Morning Report – 3-29-14 – Giancarlo, ST Schedule, Lannan, Vegas, Gee

1903 New York Yankees

Coming Up –

        11 am –  Draft - Weekend D1 High-Lowlights

          2 pm  -  Top 10 LHP in 2014 MLB Draft - Updated 3-28-14 

         5 pm –   Top 10 C in 2014 MLB Draft - Updated 3-28-14

          8 pm –  Marcus Wilson, Grant Holmes, Aaron Nola, Brady Aiken, Austin Murphy

        11 pm -  SS - Cole Tucker - Mountain Point (AZ) HS


We're staring to get the picture on some of the rosters that will be announced next week. Players talk, relatives blab, and twitter accoutns tweet... all resulting in the following that look like a lock so far:

Las Vegas - Syndergaard, Montero, deGrom. Mazzoni (DL?), Verrett, Socolovich, Reid, Farnsworth, Black Edgin, Muno, Flores,, Seratelli, Lutz, Centeno, Puello, Nieuwenhius, den Dekker

B-Mets - Robles, Lara, Walters, Kolarek, Leathersich, Goeddell, Clark, M Reynolds, Tovar, Plawecki, Lawley, Cecilliani, Vaughn

St. Lucie - Matz, Boyd, Nimmo

Savannah - Smith Cecchini

Giancarlo –

I know this is a little late in the game to be moving around your 40-man squad, but it seems to me that the Mets are still trying to finalize their opening day pen. Neither Vic Black or Gonzalez Germen have sewed up the spot and maybe, just maybe, some time should be spend considering Giancarlo Alvarado.

Alvarado is the 6-4 righty that threw two scoreless innings on Thursday against Washington.The 36-yr. old (perfect for TC!) was a Sandy-pick out of the Mexican League (2013) via Japan (2010-2012). He also started 12 games for Las Vegas last year: 5-4, 3.49, 1.53, 59.1-IP, 41-K, 30-BB. Oh, no walks on Thursday either. I’m just saying…

ST Schedule -

Ya know, I’m getting pretty sick and tired of playing Atlanta, St. Louis, and Washington all the time during spring training. Especially the Nats. Do we really need to show them everything we have (or don’t have)?

I understand the scheduling problems and I love the Mets complex in Port St. Lucie, but maybe the Mets need to consider taking their team to a hotel in Clearwater for 7-8 nights and make the rounds over there? You can play a split schedule back home with the kiddies who would love to get on Field 1… and who really cares if we’re the away team. It’s all about conditioning, right?

       Lannan –

       Normally, I’m not a big believer of the Sandy Alderson/Terry Collins Sign a Senior Citizen plan of the day, but you have to give them credit for the John Lannan signing. It definitely came at the same time that Josh Edgin proved he just may not be ‘in it to win it’ anymore. All I hope for here I three excellent outings out of four. I really don’t care about ERAs when it comes to relief pitchers. If you’re going to have a bad outing, fine, knock yourself out. Just make sure the other three outings are scoreless. If Lannan gives the Mets scoreless 7^th innings 75% of the time, this will be a great signing.

Vegas –

       The roster for Las Vegas is beginning to take shape and it will be dominated with very talented prospects (Syndergaard, Montero, deGrom, Massoni, Puello, Mejia, Flores) and AAAA players that have had their taste of the majors and want some more (Lutz, Edgin, Black, Farnsworth, den Dekker, Nieuwenhuis). But, the most important thing is that it seems to have held up the elevation of some other players that should be playing a level up from where they will once again begin a baseball season (Cecilliani, Fraser, Huchington, Goeddel, Walters).

       The depth of talent is very deep, but it’s mostly projects as marginal at the major league level. What you don’t want here is less time on the field for your more talented prospects.

       A good example of this would be Dustin Lawley. He has to get his at bats this year to progress in the outfield, but how is he going to do this surrounded by a Vegas starting lineup of Puello, Nieuwenhuis, and den Dekker, and a still undetermined placement of Cecilliani, Cory Vaughn, Travis Taijeron, Kyle Johnson, and Gilbert Gomez?

       The assumption is Cesar Puello will develop into a full time Mets outfielder, but so could Lawley given the time he needs to develop his game at both the AA and AAA level. His power potential exceeds Puello and it would be a shame if less talented outfields get in his way just because they have time and grade in the organization.

       We’ll write a comprehensive post on the rosters once they are finalized.                                                   

John Looby -

Hey Mack, I'd like to get the group's thoughts on Dillon Gee.

He seems to be a popular name thrown about when it comes to trade talk as he doesn't have the ceiling of Harvey, Wheeler or Syndergaard or he's going to get expensive etc...

To me, I think he is the perfect 4-5 starter on our roster for the long term. He's dependable, apart from blood clots he's not injury prone and seems to be getter better as each year passes. His end of 2013 and his spring training form have been first class. Apart from Harvey, is there any other pitcher on the squad that you would be more comfortable with throwing the ball too?

Looking ahead to late 2014 and 2015, we will have Harvey coming back from TJ, Syndergaard & Montero learning the ropes, Wheeler trying to get those pitch counts down, Niese spending every second week in the sick bay, and Meija, well, who knows.

At 27,  I think he is a rotation piece that we can just plug in and play for the next 5 years. Starting 2015 with the three headed monster, Gee and Niese/Montero/Meija means we do not have to look at the rotation for a long time. It's an enviable place to be. All focus can be on the 'pen, ss, and 1B.

        Mack – Good subject, John.

As I’ve said a number of times, the first thing a team that has payroll limits has to do is strengthen their, well, strength. In the case of the Mets, this is the starting rotation.

This isn’t going to happen for the Mets until Matt Harvey, Zack Wheeler, and Noah Syndergaard go 1-2-3. On paper this represents 60% of the games played, but, due to days off and rain outs, it will be closer to 70%.

Assuming all three of these power righties remain healthy, my plan would be to add the lefty Jon Niese $25.519mil through 2016) until the lefty Steven Matz is ready in 2017. You have to have a lefty in your rotation. You have to. If Matz doesn’t pan out, you go out and buy one, but you have to have a lefty.

This leaves one rotation spot for all those names we talk about every day we meet here. Does it have Dillon Gee’s name on it?

Fangraph –

        2014 Positional Power Rankings: Relief Pitchers (#16-30) 

Mets – Ranked 30^th - One can’t see it here, but navigating to the actual page from which these relief depth charts are taken reveals that a small collection of notable free-agent relievers, when their projected WAR figures are totaled, actually place higher than the Mets’ own relief depth chart — rendering the Mets, in effect, the 31st-best bullpen in the majors.

How much would it cost just to sign the top-five pitchers on that free-agent list? Not very much, probably, but probably more than the Mets are currently spending on their own relief corps. There’s a logic to the Mets economical bullpen construction, of course: the rest of the club isn’t particularly great. Investing heavily in relief would be unwise at this point.

Were one in the mood to take the over on one of the WAR projections here, one might benefit from doing so on right-hander Gonzalez Germen. As noted by Eno Sarris at RotoGraphs just a week-plus ago, Germen recorded swinging-strike rates greater than 25% with both his changeup and his slider last year, which is promising even if his defense-independent figures weren’t dominant across the board. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/2014-positional-power-rankings-relief-pitchers-16-30/

        Mack – Dead last. No, actually, one below dead last.