Wilson Art?

The Cincinnati Reds signed pitcher Paul Wilson today to a 2-year, $4 M contract. This comes a couple of days after Cincinnati failed to obtain Brad Penny from the Marlins in the most recent three-way Bartolo Colon trade rumor. (Cincinnati nixed the deal due to fear of a Penny arm injury.) Here's what GM Jim Bowden had to say about the signing according to the AP:

"Paul has the ability to pitch 180 to 200 innings a year,'' Bowden said. "We felt it was important to add another proven starter to join Ryan Dempster, Jimmy Haynes and Danny Graves in the rotation.''

Well actually, Wilson has pitched four seasons in the majors and only in 2002 did he pitch over 180 innings (193.2 IP). As far as being a proven starter, he has only started 30 or more games in a season once (again 2002).

Lest you think that Wilson improved in 2002, his strikeouts per nine innings dropped by almost two (7.08 to 5.16), his poor WHIP (Walks Plus Hits Per Innings Pitched) went up slightly (1.43 to 1.48), and his strikeout-to-walk ratio dropped considerably (2.29 to 1.66). Add to this that Baseball-Reference.com lists an adjusted ERA for him that is 8% worse than the adjusted average each year, and you get a sub-par pitcher. He is a serviceable fourth starter but no more.

So why give him $4 M in this poor free agent market? The Reds are desperate for starting pitching. The fact that they consider Danny Graves a starter at all, shows you how desperate they are. Graves started four games last year. Those are the only four starts in his seven-year major-league career. He was 1-0 with a 1.90 ERA in those starts, but with such a small sample that tells you almost nothing.

Here are the totals for the starting pitchers used by Cincinnati last year:

NAME		GS	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9IP	K:BB	HR/9IP
Danny Graves	4	1	0	1.89	1.00	5.68	4.00	0.05
Elmer Dessens	30	7	8	3.03	1.25	4.70	1.90	0.13
Chris Reitsma	21	4	10	4.07	1.42	5.06	1.65	0.14
Jimmy Haynes	34	15	10	4.12	1.48	5.77	1.56	0.11
J. Fernandez	8	1	3	4.22	1.55	6.33	1.50	0.12
Joey Hamilton	17	3	7	5.56	1.61	5.56	1.40	0.11
Jose Rijo		9	4	4	5.84	1.48	4.23	1.62	0.18
Ryan Dempster	15	5	5	6.19	1.58	6.70	1.74	0.18
Brian Moehler	9	2	4	6.21	1.69	3.86	1.80	0.19
Shawn Estes	6	1	3	7.71	1.96	5.46	1.00	0.04
Jose Acevedo	5	3	2	7.77	1.73	5.32	1.18	0.36
Luis Pineda	2	1	0	8.44	2.44	8.44	0.71	0.19
Bruce Chen		1	0	1	11.25	2.00	11.25	2.50	0.25
C. Almanzar	1	0	1	40.50	4.50	0.00	0.00	0.00
Totals		162	47	58	4.69 	1.48	5.40	1.59	0.14

That was a pretty motley crew. Of those men, only Haynes, Dempster, Graves, Reitsma, and Chen remain (Rijo also re-signed but via a minor-league contract). Dessens was basically the staff leader, but he was sent off to the D-Backs this offseason. The staff leader title was apparently bestowed on Jimmy Haynes, who had a decent ERA (7% better than average) and won 15 games but wasn't spectacular by any means. Also, 2002 was Haynes' best season by far in his eight-year career. On average his ERA is 13% worse than the league average. Is that a staff leader?

Interestingly, Chris Reitsma, who had similar stats to Haynes, except for wins, was lifted from the rotation on September 9 in favor of Graves and apparently does not figure in the rotation plans for now.

It's odd that Dessens who had significantly better stats than Haynes (except for wins and K/9IP) and Reitsma who was statistically comparable to Haynes were both dropped, but Haynes was reatained as the staff ace. Perhaps it's not so odd given that the peerless Bob Boone is the Cincinnati manager.