Official 2013 New York Mets Thread

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Montero has really rocketed through the Mets' system, no doubt.  Really bounced back after a rough start at Vegas too.  Only 23 years old. 

 

Hard not to love what he's shown so far:  doesn't walk people, good K totals, doesn't give up a lot of home runs, good hits-to-innings.   

[nmigliore]

Rays are close to resigning James Loney, per Buster Olney. 

 

That's one less suitor for Ike but this SHOULD finally put things in motion, likely with Milwaukee.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Man, still hoping against hope that Doofus is the one to go, but I guess Ike's salary and the fact that his value is a little higher's then Duda's means he's the one to go. 

[nmigliore]

I think everybody, beat writers and fans, have universally accepted Ike will be the one to go. I don't like Duda, but unfortunately there is nothing left on the free agent market. Kendrys Morales, who is far more of a DH than a 1B, isn't much of an upgrade over what we have AND he costs a draft pick. I really liked Corey Hart as a target before Seattle scooped him up, but I don't get the sense we are even looking for a 1B; I think Sandy will be content with dealing Ike for whatever and hoping Duda/Satin form an acceptable platoon. At this point, what's left on the free agent/trade markets probably isn't worth it anyway. 

 

SS would be my #1 priority now but I also have no idea what to do there. The free agent market is brutal after Stephen Drew, so much so that giving Tejada the job probably is the best alternative. Trading for young, controlled SS is way more easier said than done, and is probably not realistic unless the Mets are willing to fork over one of their top pitching prospects. We'll see where his market goes but I'd be willing to go 3 years and $10-12M per for Drew; I'm not a big fan of him, but that's still a pretty fair deal for what he is. Plus, I rather overpay a bit for a free agent rather than give up talent. 

 

If they didn't add another starting pitcher for the rotation, I'm fine with it; Mejia would be my choice to be the 5th starter. Maybe bring in a guy like Kevin Slowey as an insurance policy.

 

It's probably not realistic but I'd also try to bring in another left-handed hitting OF. Not a full-time player, but someone than can platoon with Lagares so you can have these OF alignments:

 

vs RHP: LHB OF, LF -- Young, CF -- Granderson, RF

vs LHP: Young, LF -- Lagares, CF -- Granderson, RF

 

A guy like Matt Joyce and his big platoon splits would be perfect for this role but a deal centered around Ike for Joyce is definitely out of the cards now that the Rays resigned Loney. Nate McLouth, who signed with Washington, would have also been an ideal fit. Hopefully whoever they bring in as a 4th outfielder can sort of fit this role if need be, as I think depending completely on Young-Lagares-Grandy to all be productive can also turn quite disastrous. 

Edited December 15, 2013 by nmigliore

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Yeah, looks like Tejada at SS (we've all known that for a while...just not much of a SS market) and Doofus/Satin at first.  Hopefully those positions are upgraded for 2015.

[nmigliore]

Nats and Syracuse agreed on an extension through 2017, so scratch off that potential landing spot for our AAA team. I can't remember all of the current player development contracts in place, but Adam Rubin speculated that we may be stuck in the PCL for awhile. 

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Rumors going around that no one really wants Ike.  Mets are apparently talking to everyone about him.

[nmigliore]

I still think it'll come down to Milwaukee and Pittsburgh. They are the two that have been strongly connected to Ike and there really aren't many comparable or better 1B alternatives available to them. I'd definitely prefer to deal with Pittsburgh; much deeper, stronger talent pool. Milwaukee's farm system is one of the worst in the game. 

 

I could see something like Davis for Jeff Locke, or one of their MLB-ready arms from the minors like Stolmy Pimentel, Brandon Cumpton, or Phil Irwin. None of these guys would be very exciting, but that seems like the upper limit of what you're really going to get for Ike. 

Edited December 19, 2013 by nmigliore

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

I think the prevailing logic was the main reason they'd trade Davis was the potential return (nothing great of course, but better than what they'd get for Duda).  If the return for Ike wouldn't be anything better, do they dare explore the option of trading Doofus instead? 

[nmigliore]

The more I think about it, the more I would like to bring both back. Sure trading Ike saves ~$4M, but I don't know if that is really going to do much in improving the 2014 squad. Both players have options, so you could give Ike one last hurrah with Duda in AAA. Neither player may be any good but you have a higher chance of hitting on one of them if both are in the organization.

 

I mean, it all really depends on the return obviously, but if all you're getting back is a pitcher who is probably a reliever, why bother? I will say, though, that this almost certainly won't happen. I feel confident in saying one will be gone by Opening Day.

Edited December 19, 2013 by nmigliore

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Yeah, at this point, you really could bring both back.  At the very least, if the Mets feel like one of them has to be gone by Opening Day, maybe one of them shows enough in spring training that a team shows interest.  I just feel that being locked into a combo of Duda and Satin at first is beyond scary.  I feel like we know exactly what we're getting with Doofus.  Maybe Ike will never be any good, but I at least feel like there's somewhat of a chance that he could become a decent everyday first baseman with some power. 

[nmigliore]

Beltran laying the smack in his Yanks' presser!

 

Jorge Castillo ‏@jorgeccastillo13m

Beltran on blame after strike 3: “Well, you got to blame somebody. You got to blame the guy who makes the most money. That’s baseball.”

 

Jorge Castillo ‏@jorgeccastillo21m

Carlos Beltran: “When somebody is trying to hurt you in a personal way…then we have trouble. Now it’s personal.”

 

Jorge Castillo ‏@jorgeccastillo46m

Beltran said #Mets organization tried to portray him as a “bad apple” and “it hurt” him and his family.

 

Jorge Castillo ‏@jorgeccastillo1h

Beltran said he grew up a Yankee fan and, more specifically, a Bernie Williams fan.

 

Jorge Castillo ‏@jorgeccastillo51m

Carlos Beltran: “I was successful in New York. I don’t need to prove anything to anybody.”

Edited December 20, 2013 by nmigliore

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Beltran and the Mets wasn't ever a great mix, for a variety of reasons...but the move was clearly no-brainer for Mets.  If one looks at his numbers strictly in a vacuum, they look terrific, especially for a CF...there's no disputing that.  But something was always off.  What's obvious is Beltran doesn't have the thickest skin in the world, and was probably too sensitive to be "the man" in NY...but to his credit, he at least put up eye-friendly numbers in his time here.

 

Beltran wasn't quite as successful as a Met as he probably thinks he was, but whatever...the Yankees are a good fit for him, because he's not being asked to carry them, and he should blend in without a problem.   

['7']

I doubt Beltran grew up a Yankees fan, and Bernie Williams didn't become a noteworthy player until Beltran was like 16-17 years old. This is the stuff the Yankees feed to all players when they sign with them "legend, history, babe ruth, monument park etc" they're briefed in this and told exactly what to say before the press conference...they're told to be in awe of the Yankees. Plus after Grandersons "real NYers are Mets fans" quips, you know the Yankees needed to fire back. And they did through Beltran

[nmigliore]

Hall of Fame election announcements coming at 2pm today. Baseball Think Factory has tracked public ballots, which makes up roughly 34% of the total vote and has been accurate in the past. Based on their projections, Piazza is likely to miss out while Maddux, Glavine, and Thomas collectively stand a really good chance of getting in, maybe Biggio as well.

 

Since Piazza is very unlikely to go in this year, I hope at least those four make it to get rid of some names for the sake of future ballots. There are a lot of Hall of Fame-deserving players on that list that aren't getting enough attention because of the loaded ballot, and as I mentioned in the General MLB Thread yesterday, there are plenty of new names on the way next year: Randy Johnson, Pedro, Smoltz; Sheffield at least deserves consideration. 

Edited January 8, 2014 by nmigliore

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Well, Glavine got in.  Good, in that he deserved to go...though when you look at his numbers, outside of the 305 wins (and 300 wins still means a lot), he was more consistently good to very good rather than dominant (and pitched for a long time).  A lot of his individual numbers scream "good, but not great", and let's face it, Atlanta pitchers enjoyed a strike zone that seemed to be larger than everyone's else...Glavine especially got a lot of strike calls on balls that simply weren't strikes.  Not trying to imply that he shouldn't have gotten in, but maybe on the second ballot and not the first. 

 

As a Met fan, I don't really feel anything, re:  Glavine's election.  For one, his heart was always with the Braves.  For another, I won't ever forget that last start against the Marlins, where he couldn't get off the mound fast enough.  Or his last three starts as a Met, really, when the team needed him in the worst way, and he gave up 17 runs in 10.1 IP.

 

If he had it to do over again, though he has been fairly complimentary about his time with the Mets, he never should've left the Braves.   

[NJDevs4978]

I'll definitely have a mixed reaction watching Glavine go in.  Not so much because of what happened that one day against the Marlins though it certainly clouded his time here, but more because it's going to be a total Brave-fest with Cox and Maddux, and it was obvious he always wanted to be there anyway so his HOF induction will probably be almost totally viewed through the Brave prism (as I suppose it should).  

 

He definitely deserves it and it's not like he didn't give an honest effort as a Met or accomplish 'some' things...but it'd probably be easier to watch him go in now if Maddux/Cox were both going in next year with Smoltz

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Part of the problem was the Mets were asking a 37-year-old to be an ace...I also don't think they took a good hard look at Glavine's 2002 campaign, which looks good at first glance (18-11, 2.96 ERA).  He was 11-3 with a 1.75 ERA on June 26 of that year, which gives you an idea of how he pitched the rest of the season.  He then got shelled in two playoff starts.  So the signs were there that he wasn't going to be the Glavine of old that the Mets paid him to be, and the Braves definitely would've fought harder to keep him if they didn't think he was about to decline.  Glavine simply shouldn't have ever left...it was clear that he didn't want to.     

 

To his credit, like you say, he made his 32+ starts per season, and he didn't always benefit from great run support (though there was something about his face when the Mets didn't score for him...when they would show him on the bench as the Mets made their last out of an inning, just before he'd go back out to take the mound...that just bugged me.  It was a look that seemed to say, "If that was my Braves out there, they'd have given me a two to three run lead to work with by now!"  Sad thing is he probably wasn't all that wrong.) 

[nmigliore]

I don't have much emotion to Glavine going in, really. Good for him, he deserves it, but there is very little Mets-attachment for me there, honestly. I have nothing against his stint with us, I always thought of him as a very solid starter as a Met, but he just never "grew" on me as a fan when he was here.

 

I was curious to see how he ranked among RA9-WAR (pitcher WAR based on runs allowed, not FIP) and was surprised to see he was 30th among qualified pitchers from 2003-2007 (his Met tenure) and 24th if you isolate 2004-2006. He wasn't an ace, and didn't sniff the latter years of his Braves career, but those are some appreciable numbers, even if things were a little rocky in the beginning and end. In a way like Beltran,  I think some Mets fans hold his stoic personality and one blowup moment (final start of 2007) against him too much (including myself). Still, like I said above, for whatever reason, I just never had a lot of emotional fan attachment to him.  

Edited January 9, 2014 by nmigliore

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

I don't have much emotion to Glavine going in, really. Good for him, he deserves it, but there is very little Mets-attachment for me there, honestly. I have nothing against his stint with us, I always thought of him as a very solid starter as a Met, but he just never "grew" on me as a fan when he was here.

 

I was curious to see how he ranked among RA9-WAR (pitcher WAR based on runs allowed, not FIP) and was surprised to see he was 30th among qualified pitchers from 2003-2007 (his Met tenure) and 24th if you isolate 2004-2006. He wasn't an ace, and didn't sniff the latter years of his Braves career, but those are some appreciable numbers, even if things were a little rocky in the beginning and end. In a way like Beltran,  I think some Mets fans hold his stoic personality and one blowup moment (final start of 2007) against him too much (including myself). Still, like I said above, for whatever reason, I just never had a lot of emotional fan attachment to him.  

 

Anyone who says Glavine completely sucked as a Met definitely isn't being fair.  He wasn't a total bust...he was decent.  Problem was the Mets signed him to be in-his-prime Tom Glavine, and those expectations filtered down to a good portion of the fanbase...Glavine not really living up to the Mets' expectations was more on the Mets than on Tom.   It wasn't Glavine's fault that the Mets shelled out top dollar when everything pointed to Glavine not being worth that kind of money. 

 

Glavine was going to have a tough time with Met fans warming up to him from Day 1, for obvious reasons.  For one, he had been the enemy for so long.  For another, the only way he was going to get Met fans to embrace him was to succeed right off the bat...if he had a 2003 year similar to the one he had in 2002 (with a little more consistency), I think Met fans forget about him having been a Brave, etc.  You go 9-14 with a 4.52 ERA in your first season (and go 0-4 against the Braves and get shelled all four times to boot), then follow that up with an 11-14 "meh" year, well, no way he was ever going to make significant inroads with the Met fanbase from then on out.  The funny thing is, I think the Met fans WERE beginning to warm up to him a little after those first two seasons...they seemed genuinely happy when he won #300 as a Met (I was), and he did have some nice Met moments...but that final start against the Marlins with everything on the line really seemed to blow a lot of that up. 

[nmigliore]

Great article by Dan Lewis at Amazin' Avenue on the silly Piazza/steroid myth, including a really cool vintage scouting report back when Piazza was an amateur: http://www.amazinavenue.com/2014/1/9/5290422/mets-mike-piazza-steroids-hall-of-fame-backne

['7']

Anyone who says Glavine completely sucked as a Met definitely isn't being fair.  He wasn't a total bust...he was decent.  Problem was the Mets signed him to be in-his-prime Tom Glavine, and those expectations filtered down to a good portion of the fanbase...Glavine not really living up to the Mets' expectations was more on the Mets than on Tom.   It wasn't Glavine's fault that the Mets shelled out top dollar when everything pointed to Glavine not being worth that kind of money. 

 

Glavine was going to have a tough time with Met fans warming up to him from Day 1, for obvious reasons.  For one, he had been the enemy for so long.  For another, the only way he was going to get Met fans to embrace him was to succeed right off the bat...if he had a 2003 year similar to the one he had in 2002 (with a little more consistency), I think Met fans forget about him having been a Brave, etc.  You go 9-14 with a 4.52 ERA in your first season (and go 0-4 against the Braves and get shelled all four times to boot), then follow that up with an 11-14 "meh" year, well, no way he was ever going to make significant inroads with the Met fanbase from then on out.  The funny thing is, I think the Met fans WERE beginning to warm up to him a little after those first two seasons...they seemed genuinely happy when he won #300 as a Met (I was), and he did have some nice Met moments...but that final start against the Marlins with everything on the line really seemed to blow a lot of that up. 

 

Glavine was an enemy but not a hated one. Sure he beat us plenty with Atlanta but he wasn't a prick about it like Rocker or Chipper Jones (and I'm still pissed we "honored" him in any way") Regarding 2007, Glavine was a part of that collapse but I don't focus on him exclusively. Everything went wrong at the worst possible time. When we hit the bullpen spit it up. Every starter seemed to put us behind the 8 ball early, failures with RISP. Everybody had a hand in that. Plus the opposition was playing the Mets like it was game 7 of the world series. The Nats and Marlins would give their first born to beat the Mets that year. And they happily rolled over and died when they saw Philly.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

'7'...no, Glavine wasn't the only reason for the '07 collapse...he had plenty of company.  It was just SO spectacular a failure in that last start, for a guy who'd been battle-tested and used to pitching in big games...one thing to battle and give your team 5-6 innings of mediocre ball...but he failed about as miserably as one can in that game...and his last three starts were SO bad.

 

Rocker was hate-able just because.  Chipper was just that guy who you wish played for you.  Guy always seemed to hurt the Mets, so much so that it was maddening. 

[NJDevs4978]

Mets apparently re-signing Dice K lol

Edited January 15, 2014 by NJDevs4978

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

Mets apparently re-signing Dice K lol

 

Meh, it's a depth-move signing.  He was OK in AAA last season.  The Mets had some crappy starting pitching in Vegas (outside of Montero, Torres prior to his call-up, and deGrom).  If/when Montero and Syndergaard make it to the big club during the 2014 season, someone's got to throw innings for Vegas.