If you happen to’re a Milwaukee Brewers fan, you in all probability know the amount and high quality of Colin Rea’s work the previous two seasons. Final season, solely 58 pitchers certified for the ERA title, and Rea was amongst them. Over the previous two seasons, Rea is second amongst Brewers pitchers in begins, innings, wins, and strikeouts, trailing solely Freddy Peralta in these classes.
If you happen to’re not a Brewers fan, you might need seen the information that Rea signed with the Cubs and thought, “Oh, is that this man the Padres tried to commerce with a torn UCL? Is he again from Japan?”
In an offseason outlined by the shortage of beginning pitching, it’s a bit jarring to see a starter signal for one yr and $5 million. Particularly one who simply threw 167 2/3 innings in 2024. There aren’t sufficient of these guys in all the league for each group to have two. Roughly 15 occasions as many individuals summited Mt. Everest in 2024 as certified for the most important league ERA title. And Rea bought simply $5 million? What provides?
Let’s say you wish to signal a beginning pitcher to a one-year contract. Which is all of the Cubs actually need, if we’re being sincere. They let Kyle Hendricks stroll, however in addition they introduced over Cody Poteet within the Cody Bellinger commerce; once I wrote about that deal again in December, I discussed that the Cubs didn’t actually appear to wish Poteet all that a lot.
With the caveat that you may by no means have an excessive amount of beginning pitching, Chicago’s rotation does appear fairly deep. The Cubs are returning 4 pitchers who threw 130 or extra innings final yr; a few of them — Justin Steele, Shota Imanaga, perhaps Jameson Taillon — are fairly good. I don’t assume there’s a bona fide ace in there, however you may begin these guys in a playoff recreation.
Talking of beginning playoff video games, the Cubs additionally added lefty Matthew Boyd. The veteran made solely eight regular-season begins in 2024, however he took the rubber in three postseason video games for the Guardians. By the way, the Cubs’ rotation collectively has the identical playoff report as 2024 Boyd — three begins, zero wins — throughout the previous seven seasons.
Add in Javier Assad — whom I like, at the same time as I enter Yr Three of ready for the opposite shoe to drop — and there’s your five-man rotation. And if any of these guys get harm or neglect tips on how to throw strikes, Chicago has one other rotation’s price of depth, starting from guys who personal a glove and have presumably seen a jar of giardiniera in individual (Poteet, Jordan Wicks) to precise prospects like Cade Horton.
Would signing somebody like Jack Flaherty make the Cubs higher? Definitely. Sufficient to justify the expense for a group that’s apparently prepared to combat Kyle Tucker for the final couple million {dollars} in arbitration? In all probability not.
I speculated that Poteet may very well be as little as tenth on the group’s beginning pitcher depth chart. Rea is best, and can possible be increased. However I doubt that Chicago’s Plan A entails Rea matching his 2024 innings whole. As a substitute, he’s an old-school no. 5 starter. Somebody to go five-and-dive as soon as every week, or fill in when harm or fatigue calls for it.
A confirmed front-end starter like Corbin Burnes, Blake Snell, or Max Fried prices within the $200 million vary on this market, and even then all of these guys have query marks. Second-tier starters with playoff expertise price in extra of $20 million a yr, typically on multi-year contracts. To get a beginning pitcher with any type of upside, the worth is a multi-year contract, $15 million a yr, or each. And that appears to contain taking up big threat when it comes to harm, age, and/or efficiency. Trevor Williams and Patrick Sandoval bought multi-year contracts.
If Rea possesses such upside, it’s not instantly apparent to me. He threw six pitches in 2024, and whereas he managed to place all kinds of motion on his varied choices, none of them stood out; PitchingBot rated all of them between 37 and 44 on the 20-80 scouting scale. Baseball Savant had all six pitches inside two runs of common. He managed an opponent wOBA underneath .250 solely on his sweeper, and a whiff fee over 25% solely on his splitter, although hitters slugged .492 general towards that pitch.
The one place Rea excelled was in command and management: He walked simply 6.0% of opponents. Which you may’ve guessed, as a result of guys who throw 92 and don’t miss bats solely get signed to main league contracts in the event that they throw strikes. (Guys who throw 92, don’t miss bats, and stroll a bunch of men are referred to as actual property brokers.) That 4.29 ERA and 4.75 FIP Rea posted in 2024 are in step with his numbers from 2023, and if he repeats the trick in 2025 I think about everybody can be glad.
That isn’t all that fascinating in a vacuum, but it surely’s yet one more illustration of how costly competent beginning pitching has change into.
A group that desires a no. 5 starter — or a no. 6 starter, given the form of contemporary pitcher utilization — will discover itself in a little bit of a bind. Mainly anybody with the capability to be greater than a no. 5 starter, if not homegrown, can have the leverage to demand an even bigger position and the wage that comes with it. You possibly can nonetheless discover a replacement-level pitcher fairly simply, however the starter who’s just a bit bit higher than that? To paraphrase the nice English poet Yusuf Islam: The primary win above substitute is the costliest.
To this point this offseason, 15 beginning pitchers who appeared within the majors final yr have signed one-year free agent contracts. Right here they’re, together with chosen 2024 stats and their projected 2025 WAR.
Innings Are Costly, Even in Bulk
So except you wish to stand vigil on the lighthouse ready for Adrian Houser to place all of it collectively, that is the market. And hey, a method to have a look at it’s that Rea was higher than Justin Verlander final season, in a a lot increased quantity, and the Cubs bought him for a 3rd of what the Giants paid Verlander. You realize what? Let’s take a look at it that means. That looks as if enjoyable.