26
2012
Zack Wheeler Will Be In Starting Rotation on Opening Day 2013
An article by 
2012 may not be over yet, but everyone is already looking ahead to 2013 and beyond, for a glimmer of hope. One of those glimmers is starting pitcher Zack Wheeler. Deemed a savior by Mets fans, the Mets organization doesn’t seem to be in much of a hurry to throw him into the New York limelight. Well it seems time is running out.
The Mets will have no choice but to have Wheeler in the opening day starting rotation. The Mets fans are tired of waiting. Wheeler is ready. Starting him in Triple A next season is doing him a disservice, the team a disservice, and the fans a disservice. The Mets made a mistake not making him a September call up, although it’s understandable that he had already reached his innings max, and they didn’t want to overwork him.
Wheeler has said he thinks it is a long shot for him to make the starting rotation in 2013. I’m not sure if he is just being modest, or that is the message he is getting from the Mets organization.
If it’s the message the Mets are sending this kid, then I am scratching my head. Wheeler has the makeup to be the ace of the staff – he works with a 90-95mph fastball which has wicked movement (in on right-handed hitters, away to left-handed hitters), he has an elite curveball, and a changeup which is considered below average right now, but could develop over time.
If the Mets are opting to keep him in Triple A for him to develop his changeup, they will be making a huge mistake. Also, and most importantly, Wheeler is not afraid to pitch inside. In fact, he has exhibited better command when pitching inside – I’m starting to love this kid already (scouting report information from www.projectprospect.com).
The 2013 rotation would be pretty formidable with Wheeler in the mix. Here is how I project the starting rotation on opening day next season:
- RA Dickey
- Matt Harvey
- Johan Santana
- Jon Niese
- Zack Wheeler
Dillon Gee will be edged out by Zack Wheeler in spring training, but it will only be a matter of time before he has to fill in for Santana, who doesn’t seem to be able to stay healthy anymore.
The Mets would also be wise to have Gee come out of the bullpen initially, due to the severity of his injury in 2012. They will bring him along slowly and it will leave the door wide open for Wheeler to rise to the occasion. Once he gets his foot in that door, I don’t think he’s ever going to look back.
The starting pitching doesn’t seem like it’s going to be a problem in 2013. The problems still lie in the bullpen and the outfield. Zack Wheeler being in the starting rotation won’t solve all the Mets woes, but it’s a start. Dickey was dynamite in 2012; Santana gave us our first no-hitter; Harvey gave us hope; Wheeler will be to the Mets, what Luke Skywalker was for the Jedi – a new beginning.
Thoughts from Joe D.
When Jim Callis of Baseball America floated that idea last week, I thought he was just trying to get a rise out of Mets fans. But the more I consider the current topography we find ourselves in, the more I’m starting to believe that the fifth spot in the rotation is Wheeler’s to lose and not Wheeler’s to gain.
There will be no sexy names coming to Flushing this offseason. There’s a good chance that either David Wright or R.A. Dickey or even both won’t be back. The Mets have no trade chips to speak of aside from those two. The fans have already had their say with what they think of this team and it’s direction after a third straight decline in attendance and performance. All arrows are pointing down.
Can the Mets really host the 2013 All Star Game with a No-Star roster?
Wheeler may not be ready, but he would inject some excitement to what already looks like another dull and unexciting team in the works for the 2013 season.
One day Alderson says there will be wholesale changes, and then yesterday he admits it will be complicated to achieve that. What gives?
Yes, Wheeler will be in the 2013 starting rotation, if only to create some buzz for a team that is running out of breath, interest, and cash-paying fans.
About the Author: Mitch Petanick
Mitch is currently an Editor and Minor League Analyst for Mets Merized Online. His baseball experience includes being a former All-Conference collegiate baseball player who had numerous professional tryouts, and he is currently a hitting instructor. He has been involved with the game of baseball for over 30 years now as a player, coach, and consultant. Mitch is also a former Featured Columnist on Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @FirstPitchMitch.
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NL East Standings
| Team | W | L | Pct. | GB |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Braves | 24 | 18 | .571 | - |
| Nationals | 23 | 20 | .535 | 1.5 |
| Phillies | 20 | 23 | .465 | 4.5 |
| Mets | 16 | 24 | .400 | 7.0 |
| Marlins | 11 | 32 | .256 | 13.5 |
Last updated: 05/18/2013
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of course they have a choice. and if the FO has shown anything, it is that they are going to be careful with bringing a guy up, and not do it because the fans are clamoring. so if it makes sense to start him at AAA (to finish working on development, manage his workload, or look to gain an extra year of control from Arb), then he will start in AAA. Could easily be up by June, but he won’t be on the OD roster just because they need to throw something to the fans, or because of the ASG.
Agreed, this idea that they need to appease fans stuff is exactly why we are in the mess we are in. Stop worrying about the fans and build a good baseball team.
I also agree that Wheeler will not start the season in the rotation. As long as Gee and Johan are healthy that is… big if. If they are then Wheeler will go down to AAA and will be back in Citi before temperatures spike in Vegas.
Five days after the fans were clamoring for Harvey and a day after the front office said he wasn’t ready, Harvey was promoted. If he wasn’t ready, why did he get promoted if not to appease the fans and sell a few extra tickets including to me who made sure I got to see him for his first Citi Field start?
There isn’t much development going on at Triple A – Triple A is usually a short stop before hitting the bigs as you adjust to slightly better hitters. The biggest jump comes from single a to double a. Triple a is similar to a holding pattern like planes waiting to land in the airport…players waiting for a hole to open up. Two more months in triple a won’t do anything for his development.
Triple A in Vegas now.
Wonder how much you have to adjust the numbers for pitching in that stadium?
Making excuses already for in case he gets bombed again in triple A as he was getting towards the end?? You’re very sneaky i might add.. You’re very good at your craft..
Now you pointed that out, as soon as he gets bombed you’d blame it on the park. however, if he does well, you can gloat about how amazing he is putting up good numbers while pitching in a hitter’s park…
I kinda got you figure out you know… Very clever though
Nope, not making excuses, just asking an honest question.
All I keep reading is how you have to rate on a curve for all power hitters in Las Vegas and most pitchers pitching in that home stadium. Just wondering what the criteria is…..
Let me put this politely, Alex……get off my lawn.
I will… As soon as your leader gets off mine… Ito quote him “IF you don’t like to be called out for what you write here then don’t comment here”.. There.
What is this mythical world you live in Alex where people are in super hero groups as adults and are lead by their fearless leader vs their arch nemesis?
SRT – Gary C and Ron D were having that exact conversation the other day in the booth, how it will have an effect on both pitchers and hitters numbers.
I missed that conversation but I have read concerns about this.
Kind of annoys me that they wound up in Vegas to begin with. It’s really a shame that they didn’t/couldn’t stay in Norfolk. I have friends down there that attended many games over the years there and were highly pissed off when that lease came to an end and they couldn’t renew. Heard DWright mention growing up attending games in Norfolk too last night.
Mejia in the BP to start the 2010 season comes to mind….
Desperate times call for desperate measures. They already rushed Harvey 5 levels in 18 months. But he was such a great draft selection he hit the ground running. I’m sure after his first start you could hear a collective “whew” from the Mets executive offices. Wheeler will be here, I have no doubt.
well, he was a college senior draftee, so he should move quicker. And he earned it.
but still, remember all the angst from some quarters when the mets did not put him in the rotation out of ST, and later when they wanted to give him some more time to finish developing in AAA?
Odds are they do the same with Wheeler.
Yep, these are desperate times. Everyday Alderson sings a new tune. He sounds like other GM’s before him who knew they were on their way out lately. GM’s have always rushed their top prospects if there was a chance it would save their asses or extend their stay. This wouldn’t be the first time.
Put it in the books.
Putting Gee in the bullpen would be an upgrade as a side benefit. Pretty sure Young will not be back now that he will command $5M+ guaranteed. I could see this.
Wheeler will be with the clubs.. Question is when? June? July? I would love to see him in april as most fans, but i think they wanna see him get a few starts in triple A and make sure he doesn’t struggle before calling him up.. IT’d be nice to see him in ST though..
I don’t see him on the roster to start the season at all. He will get called up, but it will be as soon as they do not have to worry about super 2 status.
‘Can the Mets really host the 2013 All Star Game with a No-Star roster?’
This would be embarrassing indeed.
I have no problem giving him a chance to earn a spot and having him on the 40 man roster, but there is no way he’s a first pick to be on the team Opening Day.
Santana
Dickey
Niese
Harvey
Gee (if healthy)/McHugh/Familia/Mejia/Hampson/
Wheeler > Gee (if healthy)/McHugh/Familia/Mejia/Hampson/
If he has a great spring you bring him up north.
He is certainly more talented. It is just a matter of if he is ready. Has he hit the proper bench marks or shown the right people that his talent has translated enough into ability to get bumped up to the majors?
That’s not to say I am totally against the idea. If he shows up in Spring training and blows propel away, why not?
I hope Wheeler is better than any of these 5th spot candidates.
I am still waiting for somebody to come in and call you out for that vile venemous comment you made… Ohhh, no wait.. SA got Zack wheeler so is fine.. Never mind
How come almost everything I read questions Dillon Gee? Going into this season we didnt think hed make the team and same goes for next year. What has he done to warrant not being in the starting rotation? For a 4-5 starter, hes pretty dang good if you ask me and could be a 3 on most teams. If anything, Santana should be the one vying for a spot on the team, not Gee. I know that Johan is getting a lot of money to not start, but I think Gee deserves it more. Yes I think Gee should wait a bit to see if his arm is ok, but I think he deserves his spot in the rotation. Wheeler can come in when Santana or somebody else goes down, not start the season
He had a pretty serious injury
I think we’re better off with gee for the first half to up his trade value. Then we bring up Wheeler and trade Gee for an outfielder.
Also, Wheelers fastball is more like 94-97 than 90-95(no idea where you got that from)
He works with 90-95 but can get it up to 97 when necessary – and where I got it from is also credited in the article
my bad, I didn’t see that you got it from projectprospect. but that scouting report is still really outdated.
Yeah it was from awhile back but I don’t think it’s changed much since then
Off Topic: WFAN just mentioned a rumor going around about Frank Francisco may be needing Tommy John surgery.
Interesting….
Wonder if that’s just speculation on their part or if they know something we don’t.
I know FF has been sidelined with swelling/soreness, but this is the first I’ve heard of possible TJ surgery.
If ture, that certainly changes the complexion of that BP next season.
*If true
Nope. Wrong. Incorrect. Not accurate. Simply put, there’s no reason whatsoever to think that this is the case, and there’s no reason for smart fans to even want it to be the case.
Starting him in Triple A would be doing him a disservice? If he’s not ready (and let’s be real, the front office is more qualified to be making that call than you are), then bringing him up because some fans are demanding it is certainly not doing him any favors. It’d be doing the team a disservice? A, we don’t even know if this guy will be any good in the big leagues yet, and B, we already have a pretty good option in Dillon Gee (who the doctors say will be fully ready to go without any problems come next year). It’d be doing the fans a disservice? It’d be doing us a disservice if they did stupid things simply because we wanted them to; I’d rather they take their time and bring him up when he’s ready to be great than bring him up early just for some excitement and then have to see him struggle.
Yes, Wheeler has terrific stuff. Plenty of pitchers have terrific stuff. But that’s not a guarantee that he’s going to be a star, or even any good at all. He still has things he needs to work on. Particularly, his control; he averaged 4.4 BB/9 in his short amount of time in Triple A. That’s way too much. And even if you wanted to make the argument that he’s ready, if you’ve been paying attention to this front office at all, you’d know that they don’t rush prospects. What have you seen from them in these past two years that makes you think they’d promote their biggest prospect to the show after just seven AAA starts?
It might be easy to get excited about what Harvey did and think that Wheeler will just come up and do the same thing, but there’s no guarantee of that. Having as much success as Harvey did that quickly is not a common thing. And we’re not in a position where we have to rush him, considering our rotation is not looking like it’ll be an issue. So why do it? For some brief level of excitement that will immediately go away if he struggles? No thank you.
As I stated in a previous comment
Mitch Petanick (Edit) September 26, 2012 at 11:09 am
There isn’t much development going on at Triple A – Triple A is usually a short stop before hitting the bigs as you adjust to slightly better hitters. The biggest jump comes from single a to double a. Triple a is similar to a holding pattern like planes waiting to land in the airport…players waiting for a hole to open up. Two more months in triple a won’t do anything for his development.
That’s nice. It doesn’t change anything that I said, though. THIS PARTICULAR front office will not rush prospects, even through Triple A. You can spend hours making the case for why it’d be okay for them to do so, they still won’t do it.
Starting pitching is nice but we need players who can actually hit.
By the way, that is the wrong sequence. This would be the right one with those same pitchers.
Dickey
Santana
Harvey
Niese
Wheeler
It avoids having 2 LH starters back to back.
As far as Wheeler making the team to start the season I think as things stand today he would have to have a lights out Spring to do so. In other words he will have to force the Mets hand into adding him.
Agreed….not a shabby starting rotation. But with this non-existent offense and no wholesale changes coming, payroll staying where it is, and no real trade chips for anyone at the major league level, here’s where I can see their numbers when the 2013 season concludes:
1.RA Dickey 15 -13 ERA 3.05
2.Matt Harvey 12 -12 ERA 3.50
3.Johan Santana 7-12 ERA 5.80 (On DL half the season)
4.Jon Niese 15-14 ERA 2.95
5.Zack Wheeler 9 -12 ERA 4.30
The starting staff will pitch their hearts out, have ERA’s consistent with 20 game winners, but lose 1-0, 2-1 games all year long. Or leave games with lead, only to have the bullpen blow it for them. What a shame. What a waste.
Watchman, nice going with it.. I don’t think we’ll see wheeler winning as many games nor losing as many, his ERA i do kinda agree though, however, you’re in for a surprise when i tell you Niese and Ike will combine for more than 30+ wins and less than 20 losses..
Not bad, I for one do not expect 19 starts out of Johan much less 19 decisions. I also do not think Wheeler gets a full season but when he does come up hitters will not be used to him yet, just as Harvey so I expect his ERA to be in the 3.00′s. I would not be surprised to see Harvey’s take a slight uptick while he adjust to hitters adjusting to him. That would certainly be an improvement from Niese as well.
Aw…now you’ve ruined it for everybody. This means we can’t get our hopes up by the Mets 1st half surge because you told us how it ends!
No mention of Young? He may cost less than most relievers.
All this says to me is this offseason is the time to eat a ton of salary and trade Santana to someone who is willing to take a chance on him.
You won’t get a lot but maybe you don’t need to get much at all!
Even if all you got is another mediocre arm to throw in the bullpen that would be enough.
Santana has the ability to regain his form but even if he did he does not play into any Met plans past next year.
And while I can see giving Wheeler some starts in AAA next year to get everything all worked out and MLB ready I don’t see any reason to hold him back from taking his place in the rotation in hopes that Santana (or someone else) goes down.
Sandy’s job will be hanging in the balance next season so he might as well play the only card he has brought here and hope to stay employed.
Because if Wheeler doesn’t make this team a winner all this WAITING everyone has been doing will be for naught and there wuill be nothing more worth waiting for because Sandy hasn’t gotten anything BUT Wheeler to improve this team!
I wouldn’t be shocked if Wheeler impresses beyond people’s expectations in ST and wins a rotation spot. It’s been said since the middle of the season, when Wheeler was dominating AA with a sub 2 ERA (and before tinkering with his stuff again that backfired), he was deemed ML ready. He’s right where Harvey was last season.
I’m not as confident as everyone else penciling in Santana & Dickey in next season’s Opening Day rotation. What if one, or both are dealt and we wind up getting some more young blood (I.E. Pomeranz?) and/or a veteran starter (I.E. Haren, Peavy, etc.)? I’m not buying all the hoopla about Santana, Dickey & Bay staying put.
Good read Mitch,
For everyone that states no way, There’s always a way, injuries, trades, performance…
I just want him pitching because he’s 1 of the 5 best starters we have whether it’s opening day roster or early May.
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