Why Frankie Montas may be Mets' next great reclamation project: Three reasons to believe in veteran's comeback

The New York Mets made an addition to their rotation on Sunday, inking veteran right-hander Frankie Montas to a reported two-year pact worth $34 million. Montas, 31, is coming off a season split between the Cincinnati Reds and Milwaukee Brewers that saw him post a 4.84 ERA (89 ERA+) and a 2.24 strikeout-to-walk ratio across 30 starts. 

Those marks, particularly the ERA, are slightly below average for a starting pitcher. Nevertheless, when CBS Sports ranked Montas as the 45th-best free agent available, we noted that "the ingredients are here for better numbers." The Mets seem to agree. 

It just so happens that the Mets have done this song and dance before, and have done it quite well. Last winter, top baseball operations executive David Stearns signed Sean Manaea and Luis Severino to similar short-term pacts. Both Manaea and Severino proceeded to have good seasons, putting themselves in position to ink more lucrative free-agent contracts this offseason. (The Mets could also lose Jose Quintana to the open market, leaving them without their three top innings amassers from the 2024 season.)

Why are we (and seemingly the Mets) bullish about Montas? Below, we've laid out three reasons.

1. Superior track record

While we think the Mets are looking forward, not backward by signing Montas, we would be remiss if we didn't note that he has demonstrated he's a capable big-league starter throughout his career -- after all, he's only a few years removed from finishing sixth in Cy Young Award balloting. What's more is Montas has made 10-plus starts in a season six times, and has been average or better in four of those campaigns.

If the perception of Montas feels worse than the reality, it's probably because of a few factors. Foremost, he's coming off a down season that saw him surrender an uncharacteristic amount of home runs -- to the extent that we have to believe he'll enjoy positive regression in 2025.  There's also the bad vibes lingering from Montas' disappointing stint with the New York Yankees. You may recall that he made eight dismal starts with them down the stretch in 2022 before missing almost all of 2023. 

Even with that in mind, there's reason for optimism to be found in Montas' game.

2. Better stuff than results

Montas will celebrate his 32nd birthday ahead of Opening Day, making it somewhat absurd to focus on his perceived upside. That's just how it is with pitchers, particularly nowadays. The advancements in technology and data have made it easier, to some extent, for pitchers to make quick and meaningful gains.

Montas already has a good foundation in place. He threw five pitches each more than 10% of the time last season, in the form of two mid-90s fastballs, a cutter, a splitter, and a slider. It's fair to write that he has several above-average offerings at his disposal, but you don't have to take our word for it. 

Rather, we live in a time where there are multiple public-facing pitch-quality models available for consulting. These models incorporate a pitch's innate qualities (its velocity and movement profile) and spit out a number. You don't have to worry about the calculations to get the jist. And the jist is that Montas has several above-average pitches according to the data housed at FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus: his slider, his splitter, and his sweeper.

Take a look for yourself, but note that Stuff+ operates on a scale with a 100 base while the more negative a StuffPro number for any given pitch the better.

Clearly the ingredients are there. The key for the Mets, then, is to optimize Montas' pitch mix. And hey, would you look at that? It's a fitting segue to the next section.

3. Late-season improvements

Montas already started the process of tweaking how he deployed his arsenal following a midseason trade to the Brewers. While his ERA didn't make huge gains (he possessed a 92 ERA+, as opposed to the 88 figure with the Reds), some of his underlying measures indicated he was significantly better with Milwaukee.

Indeed, Montas' strikeout-minus-walk rate soared to more than 18%, a figure that would have ranked in the top 20 in the majors had he managed it over a full season. 

What did the Brewers have Montas do differently? A few things, from what we can tell. He upped his sinker and cutter usage, and he did so while reducing his slider and splitter's roles. That would seem to counter what the pitch models would recommend, but that's the beauty (or the agony, depending on your perspective) of such information: it's not necessarily a perfect representation of reality. 

Whether the Mets ask Montas to double down on those changes, or instead task him with embracing other tweaks that better align with the pitch-quality models is to be seen. For now, though, the future is wide open and Montas looks like a worthwhile upside play for a team that has been there and done it before.