Seattle Mariners: Pursue or pass on Trevor Williams?

Trevor Williams was just recently non-tendered by the Pirates. Should the Seattle Mariners go after him?

Trevor Williams was DFA’d by the Pittsburgh Pirates last month since he was due to go into his second year of arbitration negotiations with the team and would have made more than his previous year’s salary of nearly $3 million.

Williams had a career in Pittsburgh that occurs every once in a while with major league pitchers where he had one fantastic year sandwiched in between a good year and 2 bad years. He had a good rookie season in 2017 pitching 150.1 innings, making 25 starts, and pitching to a 4.07 ERA.

Then in 2018, he had a career year starting 31 games with a 3.11 ERA, 126 ERA+, and a 3.86 FIP. However, he followed this up by having two years which saw almost every stat rise in 2018 and then again in 2019, with his ERA for example going up to 5.38 in 2019 and 6.18 in 2020.

So, should the Seattle Mariners pursue or pass on Trevor Williams?

I don’t think that the Mariners should go after Williams and his Baseball Savant page shows why. Aside from him ranking in the 70th percentile for exit velocity, all of his other stats are ok or horrible.

Last season Williams had an xERA and an xwOBA in the 26th percentile. His numbers for 2019 are almost identical on Baseball Savant and in his excellent 2018 season they’re all similar but some are slightly better. Even in his excellent 2018, his xERA was in the 41st percentile meaning that the pitch to contact style Williams throws saw him get rather lucky to have a 3.11 ERA and have a below-average xERA.

The only reason I would say that Williams could have a chance to still put up good numbers and the Mariners should sign him is because of his common pitch to contact style with the Pirates that saw higher strikeout numbers and lower ERA’s for Gerrit Cole and Tyler Glasnow when they left Pittsburgh.

However, that was under a previous manager and pitching coach as there was a change for both after 2019 and yet Williams had his worst season last year. So for now, I am out on Trevor Williams regardless of the price.