The most controversial transaction of Brodie Van Wagenen's brief reign as New York Mets general manager was revisited quite a bit last week as Jarred Kelenic - traded as part of the package used to acquire Edwin Diaz and Robinson Cano in December of 2018 - made his Major League debut for the Seattle Mariners last week.
However, the Diaz-Kelenic trade has overshadowed another major mistake in the tenure of Van Wagenen: the decision to let Zack Wheeler walk in free agency after the 2019 season.
In five seasons with the Mets, Wheeler was a very good middle-of-the-rotation arm, posting a 3.77 ERA and 3.71 FIP in 126 starts for the team. In a sense, that type of production was disappointing because Wheeler flashed front-line potential at times, like when he went 9-1 with a 1.68 ERA in 11 starts after the All-Star Game in 2018. But it offered you a pretty intriguing picture of him as a free agent: at worst, he was a No. 3 starter, and if he put things together on a consistent basis, he had the potential to be an ace.
The Mets elected to let Wheeler walk after 2019. He landed with the division-rival Philadelphia Phillies on a five-year/$118 million deal, which looks like a bargain when you consider what Gerrit Cole (nine years/$324 million) and Stephen Strasburg (seven years/$245 million) signed for that same winter.
Make no mistake, the Phillies remain a flawed team, one that's been too top-heavy to even finish above .500 despite major investments in the last three seasons. Still, FanGraphs says that Wheeler has been the seventh-best pitcher in baseball since the start of the 2020 season. Along with Aaron Nola and Zach Eflin, the Phillies now have a pretty formidable top three in their starting rotation, thanks in part to a poor decision from Van Wagenen.
Led by two-time National League Cy Young Award winner Jacob deGrom, the Mets aren't really hurting for starting pitching depth when everyone is healthy. Of course, everyone isn't healthy right now. Taijuan Walker left his start last night with left side tightness, deGrom missed his most turn in the rotation with a right side injury and Noah Syndergaard hasn't pitched since 2019 after having Tommy John surgery in March of 2020. You can't necessarily predict injuries, just like Van Wagenen couldn't have predicted that Marcus Stroman would opt out of the 2020 season after a global pandemic hit.
The reality is that a rotation built in part by Van Wagenen - who was dismissed by new owner Steve Cohen after the 2020 season - should be pretty good if it gets healthy all at once. And that may happen. deGrom, as MLB.com's Bill Ladson noted, could return this Friday. Syndergaard will make his first rehab appearance Wednesday.
But even if this rotation comes together and helps the Mets to win the National League East in 2021, it may not be together very long. Stroman can become a free agent this upcoming offseason, and if he leaves, the Mets won't receive any draft compensation because he's already playing on the qualifying offer in 2021. Syndergaard can become a free agent this winter as well. If he doesn't command more than the $118 million that Wheeler signed for, it will probably be because he struggled to get back up to speed in his return from Tommy John surgery. Meanwhile, in the time since Syndergaard has last pitched, Wheeler has emerged as the frontline arm that Mets fans hoped he would eventually develop into.
The craziest thing about all of this is that the Mets held onto Wheeler at the 2019 trade deadline, despite interest from teams like the Houston Astros. The Mets missed the postseason in 2019, finishing at 86-76, so it's not as though they kept Wheeler to make on last World Series run. That may be indicative that the Mets believed draft compensation received after Wheeler left in free agency would be more valuable than anything they could acquire for him as a rental.
Still, you are left to wonder why the Mets were so willing to move on from Wheeler. They seemingly went through some of the ups and downs of his development - including him missing all of 2015 and 2016 recovering from Tommy John surgery - only to watch him realize his potential with a division rival.
Van Wagenen essentially suggested after the right-hander's departure that the Mets didn't believe Wheeler was worth what he received from the Phillies in free agency. As it turns out, he was probably worth even more than he signed for, and would have made for a pretty great one-two punch with deGrom for another half decade.
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