Kansas City Royals: Looking back at Jason Vargas’ career in Kansas City

One less former member of the Kansas City Royals is on the open market, as Jason Vargas inked a two-year deal with the New York Mets on Friday.

The new deal for former Kansas City Royals pitcher Jason Vargas is for two years and worth $16 million, which is pretty good considering his age and how badly he struggled throughout the second half of the 2017 season. His first half of 2017 was fantastic and even earned him a trip to the All-Star Game.

Vargas rounded out his 2017 campaign with a 4.16 ERA, 1.330 WHIP, and a whopping 18 wins. His first half was what made him one of the more talked about pitchers last season, but that poor second half coupled in with him being 35 years old is likely what resulted in teams being a bit skeptical of signing Vargy to a large contract.

The Mets are getting a pitcher who can contribute heavily to a rotation and if needed, can be the number one guy in the rotation. The jury is still out on if this will end up being a steal for the Mets or not, but as of now, it looks to be a fair deal for both sides.

Jason Vargas was never a flashy pitcher during his time in Kansas City, but he had a productive career as a member of the Royals. Kansas City signed him to a four-year deal worth $32 million in 2014 and he did a serviceable job in the rotation despite missing most of 2016.

Here were Vargas’ numbers in his four years as a Royal:

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• 2014 (30 starts; 187 innings) – 11-10 record, 3.71 ERA, 1.273 WHIP, 128 strikeouts, 41 walks, 3.84 FIP
• 2015 (9 starts; 43 innings) – 5-2 record, 3.98 ERA, 1.349 WHIP, 27 strikeouts, 12 walks, 4.30 FIP
• 2016 (3 starts; 12 innings) – 0-0 record, 2.25 ERA, 0.917 WHIP, 11 strikeouts, 3 walks, ,3.15 FIP
• 2017 (32 starts; 179.2 innings) – 18-11 record, 4.16 ERA, 1.330 WHIP, 134 strikeouts, 58 walks, 4.67 FIP

Vargas was injured about midway through the 2015 season and did not return until over a year later, which explains his limited starts in the 2015 and 2016 seasons. When looking at the fact that he missed pretty much an entire season, Vargas still put up decent numbers.

During the postseason run in 2014, Jason Vargas had impressive showings in both the ALDS and ALCS (let’s not talk about his World Series numbers) and really stepped into that second pitching role in the rotation. That’s what the Royals brought him on for at the time was to be the second guy behind James Shields and I think we could all agree that Vargas did that admirably in 2014.

While his 2017 season came crashing down quickly after the All-Star break, Royals fans have to be happy for Jason Vargas as he earned another contract and will continue his Major League Baseball career.

Vargas pitched for the Mets in 2007 and he will now rejoin them 11 years later. The Mets aren’t expected to make a ton of noise this year, but they’ve had a knack for posting a solid rotation in recent years and hopefully Vargas will impress in New York.

Best of luck to Jason Vargas! He’ll be one of those guys who will be Forever Royal, even if he wasn’t directly a part of that World Series team.

This was definitely one of Dayton Moore’s best free agent signings. Wouldn’t you agree, Royals fans?