Jon Niese started the season off as a starter and found his way in an out of the rotation around Steven Matz. Before being traded, the post-season previewed one possible universe for him in 2016 where he would have been a lefty specialist out of the pen. Ultimately the Mets traded him at the end of the season. The long-time Met had been part of the rotation for a while with fairly consistent numbers. The question is, did the computers accurately predict Niese in 2015? Let’s see what the computers said last year:
PECOTA (BP): 8-10, 26 G, 155 IP, 128 K, 40 BB, 1.23 WHIP, 3.85 ERA
PECOTA (MLB.com): 10-11, 171.0 IP, 139 K, 43 BB, 1.23 WHIP, 3.89 ERA
MLB.com: 10-12, 183.0 IP, 132 K, 48 BB, 1.29 WHIP, 3.69 ERA
ZiPS: 28 G, 171.2 IP, 132 K, 46 BB, 3.77 ERA
Steamer: 9-11, 29 G, 173.0 IP, 125 K, 47 BB, 4.07 ERA
ESPN: 11-9, 140 K, 1.23 WHIP, 3.72 ERA
Average: 9.6-10.6, 27.7 G, 170.2 IP, 132.7 K, 44.8 BB, 1.25 WHIP, 3.83 ERA
(Originally posted here)
And here are is 2015 numbers:
9-10, 33 G, 29 GS, 176.2 IP, 1.40 WHIP, 4.13 ERA
The computers pretty much nailed Niese’s win-loss record for last year, and the amount of work he put it in. They thought he would have a better WHIP and ERA. Niese allowed a lot of hits and walks last year. There were times that I was surprised his his earned runs were so low (this is partially why his FIP is higher than his ERA).