Morning Report – July 26th - Playoffs, Joc Peterson, Wilmer Flores, CarGo, Minor Notes

(apologies for lack of the depth of the coverage the past few days,,, a good friend to the NY Giants, and my next door neighbor died from complications of a car accident on her was to Hilton Head. Got clipped by a 75-yr old going 15 miles over the speed limit. 

Anyway, back to sports…

Mets at the deadline: Tulo or CarGo?
Read more at http://throughthefencebaseball.com/mets-at-deadline-troy-tulowitzki-or-cargo/43575#7PiUYQM6eCbvAEF8.99


No, I don’t think we have a chance in making the 2014 playoffs but, WTF… why not give it a go, right.

For starts, the Mets needed to take three games (out of four) from Milwaukee. 

Someone forgot to tell this to Dillon Gee who had his second bad outing in a row. To do this they need to score more runs in the last six games they have played (nine), which is oddly equaled to the amount Milwaukee scored on Thursday night.

Last night was a wonderful come from behind victory that we just aren't used to seeing. These are the kind of games that usually wind up in a loss and a lot of bad press for Daniel Murphy, but it was Murph that began the three run rally that eventually led to the win.

The series is now split 1-1 and, the race continues.

+++ one more important thing +++

Last night you saw how a perfect lineup works. The problem is that the perfect lineup was three people. Yes, you can add Curtis Granderson before them, and the emergence of Travis d'Arnaud is now creating a 'perfect 5', but this is where it currently ends.

They are now 12 - 6 in their last 18 games


(I will update the race on Monday with win-loss records since the break and the following week's schedule for each team in the race)

For now, I’d like to see the Nats win every game left that they have scheduled against the Braves or Marlins. We only have a chance of being one wild card team that comes out of the NL EAST

Also, I’d like to see the Giants keeping pounding the Dodgers out of the race. They start a series at San Francisco that, if swept, could have us already lined up next to them

But none of this means nothing unless the Mets start winning in the 60-75% range and begin to pass some of the teams with better win-loss records in the books.

Speaking of the playoffs, hats need to be tipped to both Jacob deGrom and Bartolo Colon for keeping us in the peripherals of this thing we are still calling a race. Colon has us in a single handed win-win situation… win if we trade him for a SS or LF prospect and win if we keep him around for another great year out of him in 2015. You’re reading this on the 26^th. There are five more trading days for Sandy and Company for find the last person they worked with in the Dodgers organization that it really doesn’t matter how good Joc Peterson is if he’s never going to play for them.

There’s no fair trades during the trading deadlines. There’s only trading for immediately need and the Bums need to stop throwing away well played games (with good bats) with piss poor late inning starter innings and inadequate middle relieving.

We have plenty of that… starting with Colon and ending with Montero and Familia in the pen.

I spent Thursday night trying to get caught up online and I see that Wilmer Flores is back. I can’t see any scenario where this ends well.  What happens if he hits .400+ for the first 20-30 at-bats back in Queens? Are you going to take the job away from Ruben Tejada who has done a decent job of rebounding this year? Let’s fact it, 2014 is Tejada’s year at shortstop and, as I have said before, I don’t see a happy ending for Flores… ever. I’m never going to understand this one.

My post regarding CarGo generated a lot of negative interest in him; however, Joel Sherman confirmed the following day that the Mets are interested in him. As I have said in the past, there are better outfielders out there, but they don’t become available in mid-season trades. I don’t expect this to go anywhere. In fact, I don’t expect much at all out of the Mets this and next week. This team is going to have to first begin to operate differently before I believe it.

My guess as of now… Colon and Dice-K will move on for some AA or A level prospects. That’s Sandy’s speed.

Minor Notes

SP Jose Medina has not been able to duplicate the kind of numbers he put up last year for the DSL Mets (2013: 12-starts, 2-0, 0.35, 2-ER in 52.0-IP). The 18-year old GCL pitcher gave up three more runs in four innings pitched on Thursday, raising his seasonal ERA to 7.16… we need to keep an eye on someone named Adonis Uceta. The 20-year old DSL-Mets starter has now started eight games, going 2-1, 1.48… remember July 24, 2014. It may be the day that CF Brandon Nimmo began to turn things around at the AA-level. He went 3-5, raising his AA-BA to .207…  Lucas Duda is on pace for 25 HRs, 35 2Bs, .492 slugging, and an .853 OPS this season… Wilmer Flores in 55 games for Las Vegas:  .323, 71-H, 13-HR, 57-RBI, 43-R... going into last night's game, Las Vegas SP Rafael Montero was 3-3, 3.95 in his last 10 starts... P Daisuke Matsuzaka shipped back to NYC for MRI on elbow... Las Vegas SP Darin Gorski fractured his foot and was replaced on the roster with SP Matt Bowman...