Observations from Mack - The Prospects, Jake, Uceta

  Observations from Mack  - The Prospects, Jake, Uceta

Morning. 

It doesn’t matter if the Mets planned this, but the maturing of both Brett Baty and Francisco Alvarez has begin. 

Baty is a little ahead here but Alvy is gaining steam. They both seem to have become starters at their positions, both of which have been long needed for Mets talent. 

The next step the Mets need to do is move these two higher in the batting order. 

My hopes are that Alvarez isn’t platooned with Tomas Nido, who seems to gave forgotten how to hit since spring training. 

Who is next? 

Has to be Mark Vientos, right? At least, as a RHDH in place of whatever the hell his name is. I don’t memorize secondary names until year two. 

And, sometime after the All-Star break, the Mets will have a new second baseman. 

 

Texas starter, Jake deGrom went on the 15-day IL, for something. Weakness, strain, tightening of, tearing or something like that of somewhere on either his arm or shoulder. Ya know, the expression, ‘you had me at…”? Well. Regarding Jake, you lose me at “Jake deGrom is being placed…”. 

Rumors are that baseball is thinking of naming the IL as the ‘deGrom dump’. 

DeGrom still commands when he pitches, but the problem remains that he just doesn’t pitch that much anymore. Body breakdown. Sort of David Wright with a pitcher’s glove. 

Still, in the 30.1 innings he has pitched so far this season, he has generated a +0.8-WAR and a stat line of 2-0, 2.67, 0.75, 45-K. 

Stay with me here… I figure that if the Mets resigned deGrom this year, their 1-2-3 would be some combination of him, Max, and Verlander, leaving Senga unsigned. 

So, we know money is no problem for Uncle Met. And we know that Jake’s numbers so far this season are pretty impressive. 

So, the question is, should the Mets have kept him around?

 

 The Mets recently called up RHRP Edwin Uceta and he has definitely impressed so far. 

The 25-year old 6-0 Uceta was an original International signed prospect in 2015, by the Dodgers, out of the Dominican Republic. He becomes arbitration eligible in 2026 and is scheduled to become a free agent in 2019. 

He stayed with the Dodgers through the 2021 season and pitched in 28 games (5 starts) for the parent team (5.22). He moved on to Arizona in 2022 where he also had a sub-par season (10-apps, 5.82). 

The Mets signed him this year, where he was first assigned to Syracuse 1-app, 1-IP, 0.00) and then called up to the pen middle relief pen starved Mets, where so far, in three innings, he has posted an ERA of 0.00. 

He was placed on the 10-day IL on April 25^th, to make room for the addition of Jose Butto. I don’t see this as a long term injury (frankly, I don’t think there was any injury at all). He’ll be back real soon.