Over at Baseball Crank, Dan McLaughlin touches on a subject we have all been wondering about, at least since it became clear that the Mets would be going to the playoffs: would the Mets really start Steve Trachsel in the playoffs over John Maine?
Fact: if you look at Trachsel's starts 3 at a time, he has just two, overlapping three-start stretches this season (August 2-13 and August 8-18) where he posted an ERA below 3.44 - while Maine's ERA for the season is 3.42.Dan ranks all of Trachsel's and Maine's starts in decreasing order of game score, and it comes as little surprise that most of Maine's starts are at the top of the list while most of Trachsel's fall to the bottom.
We've talked about this before, and given Trachsel's performance in the division-clinching game along with his status as a Proven Veteran™, not to mention his uselessness coming out of the bullpen, I see little chance that Trachsel won't be the Mets fourth starter in the playoffs and that Maine will be relegated to the bullpen, likely bumping Darren Oliver from the roster altogether. This is all assuming the first three slots will go to Pedro Martinez, Tom Glavine, and Orlando Hernandez.