Writings on baseball by Matt Barnard and Dan Stein.

Baldwin up and starting, Yates down
 
James Baldwin is scheduled to start tonight for the Mets, having been called up yesterday with the demotion of Tyler Yates. I haven't watched much Met baseball yet this season as I just arrived in New York, but the one start of Yates's I saw (April 9th against the Expos) was pretty good - he gave up just five hits over six innings, allowing no runs or walks and striking out four in his first major league appearance. Of course the Expos have been a brutal offensive team all year, which makes the performance look a lot less impressive in retrospect than it did at the time.

Yates earned his demotion with three crappy outings (4/14 vs. ATL, 4/30 vs. SD, 5/8 vs. MIL) in his first six. Having only started one game in his first five years playing professional ball, Yates started 23 times at three different levels last year but only lasted a total of 107.1 innings (that's including three relief appearances in the Florida State League). I don't have the breakdown of his numbers at A-level St. Lucie, but he averaged five innings or less a start at both AA Binghamton and AAA Norfolk. Expecting him to be able to thrive as a starter (able to pitch effectively deep into ballgames) was kind of unrealistic, and really didn't make much sense given that Jae Seo, who was a reliable, adequate starter in 2003, didn't even make the team out of spring training.

Of course, the Mets knew their pitching staff wasn't deep, as even their intended top three (Al Leiter, Tom Glavine and Steve Trachsel) were question marks either due to age and/or recent performance (Trachsel was probably the surest bet). So they went out and signed several guys off the scrap heap like Scott Erickson, one-time Yankee Randy Keisler and James Baldwin. Erickson, as you probably know, made the rotation out of spring training but got hurt (again) just before his first start on April 8th vs. the Braves. Keisler's pitching at Norfolk, where he was a teammate of Baldwin's until yesterday. Baldwin's been decent at AAA (a 3-2 record with a 2.90 ERA over five starts and 31 innings), but nowhere near as good as Matt Ginter's been (a 1.30 ERA over five starts and 27.2 innings, including a sparkling 24/3 strikeout-to-walk ratio).

Baldwin's apparently got an out in his contract that he can exercise at the end of May, so maybe it behooves the Mets to take a look at what they've got. But this is a guy who has started 200 games and pitched over 1200 innings at the major league level - there's not a whole lot of question about what kind of a pitcher Baldwin is. He's a 32-year old, back-of-the-rotation guy who allows way too many baserunners and doesn't appear to be showing any improvement as he ages. So why waste time with him at all? If he wants to leave at the end of the month, wish him well. I don't mean to suggest that someone like Matt Ginter is the answer (Aaron Heilman, who pitched very well this spring might be a better one), but the chances of Baldwin being a contributor to this Mets team are pretty slim.
posted by VZW Watcher at 3:22 PM -