Red Sox Reportedly Acquire Wade Miley

by
December 10, 2014

Well, this has been an interesting afternoon of Wade Miley rumors. First, the D’Backs were reportedly close to a deal with Boston, then Boston wasn’t involved at all, then it was the Marlins who were close to a deal, then no one was close, and now apparently the Red Sox have struck a deal to land Miley after all.

The quick facts, and then we’ll have a full post up when all the details are known.

Wade Miley is 28, under team control for three more seasons, and is projected to make $4.3 million in arbitration this winter. His ERA went the wrong way last season, but since you’re on FanGraphs, I’m going to assume you know not to evaulate a pitcher by single season ERA. In over 600 big league innings, he has an ERA-/FIP-/xFIP- line of 97/97/98, which is solidly above average for a starter. Especially a durable starter with no health issues.

Rubby de la Rosa is probably the main piece coming back to Arizona. He’ll be 26 in a few months and is under team control for four more seasons, and he’ll make the league minimum this year. His stuff is good, but he doesn’t miss as many bats as you’d expect for a guy with his velocity and the command isn’t great. He’s also a Tommy John recovery guy, and the combination of some medical red flags and bad command have some projecting him as a reliever.

Allen Webster (turns 26 in February) is a simliar good stuff/bad command guy who doesn’t get enough strikeouts to justify the walks. His velocity also tumbled last year, as his fastball fell from 94.0 in 2013 to 92.0 in 2014. He comes with two extra years of team control, but he also seems likely to end up as a reliever. Probably more so than de la Rosa, in fact.

The third prospect is unknown as of this moment.

2015 Steamer projections

Wade Miley: 192 IP, +2.3 WAR
Rubby de la Rosa: 189 IP, +1.4 WAR
Allen Webster: 182 IP, +0.6 WAR

The Red Sox trade 10 years of team control for three years, but get a much more reliable mid-rotation starter in exchange. And if de la Rosa and Webster end up as relievers, then the extra years won’t matter much at all. While I recognize that I probably like pitchers in the mold of Wade Miley more than most, my early take — without knowing who the third prospect is, which could change things — is that this is a pretty nifty upgrade for the Red Sox.

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Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.

24 Comments
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Cory S.
11 years ago

So we got a left handed Joe Kelly? It’s and upgrade, but not too much.

1
tz
11 years ago
Reply to  Cory S.

Miley is a notch better than Kelly. Which makes them #1 and #2 in the rotation, unless Buchholz turns it around.

And, probably better to start filling in those rotation holes while you can. Unless you don’t mind forking over Boras’s ransom demands of 8 years and $250 million for Scherzer.

1
Steve
11 years ago
Reply to  tz

Or, $155M/6 for Lester…

-2
The Flaming FIPs
11 years ago
Reply to  Cory S.

Miley has three straight seasons of roughly 200 innings. Kelly has never come close to that. Miley’s K/BB numbers are also a lot nicer than Kelly’s.

1