In today's newsletter from Baseball HQ --

Can Wacha rebound? ... Michael Wacha (RHP, TAM) had a rough season with the Mets, as once again battled shoulder issues, and he posted an ugly 6.62 ERA in eight appearances (seven starts) that totaled 34 innings. After landing in Tampa on a one-year deal, do the skills show any hope for a bounceback season?

Year   IP   ERA/xERA   BB%/K%  xBB%   SwK   Vel    G/L/F   H%/S%  HR/F  xHR/F  BPX


====  ===  =========  =======  ====  ====  ====  ========  =====  ====  =====  ===


2016  138  5.09/4.30   7%/19%   8%    8.7  93.2  47/24/30  34/67   12%   13%    95


2017  166  4.13/3.99   8%/23%  10%   10.0  95.1  48/21/31  33/72   12%   12%   120


2018   84  3.20/4.24  10%/20%  11%   10.2  93.5  43/29/27  26/78   14%   18%    62


2019  127  4.76/4.99  10%/19%  10%   10.1  93.1  48/22/30  32/76   22%   22%    58


2020   34  6.62/4.53   4%/24%   8%   12.0  93.6  36/23/41  39/64   20%   15%   112

Don't dismiss the possibility of Wacha holding some value in 2021:

• He recorded the highest SwK of his career and highest K% since his debut back in 2013. Scrapping the curve and throwing more changeups (22% SwK in '20) led to more whiffs, but the right-hander hasn't found another pitch he can be consistently effective with.
• He dished out fewer free passes than ever before, though the sample was quite small, and xBB% was more in line with his career norms. 
• Wacha allowed fly balls at a career-high rate in 2020, which, combined with a 16th percentile Hard Hit % led to some issues with the long ball. 
• There's no denying he was pretty unlucky last season. His ERA was more than two runs higher than xERA, as H% and S% fortunes worked against him, and HR/F was quite a bit higher than xHR/F.

Wacha's surface stats were awful in 2020, but beneath the hood, the skills showed some signs of life, particularly the jump in swings and misses. He can't be counted on for a real heavy workload, as he has a history of shoulder problems, and he topped four innings in just three of his seven starts a season ago. But Wacha would seem to be a logical choice to come in after an opener, a role the Rays often deploy, at which point he wouldn't have to go a full five frames to qualify for a win. He doesn't offer a great deal of upside, but if the SwK gains hold, Wacha could turn a decent profit on his draft day cost, which is very low at this point (489 NFBC Draft Champions ADP in January). 

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And, of course, the Rays have access to many, many more peripherals. No one will be surprised if they coax a respectable year out of him.

The Fangraphs peripherals show I slightly above-average fastball, a slightly lower than average exit velocity, a significantly higher than average hard-hit rate and a terrible HR/FB.

MLB averages in the Benchmarks thread.

Michael Wacha (P) TB - Dec. 18

https://www.rotowire.com/baseball/player.php?id=762087

Wacha signed a one-year, $3 million contract with the Rays on Friday, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times reports.

ROTOWIRE RECOMMENDS: The Rays' reputation is such that it's generally safe to assume that if they want a player, he's probably better than he seems. In Wacha's case, his 6.62 ERA in 34 innings for the Mets last season came with a solid set of peripherals, as he struck out 23.7 percent of opposing batters while walking a career-low 4.5 percent. He did also see his groundball rate plummet from 48.0 percent in 2019 to 35.5 percent in 2020, however. Still, there's enough there to suggest that he should have a decent chance to carve out a successful season as a back-end starter or in whatever creative role the innovative Rays elect to deploy him. 

Fangraphs: FB 43% FBv 93.6 EV 87.9 HardHit 44% HR/FB 21% LD%+ 108 FIP 5.25