Mack Ade – Morning Report – 5-28-13

Stephen Guilbert to me - Sean Manaea or Ryne Stanek?

              Right now, this is sort of a no-brainer. Manaea is both in a fog and has developed tightness in his arn that shut him down during this conference games. He's sort of in that Matt Purke stage of his college career (maybe that means Boston will draft him that they do with all the reclamation projects like Purke and Anthony Renaudo).

              At the same time, Stanek is recently throwing flawless baseball. So... safe pick is Stanek... high risk but possible more upside is Manaea.

              Great question.

Michael Scannell to me  -  I realize Carlos Gomez just signed an extension in Milwaukee, however I was wondering if you thought there was any shot at him being dealt.  That deal only runs for three years, meaning the Brewers didn’t make a very long-term commitment to him, they just kept him from leaving this winter for nothing.  Now that he's under team control through 2016 and the Brew Crew can get great value for him in trade.  Sorry, I'm just envisioning a homecoming and a 1-2-3 of Gomez-Choo-Wright.

Hey Michael. I don’t remember too many times that a team signs a player for this much money/years and then deals them in the same 12 month period.

Outfield wise, Milwaukee has:

Cory Hart going to FA ($10.333mil) at the end of the year. He has been injured so far this season and doesn’t look like a candidate for a re-sign

                Ryan Braun (.311) is locked up ($150m) through 2020

                                Norichika Aoki ($1.25mil - .312) also is a free agent at the end of this year

Victor Roach’s (.215) ETA is .215, Mitch Haniger (.297) is 2015, Kris Davis (MLB: .188) is already up, Caleb Gindl (AAA- .256) is ready, and Kentrail Davis (AA - .278) is 2014.

First of all, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Brewers don’t attempt to sign Aoki to an extended contract before the season ends. He looks like the perfect fit for the team. This would leave all the kids I broke out ripe for a trade, and Roach might be the first to consider. He’s having a slow pro career, but I can speak first hand for him. He’s a home run stud that led the nation in home runs (Georgia Southern – 2011 – 30-HRs). His college career was cut short by injuries, but he was still drafted with the 28^th pick overall. He’s only playng A-ball right now (5-HRs) and, either of the Davis guys are ready, but this is the potentially top talent out of their organization.

I don’t know Michael. Like the Mets, Milwaukee is going nowhere and could being dumping payroll by the all-star break. I can’t see that being a guy like Gomez that they just signed.

Now, if you were interested in a trade and sign with Hart…


Savannah P Logan Taylor is off to St. Lucie for a rehab session. Look for him to be back in uniform (as will some other guys like Mateo and Nimmo) real soon

Gary Seagren to me - Hi Mack, As I sit here on a lake in N.C. waiting for the weather to remember it's the end of May not the end of Feb. (and I left sunny and warm Sarasota for this LOL) I ponder the recent state of the Mets and ask myself what was I thinking 51 years ago when this new N.L. team inspired a "New Breed" of fans. I think we all knew it might be a long season but I don't think we expected it to crash and burn to this degree. As we were all told by the FO about the wonders that awaited us in 2014 we never could have seen this total disaster coming. 2013 is already becoming our version of "Nightmare on Elm St (Citi-field)" only our "Freddy" is nowhere to be seen. When you can only see 3 and a half (please wake up Mr. Niese) good players on this team bleak is what you get. Now to be fair I really am the eternal optimist but boy have the Mets really tested me since .....oh 1962. At least we're really coming to the "when push comes to shove" moment but still have to wait till the off season to really know something about ZW, Travis and hopefully see a little Meija , Montero, Puello and Vaughn in Sept. The real question is of course whether or not Freddy's gonna spend $$$ this winter cause although Choo will probably be available doesn't mean he'll want to come to us. So I will do my best to remain positive and dream of a rotation of Harvey, Wheeler, Montero, Niese (he'll be much more effective as an SP4) and how about Meija as your 5th starter. As for the bullpen we'll just have to leave it up to the FO again believing they can't screw it up this badly again....can they? And as for the position spots how about Travis at C, Duda at 1st, Murph at 2nd, Ruben at SS and DW at 3rd with an OF of free agent in left a platoon in CF of take your pick because we have to have defense out there Den Decker, Lagares or Ankiel and Choo in RF. Sorry to say but I don't have any confidence Davis will ever make it back to the player we all hoped he would be. Hey it ain't perfect but should be competitive if the pitching is what we think it will be because if it ain't we're in real trouble.  Till next time, Gary Seagren

Gary, nice read (BTW, my wife and I are having dinner with the Seagrens tonight out by the highway they are travelling home on).  

No one on the Internet has spent more time promoting the youngsters in this organization; however, I’m backing up a little and recharging the batteries for 2015. I just can’t see 2014 being the year the Mets make it to the playoffs. The holes in the cheese just keep growing.

The team has multiple problems:

                -elements of the core of their team (Duda, Davis, Tejada) are under-performing

                -top talent in organization (Wheeler, etc.) remain in minors

                -no top level projected bat has been developed

                -no top free agents have been signed

                -no top 10 international free agents have been signed in 2-yrs

Too much has to go right and nothing goes right in Queens. The team always leads the league in players on the IR. There’s something mysteriously wrong with their training program that needs to be addressed. Too many players come to camp out of shape. I’ve seen this first hand and it’s been that way through the Omar years also.

I don’t know Gary. Next year, we could have a great new young catcher (d’Arnaud), an exciting SP2 (Wheeler), and even a possible addition to the rotation (Montero), but, that’s all I see right now in reality. We can talk until we’re blue in the face, but Wilmer Flores, Cory Vaughn, and Cesar Puello are simply not ready and I will believe a top free agent signing when I see one.

I’m sorry, but I’m just not as optimistic as I have been in the past.

Keeping my eyes on…

              

  AA – Binghamton SP Rafael Montero – Another quality start on 5-26: 6.0-IP, 0-ER, 8-K. His AA ERA is now 3.08 and it’s 3.03 combined with his one AAA outing. Montero now has 10 starts for the season and the only negative I can find is the fact he has only throw 59.1 innings over those games. His last ten outings have averaged only 52.2 innings per game. I don’t see this holding him back, but I would have liked to see a couple of seven or eight inning outings. The big number for the reason remains 59.1-IP/67-K/9-BB. You can’t do much better than that.

               

AAA – Las Vegas – C – Francisco Pena – No one has been more harsh on Frankie than I have over the 567 years I have covered him in the Mets system. I have never seen a team show so much patience and give a player so much time to develop. Look at some of these seasonal batting averages:  Savannah 2007 - .210… St. Lucie 2009 - .224… St. Lucie 2011 - .223… Binghamton 2012 - .198…  He was hitting only .246 for Binghamton this year (only 69-Abs) when he was called mysteriously to Las Vegas. Vegas already had Landon Powell (.169) and Kai Gronauer (.294) there, but both Travis d’Arnaud (.250) and Juan Centeno (.297) were then on the DL. So far, after 23-Abs, this looks like an excellent move: .348/.375/.652/1.027, 2-HR. This move probably was done due to need, but it does give Pena an opportunity to showcase his so far under-achieving professional career to some scout looking for a peg in a trade (update – he hit two more home runs on Monday while I was writing this about him).

MARK MOKRIS to me - Hi Mack,    I hope all is well with you.  I was just wondering now that we have had a chance to finally see a little of Steve Matz and he is doing well whatever happened to the other big lefty in that draft?  I know Zach Dotson had a signing bonus of $500,000 and then he had the suspension the next year but then nothing for almost two years now.  You would think that if he didn't have future with Mets they would just release him but it seems like he is in the witness protection program or something.  I was very surprised the Mets didn't give him a shot at starting at Savannah this year.  I realize the Mets have an abundance of pitching but I thought they would have given this kid more of a chance.  It almost seems like the Mets decided to punish him by never allowing him to start his career.  What gives?  Thanks.

Hey Mark.  First of all, Zach is still a New York Met and is currently in extended camp. He is scheduled once more to attempt to play as part of the Kingsport Mets rotation. Obviously, Dotson has had some problems getting out of the box. He did get on the mound twice since the suspension, but both outings were less than one inning disasters (1.2-IP, 11-R). The word I’m getting is the Mets still have a lot of faith in my local boy Zach and he still is only 23—years old. My guess is his days of possibly making a Mets rotation is over because of age; however, he still could have a future in the pen, come 2-3 years from now. At this point all I can tell you is he is 100% physically healthy.