Mack Ade – Morning Report – 4-23-13

Question from Michael Scannell to me:

Cory Vaughn seems to be quietly hitting well at AA.  Any chance he sees Vegas this year?

Mack – Hey, Michael. 

I wrote about Cory earlier. Yes, I think any Mets outfielder that shows any ability to hit the ball has the potential to eventually get to AAA ball. Vaughn looks like he will be the first out of AA. He definitely has the talent to succeed in this game (was 2^nd in HRs last year in the Florida League), bu he’s just too dam streaky. Still, this year, his slow start was only during the early part of the first month of the season.

There’s no one in front of him to get in his way/ Look for an all-star break elevation

Adam Rubin –

Outfield prospect Juan Lagares, who is tearing up the Pacific Coast League, likely will join the Mets as soon as Tuesday, baseball sources told ESPNNewYork.com. Lagares, 24, is hitting .346 with three homers and nine RBIs through 78 at-bats with Triple-A Las Vegas. All 17 of his appearances with the 51s have been in center field. He also has experience in both corner outfield spots. He already is a member of the Mets' 40-man roster.

Good for him. I watched Lagares play parts of three seasons in Savannah and I thought he’d never get out of there no less this far. He and Hector Pellot were the inside infield prospects in 2007 and it’s great to see someone that can successfully make the conversion to the outfield. It doesn’t matter if he hits .100 in Queens. He has already succeeded past anyone’s expectations. Congrats Juan.

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We seem to be getting closer to Shaun Marcum time. He threw 52 pitches over 5.0 innings in an extended spring training game yesterday. He then went to the pen and threw four more pitches just for grins. Target date remains Sunday.

We need to keep an eye on Savannah Sand Gnat's starter, Steven Matz. After three starts, he's holding down a 1.29 ERA and all signs are that his arm has finally healed. I had a chance on the last home stand to sit right in front of his bullpen session and, though I wasn't behind the catcher to check if there was any sink, I can tell you that the fastball was both electric and accurate. I had mentioned in an earlier report that I also talked with the catcher of that session, Jeff Glenn, who raved about his pin point accuracy. I don't expect the Mets to rush Matz. Let's see how the arm holds up in Savannah, probably for the entire season.

I heard from 2009 13^th round draft pick, LHP Zach Dotson (Twitter: @_ZachDotson) who is in extended camp. Dotson was a local boy out of the Savannah area here who sent signs out that he was going to go to college. The Mets drafted him anyway and offered him big time money to sign, which he did. Since then, all things went to hell and Dotson has had a myriad amount of problems which many teams might have cut fish with. The talent remains, but the game went to hell and any attempt to pitch (2011: 54.00, 2012: 40.50) failed. Prior to that, in 2010, Dotson started four games for the GCL Mets: 0-1, 3.31, 16.1-IP, 18-K. Keep this name in your head. There’s a lot of pitching talent here if he can just translate it to the catcher’s mitt.

Chris Blessing –

Four years after Steven Matz was drafted by the New York Mets in the 2009 draft, Matz made his full season debut Saturday for the Savannah Sand Gnats in Rome. The road for the 21-year-old left hander has been rough, he has battled a multitude of arm injuries throughout his career. He made his professional debut last season in short-season ball with Kingsport and dominated the opposition in six game starts before his season was cut short by left shoulder tendonitis. In 29 innings with Kingsport, Matz struck out more than 10 batters per 9 innings and gave up only 5 hits per 9 innings. However, he showed a wild streak by walking 5 batters per 9 innings. link

Kevin Kernan –

After spending a baseball lifetime in the minors, Scott Rice leads the Mets in appearances this year with 10. The lefty’s ERA is 1.00 and yesterday he got out of the biggest jam of his major league life when Jayson Werth grounded into an eighth-inning double play on a 3-0 sinker with no outs and runners on first and second following a single and a walk. link

Ken Rosenthal –

Rookie right-hander Matt Harvey is getting most of the attention in the Mets’ rotation, thanks to his 0.93 ERA after four starts. But Mets officials also believe that lefty Jonathan Niese has turned a corner, and is now evolving into a top-of-the-rotation starter. Niese, 26, gained security by signing a five-year, $25.5195 million contract in April 2012. He then threw a career-high 190 1/3 innings, proving that he could stay strong an entire season. And he got married in January, taking another step toward maturing off the field. Johan Santana’s season-ending shoulder injury left Niese as the leading veteran in the Mets’ rotation. The newfound position of responsibility, club officials say, seems to suit him well. link

Jim Callis –

Q - There recently has been discussion among Mets fans that righthander Rainy Lara has been underrated by the prospect community. He posted a 77-12 K-BB ratio in 68 innings at short-season Brooklyn in 2012 and has put up similar numbers in four starts at low Class A Savannah this year. Why was he excluded from the Mets Top 30 Prospects list in the 2013 Prospect Handbook?

A - The strength of the Mets system is righthanded pitching. Their No. 1 prospect is a righty (Zack Wheeler), as were seven members of our Mets Top 10 Prospects list and 13 members of our Top 30. Those lists were compiled before the R.A. Dickey trade, which brought over another blue-chip righthander in Noah Syndergaard.Lara was the next righty listed on our Mets depth chart in the Handbook. Signed out of the Dominican Republic in 2009, he stands out most for his command of his 89-92 mph sinker. Scouts aren’t as enthused about his secondary offerings, however, and they aren’t in love with his long arm action. While Lara is a prospect, New York has several more promising arms in its system. At the lower levels of the minors, tools and stuff matter more than statistics, and his stuff is fairly ordinary. He’s also old for low Class A at 22, and unless he adds velocity or develops a quality second pitch, he’s looking at a ceiling as a middle reliever.

Singer-songwriter Richie Havens died yesterday at 72 years old. I used to go see him play at Gerdes Folk City in the Village back in the 60s where he actually began as the janitor. His best friend was the house singer there and got a gig one day to open for another group on a tour. This friend’s old lady wouldn’t let him go on the road so he asked Havens to ‘fill in’ for him since he knew all the song this dude wrote (“Handsome Johnny”, etc.) plus he played guitar the same way. Havens said yes and the rest was, as they say, history. Oh yeah… the house singer who wrote all those songs… was Lou Gossett Jr.