Mike Baumann has traveled a lot. He made his major league debut with the Orioles in 2021 things were going along well. Over parts of four seasons Baumann pitched 127 1/3 innings over 94 games with a 4.45 ERA, 4.46 FIP, 1.437 WHIP and a 91 ERA+. He was solid, major league pitcher getting a lot of work with the club that drafted him.
Then 2024 happened. The Orioles traded him to Seattle in May. Then the Giants purchased his contract. He pitched one game with them and ended up with the Angels. He pitched 10 games with them and then ended up on the Marlins. Five different organizations in one season.
After all that chaos he went to Japan for a season and pitched 26 innings over 27 games for Yakult with a 4.15 ERA and a 1.577 WHIP. Now he’s back state side trying to break onto the Mets roster.
When Baumann last pitched in the major leagues he had a mid-to-high 90’s fastball that was in the 87th percentile for velocity. His extension was in the 71st percentile. Usually this is a combination for success, but not in 2024. He had a 4.71 xERA (18th percentile) and was only getting hitters to chase 27% of the time (29th percentile). Hitters were barreling up on him 9.2% of the time (21st percentile) and hitting the ball hard 43.7% of the time (12th percentile).
Baumann used his fastball 40.6% of the time in 2024 and leaned on his knuckle curve 33.5% of the time. He would change things up with his low-90’s slider 23.9% of the time and occasionally mix in a changeup and a sinker.
Baumann has a lot of different pitches in his arsenal. Let’s watch this spring how the Mets pitching lab makes adjustments. He made his debut against the Yankees on 2/22 and pitched a scoreless inning allowing one hit and striking out one batter. He has a lot of competition between getting on the 40-man roster and then on the active roster, but the Mets did use 46 pitchers last season.
