Yesterday I did a little preview of the Minnesota Twins, and I was remiss in mentioning Scott Diamond, who is not in the rotation to start the year, but will make his way back, likely within the next couple of weeks and nudge either Cole De Vries or Liam Hendriks out. As I noted with Kyle Gibson, introducing Diamond to the rotation will serve to push that rotation’s spot from the 5 range to around 4.
The question that needs to be asked then is how effective Diamond will be. Perhaps we need only look to Vance Worley who came back from the same surgery (arthroscopic elbow surgery to remove a bone chip) last year. The recovery wasn’t as rocky as a Tommy John recovery, and Worley didn’t miss much time, but his statistical performance took a hit post-bone chip. It’s hard to believe that Diamond will come through unscathed.
Worley saw his strikeout rate drop and the home run rate increase slightly. He was also the victim of significantly worse luck, thanks in large part to the atrocious outfield that led the Phillies to acquire Ben Revere, so if we look at the reduction in FIP, an evaluation of only things he can control, we see that he was about half a run worse after the surgery.
That’s bad news for Scott Diamond. Diamond already doesn’t strike out many batters and has a home run rate that matches Worley post-surgery. Diamond also walked fewer batters than Worley, but in the Vanimal’s case, that was unaffected by his surgery. The entire point of all of this is that last year, post surgery, Vance Worley was a better pitcher than Scott Diamond was pre surgery. Assuming that Diamond heals in a similar manner as Worley, that’s bad news.
Diamond’s FIP last year was higher than Worley’s, but he was aided by the fact that he had a fantastic outfield. The outfield is less fantastic this year, and you can expect more balls to drop in the outfield or sneak past Trevor Plouffe than were snagged last year. Even if he was able to pitch at the same level as last year, his ERA would be a closer approximation to his FIP thanks to a weaker defense, giving him an ERA around 4. If you take the same half run drop that Worley had because of injury, Diamond might only be capable of a 4.50 Natural pessimism says it will be a hair lower than that as well.
Obviously, this assumes quite a bit. Will Scott Diamond heal the same was as Vance Worley? Perhaps not. Will the Twins be patient with him if his ERA is in the mid 4’s? There are a lot of players in the system now that can match that. This year’s top pitcher will likely not be Scott Diamond. Maybe Vance Worley is due for a return to form.
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