Houston Astros working on a trade for Met’s Seth Lugo?

Rumors say that the Houston Astros are talking trade with the New York Mets for Seth Lugo.

This morning Astros fans woke up to learn that Scott Boras was in Houston via Pedro Gomez. While he jumped to Bryce Harper speculation, there could be other reasons he is in town, like Dallas Keuchel. That’s a separate post.

We have learned with past transactions, the Astros are not opposed to taking on a project with high potential upside. Not that Gerrit Cole was that much of a risk, someone like Charlie Morton or Collin McHugh would fit better. With Keuchel’s market moving slower than he thought, he could possibly look at returning at some point.

But the Astros are looking for other options.

According to Mike Axisa, the Astros and Mets are discussing a trade for Seth Lugo. While that deal may not knock your socks off, it should. He actually had a great year last year with the Mets. In 54 games between the rotation and the bullpen, Lugo had a 2.66 ERA with 103 strikeouts in 101 1/3 innings via Baseball-Reference. He only started 5 games, but he began his career as a starter.

The former 34th round pick in 2011 has pitched well and has a good spin rate. According to Baseball Savant, his spin rate of 3064 RPMs sat third behind Ryan Pressly for best in baseball in 2018. He has the highest spin rate of any pitcher in the past five seasons, according to Axisa at 3163 RPMs.

He is an Astros type of guy.

We saw how much Brett Strom did with Cole, Morton, Lance McCullers, and Justin Verlander. Lugo would continue to grow as a pitcher as he learns from MLB’s coach of the year.

While it is unknown what it would cost to acquire Lugo, he is under team control through 2022. It would not take prospects such as Forrest Whitley, Kyle Tucker, or Yordan Alvarez. However, the Mets don’t have to trade him. The Mets have a decent amount of starters and they may be more willing to let Lugo go than their top starters. It won’t come cheap.

Should the Astros trade for Lugo, would he be the answer for the third starter in the rotation? The team probably has that spot reserved for Whitley when he settles into the rotation. With all the trades they have passed on involving Whitley, they think he’s the real deal. A player like Tony Kemp could be part of a deal plus some pitching prospects.