MIAMI —Seven starts into the season, Bartolo Colon’s 7.22 ERA was the worst among 99 qualified major league starters entering Sunday’s games.
The worst.
This was obviously not what the Braves had in mind when they hurried to sign the oldest active player in the majors to a one-year, $12.5 million contract in the first week of the free-agent signing period in November. Colon, who’ll turn 44 on May 24, was coming off an All-Star season with the Mets in 2016, when he was 15-8 with a 3.43 ERA.
Everyone knew that his post-40 career resurgence would have to end at some point, that eventually even Colon would decline like all aging athletes. The Braves just hoped it wouldn’t be this season. And they still have that hope, since nearly four-fifths of the season remain and he’s bounced back from similar slumps before.
Still, there has to be plenty of concern than they got Colon a year too late. The 20-year veteran enters his eighth start Monday at Toronto having already allowed 31 earned runs — the most in the majors before Sunday — in 38 2/3 innings, after surrendering just 73 earned runs in 191 2/3 innings in 2016.
A year ago, Colon moved into the Mets rotation after one relief appearance, and in his first six starts had a 2.92 ERA and 1.14 WHIP, with 32 strikeouts and four walks in 37 innings. The fifth of those starts was May 2 against the Braves, when he pitched eight scoreless innings and allowed seven hits and no walks with seven strikeouts in 99 pitches.
In two of his past three starts this season, he’s required 91 pitches to get through five innings and 92 pitches to get through 5 2/3 innings. His .301 opponents’ average is the eighth-highest among MLB starters, his 895 opponents’ OPS is the sixth-highest, and his strikeout rate of 6.05 per nine innings is the 14th-lowest.
Last season, Colon didn’t lose a start or allow more than three runs or one homer in any game until his seventh start May 12 against the Dodgers, when he surrendered seven hits, five runs and two homers in five innings.
In seven starts this season, Colon (1-4) has allowed fewer than four runs only two times – in his Braves debut April 5, when he held his former Mets team to two hits and one run in six innings at Citi Field, and April 16 in his Braves home debut against the Padres, when he gave up just one hit, one run and one walk in seven innings.
In four starts since his win against the Padres, Colon is 0-3 with a 9.55 ERA and .375 opponents’ average, allowing 36 hits (five homers) and five walks with 12 strikeouts in 21 2/3 innings. In his past three starts has pitched fewer than six innings each time out while allowing six, five and finally eight earned runs in 5 2/3 innings Tuesday at Houston, where he gave up five runs and two homers before recording an out.
He has an 11.66 ERA, 1.98 WHIP and .423 opponents’ on-base percentage and 1.195 opponents’ OPS in his past three starts.
If there was a silver lining to his recent work, it’s that Colon settled down after the initial first-inning flurry Tuesday, giving up no hits or walks to the next 14 batters before a Josh Reddick homer in the fifth inning. But the mere fact that it was pointed at as progress also indicated the depth of Colon’s early season struggles.
“After the first inning I felt like he did start mixing it up more,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said, noting the success Colon had once he began to better utilize pitches other than just his bread-and-butter sinker. “But we just can’t be in that position all the time where we’re coming back and fighting back, because it’s just tough to do.”
