Luis Cessa has put together two solid back-to-back starts for the Yankees, but there’s no way the team should count on him to be their fifth starter.
Brian Cashman would like you to think that Luis Cessa is an option to be the Yankees’ fifth starter for the rest of the season, but that’s pure fiction. He’s done a nice job in his last two starts, but a closer look at his statistics show serious cause for concern.
The good news is that Cessa does look like a major league pitcher at this point in time. He’s got an excellent ERA of just 3.10 in his 20 1/3 innings pitched this season. In particular, he’s been effective in his last two starts. Cessa has only given up two earned runs in 11 1/3 innings of work during his last two games. That’s caused some Yankee fans to wonder whether or not he’s the answer to the fifth starter conundrum.
Unfortunately, he is not. His career ERA of 4.30 is a much better representation of his ability. The biggest difference in his performance this season is his ability to keep the ball in the ballpark. His home run rate in 2018 is just 0.6. That’s only one-third of what it was in 2017 when he pitched 36 innings in the majors. He threw 70 1/3 innings back in 2016 and had an even higher home run rate of 2.0.
When you watch him pitch, he isn’t showcasing anything that would explain this drop in home run rate. His velocity has been roughly the same as it’s always been and his breaking stuff doesn’t look any sharper. Unfortunately, the most likely explanation for his low home run rate this season is good luck. That means his ERA Is likely to balloon to his normal level once he gets a reasonable number of innings under his belt.
Ultimately, if Cessa keeps serving as the fifth starter for the full season he’s probably going to end up with an ERA in the mid-high 4’s. That doesn’t make him a bad pitcher, but it isn’t what the Yankees need if they want to close the gap on Boston to win the AL East.
Cashman is smart to continue to hype Cessa as a legitimate option down the stretch, but it’s all rhetoric designed to improve the team’s negotiating position. If the Yankees don’t add a fifth starter before the deadline it means the price was truly prohibitive.