6/15/18

Q and A - Silver Linings?


Mack asks –

With all the gloom and doom going on in Queens this month, do you see any silver lining for this team in the future?

Tom says –

            Not for 2018 - too many torpedo shells have impacted this team.
However, there is always a silver lining to be found, despite the dark clouds that are the Wilpons.  Pitching has had its bumps this year, but who wouldn't want deGrom, Thor, Matz, Wheeler, Lugo, and Gsellman?  Hopefully Vargas stays solid after his atrocious start to 2018.

If Familia's shoulder calms down, who wouldn't want him?
Drew Smith is looking more and more like a legit pen arm.  Maybe one of the other acquires will, too, although had we absorbed some of the 2017 traded guys' salary, we'd have better guys to call up.

At long last, Justin Dunn is rocking, and David Peterson has been terrific - one can make the case that both could be ready to make a major league impact by this time next season.  Is that fast for Peterson?  Yes - but he walks few, has a fine WHIP, a solid K rate, and seems mature, so why not?

Maybe Nabil Crismatt becomes a decent 5th starter soon - or a pen arm.
Hitting-wise, less optimism in the Brennan camp, but still some:
McNeil and Alonso will have to prove their major league hitting chops, but I would be very surprised if we don't see both this year.  Both may be revelations when they get here

Conforto should come around (please, don't be the next Ike Davis).  Maybe Kaczmarski becomes a good 5th outfielder.  Nimmo, meanwhile, has been a true surprise.

Also by this time next year, we may just see Andres Gimenez - 500 more plate appearances, and another year of maturity, and he could be a help to Mets in late 2019.

Their pitching could be enough to attract a big bat like Machado.  I still think moving the center field fence in to 400 feet from 408 would make it reasonably attractive to a slugger, making it perhaps a slightly BETTER than average field to hit in.

Maybe Cespedes learns his legs are fragile and he cannot be reckless and steal bases.  Maybe Bruce starts to hit like Bruce again.  Maybe Mesoraco gets ome of his 2014 magic back for the rest of 2018.

The biggest silver lining would be if the Wilpons would sell this team for a king's ransom and leave the job of owning a major league, big market team to someone competent enough to get it right.  But I believe there is no silver lining to that dark cloud.

Reese says –

The success of Seth Lugo and Robert Gsellman make me more confident in the Mets parting ways with one of Jacob deGrom or Noah Syndergaard to replenish a barren farm system.   It would take at minimum 3 of a team's top 10 prospects to even take the call. 

I saw in Sunday night's game some intelligence from Todd Frazier when he stole a base on the first pitch off Luis Severino and Gary Sanchez.  Maybe that level of preparation will rub off on some of the other players. 

Through the darkness of the various batting slumps I see the slightest glimmer of hope that opportunities could open up for guys like Peter Alonso or Jeff McNeill since there is no point in playing people who are not getting it done.  (Then again that's been true for the last 7 years, too, so I don't know why I should expect that to change now)

Michael Maar  says –

            The silver lining for me is that the starting rotation still looks like it can be among the best in baseball once Thor is back.  I'd define that rotation as deGrom, Thor, Matz, Wheeler & Lugo.  There are still 3 good young building-block position players in Conforto/Nimmo/Rosario that with a little maturity & improvement form a decent base to build around.  So while things look pretty bleak at the moment, I'm currently in the camp of resisting a full rebuild (i.e. not trading deGrom/Thor).  That's not to say I wouldn't entertain selling pieces like Familia at the deadline.

Things don't look promising in terms of coming together in 2018 but if 2+ more young players emerge to help generate some more consistent offense, I think there's still a path for the Mets to build a contender with the core they have.

Mike Friere says –

            It is really tough to see anything positive with regards to the Mets' roster if you focus on the short term.  An unbelievable, almost Hollywood like confluence of events has conspired to destroy the 2018 season and it seems like there is no end in sight.  However, if you look past the negative issues, there are a few positives to include our pitching staff rounding into form.

Quietly, Matz and Wheeler have rebounded of late, along with the regular dominance of DeGrom and Syndergaard (when healthy).  If you add in Lugo's gem last night, you have the makings of a pretty good rotation moving forward which SHOULD free up the front office to address the dreadful lack of offense that has plagued the team to date.

Mack says –

            There are always silver linings… the question is whether there is enough to get yourself out of the abyss.

            Fangraphs, one of the more respected baseball websites, just posted there new Top 131 prospects in the game. There were three Mets on the list, one of which has never played an inning for them yet (Kelenic).

            131 prospects. 3 Mets.

            Fangraphs aren’t Mets fans or Mets haters, They’re objective baseball people who’s only job is to do these kinds of analytical posts. They aren’t influenced by their fandom. They are like Joe Friday on Dragnet. ‘Just the facts, ma’am’.

            They listed Peter Alonso (#73), Jarred Kelenic (#96), and Andres Gimenez (103).

            Are there more?

            Well, I love David Peterson, Drew Smith, Jeff McNeil, Justin Dunn, Nabil Crismatt, Tyler Bashlor, Ryder Ryan, Jordan Humpreys, Thomas Szapucki, Wagner Lagrange, and Anthony Kay but, the more I think about it, they are probably right. There are a lot of Mets prospects that I like but they probably don’t belong on any Top 131 list… yet.

            There’s even a longer list that, like Luis Guillorme and McNeil, have showed the signs of breaking out of the pack and become a red star prospect… Corey Oswalt, Gerson Bautista, Joseph Zanghi, Joshua Torres, David Thompson, Kevin Kaczmarski, Patrick Mazeika, Adonis Uceta, Matt Blackham, Dave Roseboom, Harol Gonzalez, Matt Pobereyko, Thomas McIiraith, Adam Atkins, Anthony Dimino, Desmond Lindsay, Quinn Brody, Rigoberto Terrazas, Mark Vientos,Walter Rasquin, Blake Tiberi, Jeremy Vasquez, Aaron Ford, Carlos Hernandez, and Trey Cobb… but, as John Sickles, of Minor League Baseball fame, said in his sub-headline in the last Top 20 Mets prospect list he put out… “if you love C+ prospects, you will love the Mets’.
           


           

6 comments:

Tom Brennan said...

Take off our fans hats for a minute - let's say we parachuted down from Pluto and, totally untainted and objective, had to evaluate each MLB team for its current status and silver linings.

This team would clearly be bottom 10, perhaps bottom 5. Not pretty.

This team produces insufficient numbers of dangerous major leaguers. Sooner or later that catches up to you.

Reese Kaplan said...

But not to Sandy Alderson, apparently.

Tom Brennan said...

Sandy is Teflon Don.

Mike Freire said...

It seems like we are all saying the same thing, just in different ways.

The team simply isn't good enough and changes are needed if there is a chance
at changing the narrative.

With that said, I still say that 2018 should be used to evaluate what we have moving forward and what we need to improve upon.

Mack Ade said...

But let's use Daniel Murphy as an example.

I was in camp when he was, not only trying to work his way on the 25-man squad, but also find a position to play at.

I put up a picture I took when I was there watching his shag grounders at second with two other wannabees.

ANYONE with the talent I listed in this both has the God given talent to step up in this game.

Anonymous said...

Mack:

Good comment regarding Daniel Murphy on your recent post.

The players I follow now, AA Binghamton to AAA Vegas, I have all mentioned posting here prior. Normally after about two months of playing time for them at AAA Vegas, I can judge that player's realistic chances going forward to the bigs. It's also the intangibles.

With Brandon Nimmo it was all the above, skill set and intangible things. So who is the next potential "big thing" here from within this NYM organization?

Surprisingly, these NY Mets have like seven players I am watching closely right now (mostly pitchers) from Vegas to Binghamton. Nabil Crismatt took it on the chin last night starting, but I am still interesting in following him.

But I think the call up to Vegas of Peter Alonso and Jeff McNeil were perhaps telling here. With potentially both Dominic Smith and Peter Alonso being a NY Mets player at the same time and position, one will have to obviously be moved to left field or third base. Not sure on this yet, but I think that the new core is beginning to form.

I am also a big Drew Smith fan, as I have stated here before. I think Drew has the best potential going forward to start and be successful for these NY Mets out of any/all NYM MiLB possible starters. He has that nice mix of pitches a team wants to see, size, a change, a four-seam and fastball with 98 mph potential he at times will display. And Drew has "that look" whatever that really is who knows, but he does. And he is upgrading his control feature at current.

What in summary this is telling me, is that the NY Mets might be wise to hang onto their current four NYM stud starters as best a team possibly can. They are decent enough to make a WS run for the next few seasons at least, if the hitting and relief pitching is added into this Mets equation.

However, if the NY Mets cannot satisfy Jacob deGrom and his agent's salary request on a new contract, then obviously Jacob will have to be traded at the deadline.

The Boston Red Sox (to me) and not the NY Yankees are the better trading partner for the Mets with this, if it were to happen at all with Jacob. The reason being is that the NY Yankees top two levels the past two seasons (AAA Scranton and AA) are pretty much already up to the NY Yankees parent club.

Gleyber Torres is 21 years old, a rookie, has an incredible skill set off the charts good, has incredible power potential going forward, and has the intangibles for greatness. He is the 2018 AL Rookie of the Year most likely. But the NYY have already announced that Gleyber Torres is not and will not ever be on the trade block for them. The only thing I can see at the NYY is Brandon Drury at third base who is Andujar's lifetime backup. After that the cupboard with the NYY AAA Scranton and AA teams gets a little bit thin. Yes, there are one or two pitchers of interest down there in their minor leagues, but they are not probably as good as Loaisiga is.

The Boston Red Sox have a more interesting and tempting group of really good AAA and AA players I believe. My favorites right now are 19 year old lefty starter J. Groome (currently out with TJ surgery and this young which should be overall a good thing for him), 22 year old third baseman Michael Chavis (out with PEDs but look up his power stats batting), and then maybe too lefty starter E. Rodrigues (ERod) to round this all out if it were to happen.

But this talk is all premature and I am hoping that Jacob deGrom can definitely stay a NY Met over the foreseeable future. But the Mets MiLB top two levels have decent and young relievers they "could call up" here soon. And with Peter Alonso and Jeff McNeil close, maybe it's time to start feeling good about things all Mets.

Hang tough Mets fans!