Proper-hander Seth Lugo reached free company for the primary time in his profession final week and has already drawn loads of early curiosity as groups start charting their offseason gameplan. Will Sammon of The Athletic reports that greater than a dozen groups — however not the Mets, but — have reached out to Lugo. That shouldn’t be stunning for a persistently strong setup man, however what’s extra fascinating is Sammon’s be aware that a few of these golf equipment have expressed curiosity in placing Lugo again right into a rotation.
Lugo, 33 this week, has bounced between the Mets’ rotation and bullpen at varied occasions in his profession however has been a full-time reliever in every of the previous two seasons. In that point, Lugo sports activities a 3.56 ERA with a pointy 26.6% strikeout price, a 7.9% stroll price and a 44% ground-ball price. He’s averaged 94.4 mph on his heater in that point, and Lugo often sits close to or on the very prime of leaderboards for the spin price on his curveball. Since 2018, FanGraphs’ run values peg Lugo’s fastball because the fifth-most valuable four-seamer amongst 279 certified relievers; his curveball ranks seventh, simply behind Ryan Pressly.
Usually talking, Lugo has been a quietly efficient member of the Mets’ bullpen for the majority of his time as a reliever. In precisely 300 profession innings out of the bullpen, the right-hander’s ERA sits at 2.91. He’s fanned 27.9% of his opponents and walked 6.9% of them, relying totally on that fastball/curveball pairing but additionally mixing in a sinker, occasional slider and a really seldom used changeup (which has been notably uncommon in latest seasons).
That blend of 4 to 5 pitches, nonetheless, is probably going what provides some groups the idea that Lugo might discover success in a return to a lengthier function. It’s additionally value mentioning that whereas Lugo struggled immensely as a starter in 2020, his total physique of labor popping out of the rotation is strong. He’s thrown 194 innings as a beginning pitcher within the Majors and pitched to a 4.35 ERA in that point. His 20.9% strikeout price as a beginning pitcher is way decrease than his 27.9% mark out of the ’pen, however his 6.3% stroll price is barely higher than his 6.9% price as a reliever.
Lugo would possibly’ve caught within the Mets’ rotation for the lengthy haul have been it not for some well being points that cropped up early in his large league tenure. Most notably, he was diagnosed with a “slight” tear in his proper elbow’s ulnar collateral ligament again in 2017. Any tearing of the UCL, even in minor instances, results in concern of Tommy John surgical procedure. Nevertheless, Lugo acquired a platelet-rich plasma injection within the elbow on the time, opted for relaxation and rehab fairly than surgical procedure, and has not incurred subsequent points together with his elbow ligament. Even in 2021, when he underwent surgical procedure to take away a bone spur from his elbow, Lugo indicated that upon inspecting the MRI outcomes to diagnose the spur, his surgeon “was actually impressed with how [the UCL] wound up” (link via MLB.com’s Anthony DiComo).
Lugo tossed simply 65 innings in 2022 and has a career-high of 101 1/3 innings pitched — a complete he reached in each 2017 and in 2018. As such, it’s honest to query simply what sort of workload he would possibly be capable to construct as much as in 2023 if he certainly opts to signal as a beginning pitcher. That mentioned, there are absolutely loads of groups additionally eyeing Lugo in what has turn out to be his conventional late-inning setup function — one wherein he’s thrived over the previous a number of years. Curiosity as a starter might properly show to be a moot level, but it surely’s a very good reminder of the outside-the-box strategy that a variety of golf equipment will take with regards to constructing out their rotations.
