Tuesday's underwhelming decision by Sandy Alderson to promote Kirk
Nieuwenhuis – a guy whose numbers have been in steady decline since the opening
day of the season -- can be rationalized
away since he enviably holds a spot on the existing 40-man roster. The other outfield alternatives holding the
same lofty privilege – Matt den Dekker (.233) and Cesar Puello (.268) are not
exactly setting the world on fire. The
versatile Anthony Seratelli (even worse at .176) and Eric Campbell (.295) are
not on the 40-man roster. Consequently,
the options he had were fairly limited.
Of course, you could go another way – promote .325 hitting
Zach Lutz to play off the bench and some RH first base duty, but that would
mean shifting the suddenly hot Lucas Duda to the outfield and pushing Josh Satin into limbo. Given
how Duda has responded offensively in the past when the pressure of playing his
non-preferred position seemed to take its toll, that’s probably not a good
approach (without even getting into the defensive adventure he is lumbering
around out there).
Like it or not, they probably made the right call in who to
move and it’s probably going to be a three man outfield of Eric Young, Kirk Nieuwenhuis
and Andrew Brown until Curtis Granderson is healthy and Chris Young returns
from the DL. In fact, Nieuwenhuis may
not even get to unpack since they will have to make another roster move on
Friday. Then it becomes Eric Young,
Chris Young and either Andrew Brown or Curtis Granderson. Of course, they could jettison someone from
the bullpen such as John Lannan to give themselves an extra outfielder, but the
smarter move would be demoting Ike Davis to play every day in Las Vegas. (It’s not like any of the Las Vegas 1B
options are the second coming of Jeff Bagwell anyway). Then they could have 5 outfielders, a backup
corner infielder, a backup middle infielder and a backup catcher.
Hopefully with a full complement of outfielders over the
next two weeks while Juan Lagares recuperates, Terry Collins will see the true
value (or lack thereof) having Eric Young, Jr. and/or Kirk Nieuwenhuis in the
lineup. Something must be done to break
his infatuation with the former as he’s delivering worse than ever, leading the
team in strikeouts (on a team with K-Machines like Curtis Granderson, Ike
Davis, Lucas Duda and David Wright. Chris
Young gets a pass as he hasn’t even swung the bat yet). Eric’s not getting on base, not making
contact and not showing any power.
Hopefully when Lagares is ready to return they will at least consider
the Colorado Rockies approach when it comes to the currently healthy
Young. I don’t think Kirk Nieuwenhuis is
the answer long term either, but if that’s what it’s going to take to get
Collins to do what abundantly clear to everyone but him – playing Chris Young,
Juan Lagares and Curtis Granderson – then so be it.
While we’re looking at the 40-man roster it might be time to
consider the switching of John Lannan miscast
as a reliever with someone
else. Unfortunately the only reliever
who is healthy and pitching well for the 51s is the man who had a perfect
spring – Miguel Socolovich – who’s slightly less than perfect with a miniscule 1.93
ERA. Joel Carreño is doing fairly well
at 3.38, too. Neither are on the 40 man
roster and if they wanted to make a lefty-for-righty change then they would
have to risk losing Lannan to have room to add one of the non-roster
players. That means Josh Edgin and his
10.38 ERA is the more likely move – replacing a lefty with a lefty and staying
within the confines of the 40 man roster.
There is another way to go – converting another starter to
reliever – but I’m not talking about young Rafael Montero. Daisuke Matsuzaka is sporting an ERA close to
2.00 and a WHIP close to 1.00. That way
they would still keep him in the organization by promoting him prior to May as
stipulated in his contract. Still, Dice-K doesn’t solve the need for a second
lefty.
On Terry Collins Just Since Saturday
On Sunday he
goes on record complaining that Scott Rice might have a tired arm because he
was burned out pitching in 73 games last year.
Ummm, Terry…who was the manager last year who chose to put him into 73
games?
On Monday we
had this comment from our illustrious manager regarding Juan Lagares, "I
wouldn't say he's going to be in there more than necessarily anybody else…When
Chris gets back, I'm going to have a meeting with those four guys ... and try
to explain how we're going to run it. It's going to be a juggling game that
hopefully we'll have success doing it."
Then on Tuesday comes the about
face, “
“It’s really tough. He’s played absolutely great, he’s swung the bat well, he’s earned that right to be out there every
day.”
Can someone PLEASE just buy a muzzle for Sandy’s lap dog?
9 comments:
Trends, trends, trends....
EY was downright awful his first 5 games this year: 2 for 19, 1 walk, 9 K's. As bad as it gets.
Since then, in 8 games and 37 plate appearances, he has been on via hit or walk 16 times, with a still too high 10 Ks, and all 7 of his steals, and 11 runs scored.
Stunningly, though, he has K'd at least once in each of the first 13 games. how does a no-power guy do that, especially when he shows that when he gets on base a lot, things happen that are very good.
Maybe, just maybe, he'll be OK until Lagares returns. Hopefully, his next 8 games will be as good as the last 8.
Thomas -
I'm really happy to have you as a daily reader on the site. You seem to love to break out all this tuff and it adds so much to each post.
As for EYJ, I love his electricity, but we are probably right now seeing the best he will ever be.
I just don't know how the Mets consider him a decent leadoff hitter. He will always produce too many strikeouts due to the way be approaches the game.
Don't get me wrong... I love it when he's on base, but, in my opinion, he just misses.
Reese -
I give Nieuwenhuis all the credit in the world capitalizing on the opportunity, but I still don't see him as any longer term solution for the Mets in the outfield. He's welcome to gum up the works and prove me wrong, but, for now, Granderson is going to get 600 at bats no matter what he hits, and the law firm of Lagarus, Young, and Young will rotate the other two slots.
I'm impressed with the .500 record... limited pitching, lousy bullpen outings, dead last in team hitting, and yet...
You get this with decent pitching, one key long relief outing, and timely hitting. Don't count on nine runs every night but you can win most games you get 4 runs if you play this way
EY is better as role player. Im looking forward to Chris Young (althou is most likely 1 year rental,,but we are .500 early after a sht spring, gotta beleive). Im into offense, I dont think Kirk is the answer but wasnt it nice to have offensive production ?? The thing is i dont think Lagarus is the answer either, never going to get enough production, but hey, we need him to roam cf at Citi Field, he has a role. I still want to tinker w Duda in LF when on the road against righties too. I would like CY and CG fulltime and Collins mixing it rest up vs matchups, we could get some production ..and we're going to need an arm in the bullpen !!
As our good friend Bill often demonizes small sample sizes, you have to understand the long term track records of the players in question. Kirk will regress to the mean. The rally by Eric Young to .255 is what you're going to get -- PERIOD. Matt den Dekker interestingly usually does well after adjusting to each new level of pitching, but two years at each level makes him a bit long in the tooth for a full time role anymore. The only offensive OF future in AAA is Puello who has yet to make his mark at that level.
Speaking of small sample sizes, it was nice to see Wilmer Flores get a multi-hit game. Let's hope he can build on it.
I'd been prescient in suggesting they swap Lannan with Dice-K and that came to pass today. Now if only they'd clear up the first base logjam and let Ike Davis get steady work in LV to build up his trade value and/or prepare to replace Lucas Duda if he falters.
The trade route continues to be the best hope for SS. Too bad Nick Franklin is now up in the bigs as his price tag probably just jumped. Is Didi Gregorius' glove worth parting with one of our pitchers? While our defense is a bit like Swiss cheese, I don't think a .250-.260 hitter is worth sacrificing a Rafael Montero to obtain.
Speaking of Montero, I will go on record saying he will have more early success in the big leagues than will Noah Syndergaard, but Syndergaard (like Verlander) will harness it after a few years of uneven work.
Jam -
what you want from teams with a limited amount of talent are players that motivate each other to produce more on a single game basis.
a good example is today... Recker gets the start, and hits a massive home run
one game at a time
Reese -
I'm really upset that the Mets are allowing Flores to go back to 2B sometimes.
It would be in the best interest of the Mets that he learned how to play SS... period.
Derek Jeter is a big guy who manned shortstop for many years. Gone are the days where a shortstop was built like Bud Harrelson.
However, I have no problem with them playing him at 2B IF THERE IS A PLAN to either trade him or Murphy. However, there's been no semblance of a plan on the offensive side of the ledger since Alderson took over, so I'm with you -- let him play SS and just hope that the runs he gives up are less than the number of additional runs he produces.
Reese, sometimes I think the plan is to have no plan.
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