HEY!
THE METS DID WELL IN INTERNATIONAL SIGNINGS.
Three in the Top 50, including #6, catcher Yovanny Rodriguez.
Y Rod, anyone? At $2.85 million, half their signing $ pool.
Man, are the Mets stocked with catchers in the minors now, although none are ready for a 2024 call up.
A subject for another day.
Now, on to today's previously written topics....
What about our 2022 Mets draftees?
How are they doing?
Too early to really tell, but looks like a great draft if Parada pans out.
1 (11): Kevin Parada, C, college: $5,019,735. First full year in 2023 was solid, but not great. Strikeouts on the high side. Will he WOW or disappoint us in 2024? The Mets just signed 17 year old premier catcher Yovanny Rodriguez, more future catching competition for Parada, so let's hope Kevin rocks our world with an outstanding 2024.
1 (14): Jett Williams, SS, high school: $3.9 million. Absolute on-base and base stealing teenage machine. Walks and HBP with great frequency. Can’t wait for 2024. Headed to Citi Field by September, in my estimation. 2024 with the Mets is his goal.
2 (52): Blade Tidwell, RHP, college: $1,850,000. Solid progress in 2023. Depending on how good his 2024 goes will dictate whether or not he reaches Queens in 2024.
2C (75): Nick Morabito, OF, high school: $1,000,000. Hit .306, with 21 steals in 57 games. 65 speed. Expect big progress from him in the minors in 2024. Finish the 2024 season in AA, maybe AAA.
3 (90): Brandon Sproat, RHP, college: did not sign in 2023, but re-drafted and signed in 2023. High velo arm, his next pro inning will be his first.
4 (119): Jacob Reimer, 3B, high school: $775,000. Very nice season for the 19 year old in 2023. 336 at bats, .265, 8 HR, 49 RBI season. He should push through to AA before 2024 is over.
5 (149): D'Andre Smith, SS, college: $379,400. Mediocre so far. He is no Victor Scott, the 112 base stealer the Mets could have drafted instead.
6 (179): Tyler Stuart, RHP, college: $200,000. The 6’9” righty was great in 2023. A strong 2024 might result in a 2024 Mets debut at some point.
7 (209): Jonah Tong, RHP, high school: $226,000. 21 innings, 38 Ks, 6.00 in 2023. Love that K rate, don’t you?
8 (239): Dylan Tebrake, RHP, college: $146,430. Has been stellar in relief, finishing 2023 in AA. 55 Ks in 36 career innings, 2.27. Watch him.
9 (269): Chase Estep, 3B, college: $125,000. Lefty hitter has been released.
10 (299): Zebulon Vermillion, RHP, college: $20,000. Just one scoreless inning in 2022. Likely a TJS victim. Still in the system, already 25.
11 (329): Rhylan Thomas, OF, college: $180,000. .328 hitter in 2023 with a fielding award. Low power, very low K. Great first full season. Can he add power? Anxious to see his 2024 encore.
12 (359): Paul Gervase, RHP, college: $170,000. The 6’10” reliever fanned 96 in 57 innings, 2.05 ERA. Some danger good AA work. See you in Queens in 2024, Paul.
13 (389): Dylan Ross, RHP, college: No pro innings yet. I guess we’ll see him in 2024. Likely an operation victim.
14 (419): Cameron Foster, RHP, college: 4-6, 4.20 ERA, 85 Ks in 81 IP.
15 (449): Jackson Jaha, 3B, high school: Did not sign (Bum!)
16 (479): Jimmy Loper RHP, college: Amount unannounced. Solid year in St Lucie at age 23. 3.86 ERA.
17 (509): Connor Brandon, RHP, college: $200,000. Barely pitched. Went badly. Released.
18 (539): Chris Santiago, RHP, college: $125,000. 3 outings, 3 hitless innings, 3 walks, 2 Ks, no runs in the FCL. BUT…no innings in 2023, but still active? Another surgical strike, I guess.
19 (569): Jackson Lovich, SS, HS: Did not sign (Bum!)
20 (599): Eli Ankeney, LHP, college: $100,000. Pitched well in 2023. Better than one would expect in round 20. 27 outings, mostly for Brooklyn, 3.07, 55 Ks in 44 IP. When they needed a reliever, his walk-in song should be “Eli’s Coming!”
Six months after Clendenon was born in Neosho, Missouri, his father, Claude, died from leukemia.
Claude Clendenon was a mathematics and psychology professor and chairman of the mathematics department at Langston University, an all-black school. Clendenon's mother, Helen, demanded high academic achievement from her son.
When he was six years old, Clendenon's mother married former Negro league baseball player Nish Williams. In addition to academic excellence, Clendenon's new stepfather decided he was going to make his stepson into a baseball player. Williams served as a coach on nearly every baseball team that Clendenon played on, including his college team at Atlanta's Morehouse College, and his semi-pro career with the Atlanta Black Crackers.
Along with Williams, Clendenon received guidance from some of the players Williams knew from the Negro leagues, including:
Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige, Roy Campanella and Don Newcombe.
Clendenon graduated as a letterman in nine sports at Booker T. Washington HS in Atlanta, and received a host of scholarship offers. He was prepared to attend UCLA on a scholarship until coaches from Morehouse College in Atlanta visited his mother, and convinced her that he should attend a school closer to home.
Morehouse College was and is one of the premier academic institutions for young African-American men.
Just before Clendenon arrived in 1952, the freshman class were assigned "Big Brothers" to help the students acclimate themselves to Morehouse and college life.
Although the policy had ended when he arrived, a Morehouse graduate volunteered to be Clendenon's big brother; his name was Martin Luther King Jr.
Clendenon became a twelve-time letterman in football, basketball and baseball at Morehouse, and had received contract offers from both the Cleveland Browns and the Harlem Globetrotters.
Clendenon, however, decided he wanted to teach, and taught 4th grade upon graduation.
Williams convinced Clendenon to attend a Pittsburgh Pirates try-out camp in 1957, and he signed with the team as an amateur free agent shortly afterwards.
Back to Tom:
It took Donn a while to reach the big leagues at age 26, but he was a fine player, including during his brief tenure with the Mets. He had just one post-season, with the 1969 Mets, and cracked a double and THREE HRs for the Mets in just 14 at bats. Wow.
Perhaps in this day and age, with the money in baseball, he would have focused more on baseball early on, and made it to the big leagues a few years sooner and had a longer, even more impactful career.
He became a lawyer after his playing days were over, also served as a drug counselor, and died at age 70 of the same leukemia his father died of.
His 97 RBIs in 396 at bats in 1970 for the Mets was a truly remarkable RBI rate. Alonso had 131 RBIs in 597 at bats one year, a significantly lesser rate per at bat than Clendenon in 1970.
MARTE DOING GREAT:
If so, and he continues like that and returns to being Marte circa 2022, the Mets’ offense is sufficient as is.
If they move the fences in, you cannot write one article about how the pitchers are allowing too many home runs
ReplyDeleteI'd imagine the earliest we see Yovanny Rodriguez in a Mets uniform playing in Queens is mid-2026. More likely 2027-28.
ReplyDeleteSteveM, I might note the increased HRs allowed by pitchers, but I and the hitters will still be happy. Mets pitchers have had it too easy at home, at the expense of the hitters. Seven feet closer, in a park where the ball often carries like crap? It will just make the park HR-neutral.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteSteveM, I took a little time to look at home and away hitting since 2015 the first season of the current dimensions (slight change in 2023). Keep in mind there s/b a homefield advantage.
ReplyDeleteAverage for 8 years on the road: .253, 103 HRs, 365 runs
Average for 8 years at home: ..238, 96 HRs, 332 runs
On average they have been in the bottom third in home hitting, almost in the top third in road hitting.
If there is a homefield advantage, the .253, 103 HRs, and 365 runs on the road should be about .257, 110 HRs and 380 runs at home if the park was neutral, as one should expect a team would hit better at home. The gap between hypothetical home results in a neutral park, and actual home results, is huge, and negative, to the hitters.
If you want to attract marquis free agent hitters, or even simply help your own hitters, move the fences in to eliminate the negative park offense disparity.
I cannot understand how all the other sports have fixed boundaries except for baseball. It’s wild how you have bandboxes and canyons in the same league.
ReplyDeletedoes anyone know what's going on with 4th top 50 player that the Mets has supposedly locked up? last list I saw indicated that he's one of only a handful of top 50 players who have not yet signed.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much Tom for the education on Donn Clendenon. What an interesting story and person. I had no idea.
ReplyDeleteI am still confused at the discrepancy in home batting average. I get the homeruns, but why is the BA so low? If you move in the fences, there might be a few more homers, but it seems like there would be a marginal reduction in doubles and triples.
ReplyDeletePerhaps there is more to it than how far the fences are from the plate - is the 'batters eye' an issue?
Tom, in your eight year analysis, are you able to see how many singles, doubles, and triples are hit at home and away?
Bill, I would have to recalculate singles, doubles, triples. But my guess is that seeing 395 foot shots caught, rather than be doubles or homers, causes hitters to press a bit.
ReplyDeleteIf I am Pete, and my average is 10-15 points higher because it is 20-30 points higher at home, and I have a few more HRs and doubles, rather than outs, I walk around happier. Happy and less frustrated hitters hit better, is my guess. Short of interviewing the players off the record on the subject, I don't know how to get better answers. But Stearns can easily chat with any of them.
My brother went to a game last year, he said, where Pete lost what would have been both a double and a HR.
Adam, I didn't either. I googled him because I was puzzled why he only got to the majors when he had just turned 26. The reason, and the rest, were indeed fascinating.
ReplyDeleteGus, I'd hate to see Colorado with Phillies dimensions, but I think any team that decade after decade has their park favor pitchers owes an apology to the team's hitters.
ReplyDeleteThese days, it simply matters more in dollars and cents. When I was a kid, Mays did not make that much more than Agee. Now, it could cost players many millions to be toiling in a pitchers' park, due to suppressed results.
I still think if a) Pete was playing in Philly last year and b) he did not get that HBP in June that he rushed back from and struggled for a month, he'd have hit at least upper 50s in HRs, maybe 60.
Jon, I saw this: The Mets did not officially sign shortstop Raymel Ortiz (No. 26).
ReplyDeleteWhether that means they won't sign him at all, I don't know, and I don't know why he didn't. Maybe he saw the Mets have 600 shortstops and wanted to go in a different direction.
Last year's big catcher bonus signee, Daiverson Gutierrez, hit .186 with 2 HRs in 177 at bats in the DSL, so hopefully, Rodriguez doubles that and hits .372 this year.
ReplyDeleteGutierrez is still 18, so let's see how he does in 2024. Maybe he hits .372.
Maybe Gutierrez's fielding woes affected his hitting. In 35 games catching, he made 11 errors, had 9 passed balls and threw out 19% of base stealers. In fairness, there was an average of a very high 3 steal attempts per game, so maybe most of those were errors on throws.
ReplyDeleteMaybe he shows night and day improvement in 2024.
I wonder if Rodriguez goes right to the FCL, and Gutierrez gets to repeat his DSL stint in 2024.
Always feel like if you don't leave a comment early in the morning its a mute point but I have to say I hated this draft...
ReplyDeleteI wanted and was begging for Dylan Lesko and Brock Porter
I wasn't completely upset by Parada because he was projected all year as a cant miss C and top 5 in most draft boards (seems like another mistake)
And I was and still am against a 5'6 any position player ever to be taken in the first round (looks like we may have found a jewel here but I would never take this risk)
However what would our farm system look like with Lesko and Porter...
We keep hearing how the mets have done well in the draft in the past few years however what is the standards to make that statement... No one is kicking the door down to trade for our prospects and on the field they don't perform or scream all star (much less super star)
Eddie
Just noticed we gave away 1 million on Morabito and 1.85 on tidwell when Porter was still on the board. (dont forget the slot money lost on Sproat not signing) Porter should have been the top Arm in the system and actually a legit Ace arm....
ReplyDeleteI cant see the results in the mets drafting that they should be given any praise... when we draft a real player (that someone would desire) we trade it for middling talent
Crow for baez, Kelenic for cano/diaz, E Rodriguez for Luccachi
Eddie, you sound like my brother. Which is good. You're thinking outside the box.
ReplyDeleteI only sporadically looked at whom else we could have drafted, but you make a great point.
And when we drafted Jett, I thought the same as you. But he has some extraordinary skills.
Speaking of short guys, 5'6" Matt Rudick apparently really muscled up going into 2023, and he went from a very strong final month in Brooklyn in 2022 to being literally the best offensive player in the Eastern League in the first 8-9 weeks of 2023 before he got hurt. Man, I love to see guys work like the dickens and get better. McNeil did the same thing several years ago, which jettisoned him up.
Parada? I will take a wait-and-see, but your logic makes sense. When I heard Parada slipped down to the delighted Mets, I wondered what caused other teams to pass on him. He is now out of Basaball's Top 100 - how far out, I don't know.
Same with li'l Acuna - I am not surprised he went from # 38 last year to #77 this year.
You ought to write an article about Lesko and Porter. It would be a good one.
What’s good for the goose is good for the gander! If it helps the hitters it hurts the pitchers.
ReplyDeleteWoodrow, in Queens, it has been good for the pitchers and bad for the hitters for 62 seasons. Time to make it totally carbon neutral.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info, Tom.
ReplyDeleteJon, no problem.
ReplyDelete