him to focus on baseball by reducing the stress of wondering how he’ll support his family. Others around baseball, however, claim that BLA uses predatory tactics to pressure young players into giving up significant money on the whole; indeed they’ve admitted to intentionally bypassing agents to talk with players directly. It seems that the major focus of Rosenthal’s piece is the upside and downside of BLA’s presence in baseball. My biggest takeaway from reading the piece is that there ought to be a serious discussion in the near future about how (or if) MLB ought to be involved in regulating companies like BLA.

More from around the league…

  • It was widely assumed that Scott Kingery’s surprise extension and resulting presence on the Phillies’ MLB roster would sap at least some playing time from incumbent second baseman Cesar Hernandez. That hasn’t been the case, as MLB.com’s Todd Zolecki points out. Hernandez has actually started 18 of 19 games for the club this season, and while Kingery is a second baseman by trade, he’s played that position just twice so far at the MLB level. Instead, he’s spent time at shortstop, third and right field. Zolecki posits that while Hernandez may have seemed like an obvious trade deadline candidate at the season’s outset, it’s now difficult to see the Phillies dealing him due to his offensive impact and the uncertainty surrounding Maikel Franco and J.P. Crawford. Manager Gabe Kapler’s comments certainly strengthen that line of thinking: “We knew how Cesar’s track record suggested that he’s one of the better second baseman in baseball,” he said. “And now we’re blessed to see it every single day. It’s really exciting to look out there and see a guy that consistent. It’s really nice for a manager to have Cesar at the top of the lineup.”
  • Mike Napoli’s season-ending surgery obviously doesn’t necessarily mean the end of his career. But Ryan Lewis of the Akron Beacon Journal has some interesting comments from Terry Francona suggesting that he believes Napoli (who was playing with the Indians’ Triple-A affiliate prior to the injury) will be an excellent coach if and when the time comes for him to hang up his spikes. “I’m not saying he’s done playing, I just mean if he chooses to start to be on this side of the field, my guess is he’ll be even better than he was as a player,” Francona said. It’s certainly a fair point; Napoli is well-known for his clubhouse leadership, and especially in Cleveland during their 2016 playoff run.

Injury Notes: Zobrist, Despaigne, Ohtani

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Ben Zobrist says he’s headed to the DL to tend to a minor back injury, via Jesse Rogers of ESPN. There doesn’t seem to be any serious concern, but Zobrist has missed the past few games due to the injury, so the Cubs appear to be proceeding with caution. They’ll be able to make the move retroactive by a few days, so it seems unlikely he’ll be out for very long. The versatile Zobrist is in the third year of a four-year, $56MM contract with Chicago. He’s certainly off to an impressive start; in 49 plate appearances so far this season, the veteran has hit .326/.408/.465 with more walks (six) than strikeouts (5). For the time being, players like Kyle Schwarber, Albert Almora Jr. and Ian Happ will likely continue to get an extra game here and there to plug the gaps created by Zobrist’s absence

A pair of additional injury notes elsewhere in MLB…

  • The Marlins officially placed 31-year-old righty Odrisamer Despaigne on the DL last night (along with fellow reliever Chris O’Grady), as we noted in our daily roster roundup. The reason was a strained forearm, which is always a concerning injury when it comes to pitchers. According to Joe Frisaro of MLB.com, Despaigne had the following to say about his injury: “I first felt it tight when I was warming up in the bullpen. I tried to keep going with it. When the game started, it’s when I started to feel the pain.” For the Marlins, it’s yet another development that thins out an already-shaky pitching staff.
  • Two-way Angels phenom Shohei Ohtani appears to be making progress in regards to his blister issues. Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register tweets that Ohtani feels his blister is “recovering”, and that he’s on schedule to make a start on Tuesday in Houston. Fletcher also notes that Ohtani worked with pitching coach Charlie Nagy in a bullpen session, and came away with some things he can use (presumably to prevent a re-aggravation of the injury).

Quick Hits: Towers, Portland, Stanton, Draft

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Before tonight’s tilt between the Diamondbacks and Padres, the Arizona organization honored the late Kevin Towers, who previously served as general manager with both clubs. The D-Backs dedicated his former Chase Field suite as “Kevin’s Tower.” The widely-loved executive passed away this January at 56 years of age.

As we join once more in a tip of the cap to Towers, here are some worthwhile links from around the game:

  • The effort to bring a MLB team to Portland appears to be growing in seriousness, as Gordon Friedman of The Oregonian recently reported. Portland Diamond Project, the entity spearheading the effort, has submitted bids on two parcels that could potentially house 32,000-seat ballparks. Clearly, there’s still a long ways to go before anybody will be watching a major-league contest in Portland, but it’ll certainly be interesting to see whether that municipality (and a few others) end up as serious suitors for existing or expansion franchises.
  • It wasn’t long ago that the Giancarlo Stanton trade drama, rather than his scuffles at the plate, was the hot topic in baseball. If you recall, before the Yankees got involved heavily, the Marlins had set deals with both the Giants and Cardinals in hopes that Stanton would waive his no-trade clause to join one of those blue-blood organizations. There were varying reports at the time as to just what package would have been headed from San Francisco to Miami had Stanton approved, but Robert Murray of Fan Rag now claims to have discovered the true offer. Lefty Andrew Suarez and third baseman Jacob Gonzalez were the prospect pieces in the deal, says Murray, while the Fish also would have taken on Denard Span and his contract. Otherwise, the Giants were said to be prepared to take on all (or substantially all) of the Stanton contract.
  • Draft season is upon us, and we’re starting to see some early mocks and rankings. We’ll try to pass along worthwhile links as they come in. Those interested in seeing how things are shaping up will want to check out the top-fifty list of ESPN.com’s Keith Law (Insider link), who tabs Auburn righty Casey Mize as an easy choice as the top overall draft asset as things stand. That seems to be the consensus; Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel of Fangraphs say the same.

MLB Daily Roster Roundup: Myers, Pomeranz, Samardzija, Zunino

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ROSTER MOVES BY TEAM
(April 19th-April 20th)

NATIONAL LEAGUE

  • COLORADO ROCKIES | Depth Chart
    • Reinstated from 5-game suspension: 3B Nolan Arenado
      • Arenado played 3B and batted 4th on Friday. Charlie Blackmon hit 3rd for the first time ever with Arenado in the lineup.

—

AMERICAN LEAGUE

  • CHICAGO WHITE SOX | Depth Chart
    • Acquisiton: OF Trayce Thompson (acquired from Athletics for PTNBL or cash)
      • Thompson was not in the starting lineup on Friday.
  • KANSAS CITY ROYALS | Depth Chart
    • Promoted: RP Scott Barlow
      • Barlow was the 26th man for Friday’s double-header.

—

FUTURE EXPECTED MOVES

NL Central Notes: Butler, Price, DeJong

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Let’s take a look in at the latest notes from around the National League’s Central division:

  • The Cubs have placed long reliever Eddie Butler on the 10-day DL with a groin strain. He turned in four strong appearances to open the year but has been knocked around in his last two and now owns a 4.30 ERA over 14 2/3 innings, with ten strikeouts against five walks. There’s no reason at this point to believe that Butler will be sidelined long. Fellow righty Luke Farrell received the call to take the open active roster spot. He, too, ought to be able to give the team innings in some volume when needed, as he’s stretched out to start.
  • C. Trent Rosecrans of The Athletic breaks down the Reds’ firing of skipper Bryan Price in a subscription piece. As Rosecrans observes, it is in some regard actually more surprising that Price lasted this long, despite never overseeing a winning product, than that he was fired so early in the current season. Of course, the struggles during his tenure have hardly all been his fault, and it may be that the long-rebuilding team finally felt this was the time to make a statement. There were some internal hopes of improvement entering the year, making it all the harder to stomach an ugly start to the season. GM Dick Williams explained that “now was the right time to do something about” the fact that the team’s offseason work had gone so far south. At the same time, he acknowledged that “this is an organizational disappointment,” not something that falls only at the feet of Price and his staff. It’s certainly hard to escape that conclusion; as I documented in breaking down the Reds’ offseason just yesterday, Price was not exactly given a compelling roster to work with this year or in the past.
  • Fresh off an offseason extension, Cardinals shortstop Paul DeJong has continued to carry above-average overall offensive numbers in his sophomore campaign, due mostly to a healthy .477 slugging percentage. But as Ben Frederickson of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch observes, DeJong is also exhibiting a worrying rise in strikeouts. Indeed, a league-leading thirty of his seventy plate appearances have ended with a K thus far. And DeJong has drawn only four walks, leaving him with a .286 OBP on the young season. As Frederickson notes, the 24-year-od is showing much greater selectivity thus far in 2018 than he did last year, but he’s also swinging and missing at rates typically procured only by elite relief pitchers. Much like young Rockies shortstop Trevor Story, DeJong still needs to show he can get on base consistently enough to be a compelling offensive player.

Rangers Release Steve Delabar

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The Rangers have released right-hander Steve Delabar from his minor-league contract, per a club announcement. In a corresponding move, the team’s top affiliate has added recently signed righty Yovani Gallardo to its active roster.

Delabar, 34, has not pitched much in recent seasons. He didn’t last long with the Reds in 2016 and only turned in a short stint later that season with Japan’s Hiroshima Carp. Then, he sat out all of 2017 following a PED suspension.

The Rangers gave Delabar another shot in hopes that he might boost the bullpen depth, but obviously were not that optimistic. He had issued five walks in his 5 2/3 innings thus far at Round Rock after handing out ten free passes in nine spring frames.

Nationals Designate A.J. Cole, Select Carlos Torres

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The Nationals have designated righty A.J. Cole for assignment, per a club announcement. He’ll be replaced on the active roster by veteran reliever Carlos Torres, whose contract was selected.

It has long been evident that this was a make-or-break season for Cole, who the organization long felt would be a major-league contributor. He was given a shot at a rotation spot out of camp but lasted only two starts and two relief appearances before the team was forced to make a move.

Cole’s once bright star had already ebbed over recent seasons, as he continued to spend more of his time at Triple-A than in the majors. He reached the highest level of the minors in 2014 and cracked the bigs in the following campaign, but has thrown only 110 total MLB frames.

A major factor in Cole’s lack of chances was the fact that the competing Nationals couldn’t simply give him innings without concern for how they went. Perhaps the leash would’ve been longer this year, though, were it not for the fact that the Nats have endured a tepid opening few weeks that have left them looking up at three teams.

With a need for fresh relievers, there just wasn’t more time to let Cole work through his early struggles. Make no mistake, they were pronounced. He paces the N.L. with a whopping six home runs allowed in just 10 1/3 innings and has coughed up 15 earned runs.

Torres, meanwhile, is a sturdy veteran pen arm who is capable of pitching multiple innings. The 35-year-old, who joined the Nats organization on a minors deal just before the start of the season, has thrown more than fifty MLB innings in every season since the 2012 campaign and has a 3.73 ERA in 449 total innings in that span. He has thrown five scoreless and hitless innings at Triple-A thus far in 2018.

AL East Notes: Mallex, Red Sox, Cashner, Yanks, Donaldson

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The Rays are preparing to give a long look at outfielder Mallex Smith, as Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times writes. As he nears his 25th birthday, Smith has upped his offensive game, with a .373/.418/.510 batting line. Though he’s carrying an unsustainable .432 BABIP, it’s notable that Smith has been striking out at a meager 12.5% clip. With Kevin Kiermaier just starting a lengthy DL stint, there’s little reason not to see whether Smith can stake a claim to an everyday job. Topkin also covers some of the other players who could see additional opportunities due to the loss of Kiermaier.

Here’s more from the rest of the AL East:

  • Red Sox president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski gave an honest answer when  asked by Jason Mastrodonato of the Boston Herald whether he foresaw the team’s unbelievable start to the season. “We thought the capabilities were there,” said Dombrowski. “But for me to say we expected it to this point, that would be a bit much.” Still, he did acknowledge that he and the rest of the front office truly believed that last year’s tepid run production would turn around, with or without the addition of J.D. Martinez. Sox fans will want to read the entire piece, which gives an interesting look at all the things going right in Boston at the moment.
  • The story isn’t quite the same in Baltimore, where the Orioles are off to a miserable opening run. One bright spot has been Andrew Cashner, one of several offseason pitching additions. Jon Meoli of the Baltimore Sun examines whether his 3.00 ERA through 24 innings — which follows a 3.40 mark in 166 2/3 frames last year — could be sustainable despite still-middling peripherals. Skipper Buck Showalter seems to believe that Cashner has matured as a pitcher and “came into his own last year.” He says he’s “hoping that we’re going to reap the benefits of that” over the full course of the current season. Of course, as Meoli explains, there are certainly some reasons not to buy in.
  • Relief pitching was expected to be an overwhelming strength for the Yankees in 2018, but Marc Carig of The Athletic writes (subscription link) that there are some cracks in the pen. Beyond just short-term struggles with results, the Yanks have seen cause for deeper concern with some pitchers. In particular, Dellin Betances has shown a bit of a velo drop and, perhaps more worryingly, reduced spin rate. There are similar issues for Tommy Kahnle, who is now on the DL after not looking capable of sustaining his 2017  breakout in the early going.
  • The Blue Jays have received generally promising news on star third baseman Josh Donaldson, as Shi Davidi of Sportsnet.ca tweets. Skipper John Gibbons says that, though Donaldson isn’t going to be ready to come back after the minimum ten-day stint, he has resumed throwing and is feeling “great.” The real question, though, is whether Donaldson will be able to throw without limitation after showing reduced form early in the season.

Red Sox Activate Drew Pomeranz

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The Red Sox announced that they’ve activated left-hander Drew Pomeranz from the 10-day disabled list. Righty Marcus Walden was optioned to Triple-A Pawtucket to open a space on the active roster for Pomeranz’s return.

Pomeranz, 29, has been on the shelf all season thanks to a forearm issue he sustained in Spring Training, but he’ll return to the mound for tonight’s series opener in Oakland. He’ll step into the final spot in the rotation alongside Chris Sale, David Price, Rick Porcello and Eduardo Rodriguez, with Hector Velazquez moving to the bullpen now that Boston’s projected starting five is at full strength.

[Related: Boston Red Sox depth chart]

The 2018 campaign will be a pivotal one for Pomeranz, who’ll qualify for free agency for the first time in his career at season’s end. Pomeranz took some time to establish himself as a quality big league piece after being selected with the fifth overall pick in the 2010 draft. Originally drafted by Cleveland, he was traded to the Rockies as part of the Ubaldo Jimenez swap 14 months later. Pomeranz never put things together in Colorado, but his career took off after being dealt to the A’s prior to the 2014 season.

After a pair of quality seasons spent more as a reliever than a starter, Pomeranz stepped into the Padres’ rotation on a full-time basis in 2016 and hasn’t looked back. Over the past two seasons, he’s tossed 344 1/3 innings of 3.32 ERA ball with 9.4 K/9, 3.5 BB/9, 1.1 HR/9 and a 44.5 percent ground-ball rate. He’s yet to top the 180-inning mark at any point in his career, but if he can make another 29 to 30 starts in Boston this season, he should have no shortage of interested parties when free agency rolls around in November.

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