From The Desk Of...

Good morning.

      1.    Monday, the Mets put the first baseman in the outfield, and extra catcher on first, a shortstop on third, and a left fielder in center. This can’t be by coincidence nor can it not be something that was blessed by the General Manager. What’s the long game here? Firing? An insanity fee? Kevin Plawecki said that there isn’t a single player on the team that doesn’t believe they can make the playoffs. Does he realize that, as of a wake up on Monday, the team would have to go 59-16 to wind up with 90 wins. Does anyone do the math there. Do they have a calculator? An abacus?

     2.     At the same time, using Monday morning stats, we have a natural second baseman hitting .387 in AAA (after hitting .327 in AA) and a natural first baseman hitting .300 in AAA (after hitting .314 in AA). Following this team always confused me a little, but is becoming min blowing.

     3.    The on-again, off-again promotion and demotion of IF Luis Guillorme is so TC. He had 10 hits in 58 at-bats, over 29 games (.172). That’s a little over two at bats per game played vs. the 76 games played all season long. Did he really stand a chance here? And how do you deal with this when you are famous for being a defensive specialist’ and you’re demoted the morning after you give up two errors?

     4.    I need to say something here about Sandy Alderson. I have been rough regarding what I have called in the past ‘Sandy and Co’, but backed off and shifted the blame to the Wilpon family once I found out that the initial diagnosis of Sandy’s cancer was, as described to me, ‘very bad’. Now, that my sources are telling me that the relapse is ‘very VERY bad’ it is impossible to write anything about him operationally from this point. As the husband of a cancer survivor, I know that one of the top three reasons cancer can return is stress. Frankly, Sandy should have retired when he was first diagnosed with this deadly form, but what’s that hindsight saying? I simply wish him  well and pray he has the strength for another pennant race against this fucking disease.

     5.    I want everybody to keep tract of my favorite during the last draft. RF/1B Seth Beer (Clemson) has been promoted from Low-A to Full-A after only 11 games. Beer powered four home runs with seven RBIs in 41 at-bats, hitting .293 with a .659 slugging percentage and a .431 on-base percentage.  I will keep updating this and show you that he will make it to the pros 2-3 years ahead of our first rounder and probably be compared to Aaron Judge when this is all over. But what did I know?

     6.    MMs reader Josh Drennen sends… Jonathan Mayo - @JonathanMayo - 22nd-rder Jaylen Palmer gets $200K from @Mets ($75K counts toward bonus pool). SS from @HCKBaseball in Flushing, NY had big growth spurt, now 6-3 w/power potential, maybe stay at SS or move to OF?  -  then… 11th-rder Franklin Parra gets $150K ($25K counts toward bonus pool). LHP from @CopiagueSchools has FB that touches low-90s, breaking ball and changeup. Relative newcomer to baseball.

     7.    Mike Puma - @NYPost_Mets - In the last three years, 3 Harvard guys have departed from the Mets front office: Paul DePodesta, Adam Fisher and Sandy Alderson.

     8.    One more thing about the ‘New Mets’ and Troika v2.0… I talked to some ‘people’ about what is going on with Sandy and how Fred and Ethel have decided to go forward. Everyone seems to be shaking their heads regarding this new way of approaching the remains of this season. The one thing everybody agrees on is that we will see a new, singular General Manager next year, hired from the outside. We are about to go into the most important trade season in the history of this team. Dead wood needs to be dealt off for anything we can get, even if it is only salary relief. Serious consideration needs to be made in either trading Noah or Jake… or even both… for a boatload of Top 100 prospects. And lastly, the right side of the infield needs to be cleared out for Alonso and McNeil. But instead of having one ’Charles in Charge’ pounding the gavel at this critical point, we have three underlings making a majority decision to take to a myopic owner that only will say no anyone. As one of the real inside Mets people told me this week… ‘this is going to be a real mess’.

     Trading is not the simple task of making a phone call and closing a deal. Go re-watch that scene from Money Ball. It takes multiple negotiations with multiple General Managers that you have built a relationship with. The only person that has these relationships is Sandy.  

      Yes, this is a real mess.

     9     Seems like the all-star promotions and releases have begun. First some good news… RHP chip, Anthony Kay has been promoted from A-Columbia to A+ - St. Lucie. Tom Brennan advises that the high ERA Kay should do better in the low hitting A+ league that Lucy plays in…. RHP Stephen Nogosek transferred from St. Lucie (High-A) to Binghamton (AA)… Nogosek went 3.06 and 10.30 SO9 in 23 games for Lucy and should be a great add. He’s 23… lastly, catcher Ali Sanchez (21/yrs. A-Columbia: .259, 4-HR) has been promoted to advanced-St. Lucie (A+). The 21/yr. old (yes, he still is only 21) is having his best pro season (.259) since he played for the GCL-Mets 2015 (.278). He is almost returning to the prospect chip he had when he first started with the Mets back then as a 17-year old. I also love it because it seems to mean that Anthony Dimino will move from Lucy to Bing, allowing Patrick Mazeika to get promoted to Vegas. .. on the downside, catcher Brandon Brosher and Dariel Rivera were cut.