Maybe That Mets Trade Wasn't Sooooo Bad...

The Scott Kazmir one. That trade is still horrible any way you want to slice it, but going forward is Scott Kazmir no longer going to torment Mets fans, at least for this year? Fangraphs thinks Kazmir is a broken pitcher right now.

They use great graphs like only they can, and make some great points. Kazmir used to throw his FB at around 92-93, this year it's at 89. His Slider was 84 MPH, this year it's 80. His K/9 has dropped the last few years, and his bb/9 has increased, obviously not good signs. His ERA is 6 on the nose and his BABIP is .316, his career BABIP is .317. He's likely pitched better than that 6 ERA, but really not much better, or at least luck hasn't really been much of a factor this year.

Those missing MPH are having a pretty big impact. Batters are making contact with 84% of the pitches Kazmir throws this year, way up from his 75% career average. In turn, his strikeouts are down, but he hasn’t been able to offset the loss of dominance with a corresponding improvement in his walk rate. His 4.91 BB/9 is the highest he’s posted since his rookie season.

Not surprisingly, this version of broken Kazmir isn’t very good. His FIP is 4.78 and last night’s beating pushed his ERA to 6.00. The Rays have David Price waiting in Triple-A, and with Kazmir looking like he needs a stint on the disabled list and an MRI, they might not be able to keep him down on the farm much longer. This Rays team needs a boost, and until they figure out what’s wrong with Kazmir, it doesn’t look like they’ll be getting it from his spot in the rotation.

From 2005-07 Kazmir really a special player when healthy, but last year he was just OK, pretty much a 5 inning pitcher. I believe something is wrong with Kazmir and I believe the Rays could find out that problem, but I'm not sure that they can fix it and have the Kazmir of old. He's always been kind of brittle, he's throws a lot of pitches, and his velocity has decreased across the boards, that doesn't add up to a resurgence to me.