Trevor Williams Is Quietly Excelling In His New Role

The New York Mets prized acquisition at last year’s trade deadline was Javier Báez. In that deal made on July 30th, New York sent prospect Pete Crow-Armstrong — who is now regarded by some as a top-100 prospect in baseball — to Chicago. The last asset of that trade that is sometimes forgotten is pitcher Trevor Williams. He, along with Báez, was sent back to New York.

Williams has quietly been a solid get for New York. He has appeared in 18 games as a Met, starting six of them. The 30-year-old has pitched to a 3.60 ERA and a more impressive 3.07 FIP across his 55 innings since the trade. He has done a nice job of limiting walks and using his control to induce soft contact.

The right-hander is arguably enduring the best season of his seven-year MLB career. Five of his eight outings this year have been scoreless. And although a less than stellar 4.37 ERA, a deeper dive into his numbers paint an effective pitcher who has experienced some poor luck. Williams has a career-low xERA of only 2.65 this season. His FIP of 3.58 is also much less than his actual ERA, further showing evidence of some bad luck.

So, why has Williams been effective? And just how effective as he been? As the above snippet from Baseball Savant shows, he has been doing a lot well. The origin of his success has been limiting hard contact. This, along with his tremendous control (92nd percentile BB%), has resulted in his expected analytics being extremely strong.

As you can see when watching Williams pitch, his game is based on locating his pitches correctly. He does a good job of avoiding the meat of the plate by mixing his four main pitches on the edges and corners of the zone. Williams works his four-seam fastball in different areas, but does a good job of keeping his changeup, slider, and sinker on distinct parts of home plate.

All this has resulted in him being able to limit his walk rate and induce the soft contact. As mentioned above, his ERA of 4.37 does not exactly paint a flattering picture. However, a deeper dive into his numbers show an effective pitcher. If he keeps throwing how he has been, his actual ERA is bound to decrease.

Given New York’s current situation, Williams does not need to be anything spectacular. He just needs to give the Mets a chance to win whenever he is thrown out there. So far he has done exactly that.

Williams is scheduled to Tuesday’s matchup against the Washington Nationals. It will be a good test to see if he can continue his good work as Washington’s offense currently ranks fifth in the MLB in batting average.