David Stearns discusses when Christian Scott could come up, state of Mets' rotation
The Mets’ starting rotation has been very up-and-down to start this season.
There have been some bright spots along the way, such as the ascension of Jose Butto and the early season success of Luis Severino, but there have also been some negatives with this group.
The over-lying issue early this season has been their inability to work deep into ballgames, ultimately leading to the bullpen being overworked night in and night out less than a month into the regular season.
Mets President of Baseball Operations David Stearns addressed that issue and many others while speaking with reporters before Monday’s series opener with the Chicago Cubs at Citi Field.
“This isn’t terribly unusual in April,” he said. “We’ve had a couple of games where we’ve given up a bunch of runs early but our guys have been able to get us into the fourth or fifth inning so it doesn’t tax the pen, but sure we’d like to see our guys get a bit deeper.”
One of those pitchers in particular has been right-hander Adrian Houser, who has struggled mightily since being acquired in an offseason trade with the Milwaukee Brewers.
Houser has passed the fifth inning just once across his first five outings as a Met, and after allowing six more runs against the Cardinals this weekend, he’s pitched to a brutal 8.37 ERA and 1.90 WHIP over that span.
Despite that, Stearns reiterated that the team believes in the veteran and his ability to turn things around moving forward.
"House has a track record in this league,” he said. “I’ve seen him do it for a long time and I’ve also seen him go through some challenging stretches and be able to battle through it, so I certainly think he’ll work his way through this.”
The pressure certainly will be on for Houser to turn things around in a hurry there are numerous reinforcements are on the way for the starting rotation.
“[Tylor] Megill, [Kodai] Senga, and [David] Peterson are on the way back. Max Kranick is now in Triple-A and a couple of the prospects are throwing the ball well in Triple-A, so we have the emergence of some depth there that we thought we’d have coming into the season which is good,” Stearns said.
Among those prospects throwing the ball well is right-hander Christian Scott, who has been spectacular thus far down in Triple-A.
After impressing in big-league camp this spring training, the 25-year-old’s struck out a whopping 36 batters while posting a strong 3.20 ERA over his first five outings.
Scott’s done just about everything the Mets could’ve hoped and expected and it sounds like he could be toeing the Citi Field rubber before you know it.
“I think there’s this balancing act of when you call up a prospect versus of when is the prospect ready and then when is there the major league need and often those need to overlap and intersect and for some guys down there we’re just waiting for that intersection to occur," Stearns said.
