Amazin' Avenue Mets Awards: Worst Starting Pitcher

This vote was a dead heat right up until the end when the true "winner" was revealed. Oliver Perez, who already took home the software for worst relief pitcher, adds another fake trophy to his e-mantel by winning the coveted "Worst Starting Pitcher" award and thus sweeping the Mets pitching Razzies.

At first blush, one might reasonably wonder why this race was as close as it was. As John Maine didn't appear in a big league game after May 20, it's easy to forget how breathtakingly wretched he was through nine starts. He actually threw six more innings as a starter than Perez, which I guess is something.

While poring over the boxscores and cumulative 2010 stats, what struck me most about the Mets starting pitchers this year is how few utter disasters there were. Perez and Maine were terrible, but only for 30 or so innings apiece. Fernando Nieve was only given one start, and while it was an unmitigated stinker (two innings, five runs, three walks against the Brewers), it was still just two innings. Raul Valdes likewise had just one start, on the penultimate day of the season, and it wasn't even an awful one.

Jenrry Mejia made three September starts, two bad and one cut short by a right shoulder strain. Just 11.1 innings in aggregate. Dillon Gee tossed 33 innings over five starts with great results but an iffy process (lots of walks and very few strikeouts). On balance, I wouldn't say he was awful because he got hitters out and didn't allow many runs, but pitchers with his peripherals almost never get those results over a long enough stretch of games.

Even Pat Misch, who didn't look spectacular out there, walked so few hitters and collected enough ground outs to make himself pretty useful in a half-dozen starts.

So given that there wasn't much to choose from, Perez is the winner here by a slim margin over likely former Met Maine. Amazingly, Perez was voted the Mets worst starter and reliever despite throwing just 46.1 total innings. Such is the density of his decrepitude, a black hole of baseball suckiness.

Here is how everyone voted.

And here is the final vote tally.