Earlier today, I wrote a post on FanGraphs titled The Company That Kris Medlen Keeps. In case you've kind of checked out of baseball, or in case you don't really pay much attention to the National League, you should take a minute to check out what Medlen has been doing since joining the Braves' rotation. Sneak preview: he's a guy you probably haven't heard of who's comparing well to rookie Stephen Strasburg and rookie Felix Hernandez. Remember rookie Felix Hernandez? Now give that kind of success to a guy who doesn't have close to the same kind of raw stuff.
This post about Hector Noesi isn't nearly so flattering, nor is it nearly as thorough since I'm writing this in a few minutes before going out the door. Consider Hector Noesi, and now consider the way you reacted to considering Hector Noesi. It's unpleasant, yes? Noesi was supposed to be something along the lines of a league-average starter. Instead he's been more like a league-average batting tee. And with that in mind, I'd like to point something out. Noesi, this season, has posted an ERA+ of 62. That is very bad. Now let's take a little trip through Seattle Mariners franchise history.
Hector Noesi: 62 ERA+
Carlos Silva: 62 ERA+
Horacio Ramirez: 61 ERA+
It'd be hard to find two recent Mariners more disliked than Silva and Ramirez, so Noesi finds himself in some troubling company. He also finds himself in the company of Ryan Feierabend, who posted a 61 ERA+, and people don't really have strong opinions of Ryan Feierabend, but Feierabend spread his lousy innings over three years. Noesi, Silva, Ramirez -- they didn't spread anything out. I guess they spread strikeouts out. Haha, sad.
Noesi is young and talented and he could get a lot better. When Ramirez was here, it wasn't clear how he'd ever had success. Silva had no margin of error once he lost some of his command. Noesi still has a decent ceiling and he's an unfinished product, so he could eventually get people rooting for him, get people liking him. But he's got himself a hill to climb. His ERA+ has made some unpopular friends.