Coming
Later Today –
9 30 am – Herb G
– Minor League Report
11 00 am - Ernest Dove - Who's Left On First... and Second... and Third?
12 30 am - Michael Conforto
11 00 am - Ernest Dove - Who's Left On First... and Second... and Third?
12 30 am - Michael Conforto
12 Noon-8 00pm – Draft Coverage
Morning!
Mark Simon over at
Amazin Avenue broke out an interesting stat on second basemen in the league. He
ranked which 2Bman were good at making good plays and avoiding mistakes. His
mistakes included errors and misplays. Well, it turns out of the 33 second
basemen he listed, Daniel Murphy was ranked 15th,
or, around right in the middle of the pack.
Just
exactly what do the Mets do with this guy? He has spent most of his career
hitting in the top 50 hitters of the league (lifetime .290 hitter) and he is
still only 29 years old. Sure, the Mets are now paying him $5.7mil but is this
something I’m supposed to care about? He does become a free agent after the
2015 season and his peak trading value would be around now, but can the Mets
really afford to get rid of what seems like one third of their offense?
Look,
there’s a lot of fancy names being tossed around in the organization here…
Herrera, Mazzilli, Rosario… but, in my book, what I got is what I know and I
have absolutely no problems offering this guy a deal through the 2017 season.
By then the worst thing that could happen is David
Wright is playing first base, Murphy’s moved back to his natural
position at third, and one of the guys I mentioned above has taken over at
second.
I’m just
saying…
So, the
draft has finally arrived.
We’ve
taken our first player and we’ve got 48 more to pick.
This is
always an exciting time for me, but I have learned over the years that nothing
is a sure bet.
The first
draft I covered as a Mets reporter was 2005, which yielded Mike Pelfrey, Drew Butera,
Jon Niese, Bobby Parnell,
Josh Thole, Pedro Beato (unsigned)
and Jeremy Hefner (unsigned). See, don’t tell me
there isn’t talent after the first round.
The Mets
had no first round pick in 2006, but they sure picked the right guy in the
third round… relief pitcher Joe Smith. The
problem is they traded him in 2008 as part of a three-team, 12 player deal that
is still paying off for Cleveland for five years and the Angels this season
(23-G, 3.18). Two more interesting picks… ‘lucky #13’ was Daniel Murphy and Vic Black went
unsigned at #41
And then
came 2007 with the two famous first round draft picks… RP Eddie Kunz and SP Nathan
Vineyard. The Mets rushed Kunz into oblivion and I can personally attest
to Vineyard being a compete freak. Other notables that year were Zach Lutz (#5), Lucas Duda (#7),
Robert Carson (#14), Dillon
Gee (#21), and Juan Centeno (#32).
The Mets
had three first round picks in 2008. Do we really want to spend any time on
this? Okay… Ike Davis, Reese
Havens, and Brad Holt. Moving on, that
draft did produce Kirk Nieuwenhuis (#3), Eric Campbell (#8), Collin
McHugh (#18), and Chris Schwinden (#22).
2009 was
a year without a first round draft pick; however, LHP Steven Matz, after a
couple of seasons on the DL, looks like a winner. Lots of busts on this list
but Darrell Cecilliani (4th), Darin Gorski (7th) and John Church (23rd) still could be a future
Met in Flushing.
2010
represents the last year Omar Minaya was head of
the system and we do have to thank him for starting off with RHP Matt Harvey. Additionally, Matt
den Dekker (5th), Jake deGrom (9th),
and Josh Edgin (30th) are all part of
the Mets 25-man right now. See, you can move a player along, especially if they
were juniors out of college when you drafted them.
The point
I’m trying to make is we all get carried away about day one in the draft, but
we really don’t know how these things are going to turn out for many years
after.
Only now
are we getting some idea on Sandy and Company’s drafts.
It looks
like the 2011 draft is going to produce at least one great player (Brandon Nimmo), but there are at least another dozen
that are progressing through the chain at the proper pace.
The same
thing could be said for the 2012 draft, led by first round pick, C Kevin Plawecki.
And 2013
seems to also be producing one great future player in 1B Dom Smith.
Is this
enough? Three players in 150 picks?
Or, will
we come back three to four years from now and identify a bunch of ‘new’ Dillon
Gee’s that we knew nothing about the day he was drafted, plus the next couple
of years he was in the system?
I guess
we’ll see.
Don Zimmer died on
Thursday night.
I was
part of the original Mets fan base back in 1962 when Zimmer was one of the
team’s first players. The Mets had chosen him in the expansion draft with the 5th
pick from the Chicago Cubs.
In May, they traded him to Cincinnati for Cliff Cook and one of the Bob
Millers.
Zimmer
was also a great trivia question… who was the Dodgers shortstop in between Pee Wee Reese and Maury Wills.
They said
he was 83 years old. He couldn’t have been. He just turned 30 last year
We'll have lots of draft covergae today so come back 300x :).
We'll have lots of draft covergae today so come back 300x :).
13 comments:
great job as always Mack...
The PTBNL is.....???
SS is going to continue to be a black hole until filled from the outside. as far as 2B goes, there actually is quite a bit of inventory internally that could replace DM. I like DM, but don't love him. he is streaky and has a penchant for bonehead plays in the field and on the basepaths. he is making $5.7 this year, but that is likely to move up to over 7 next year. closest in the pipeline is Danny Muno, but he needs to hit for higher average, next comes Matt Reynolds, then Herrera, Evans and Cecchini. with that amount of inventory, I wouldn't mind parting with DM if he brings a decent return and even settle for a one year stop gap until one 2B pans out in the minors. swapping out that $7M for a league minimum and $7M more coming off with Chris Young provide nearly $15M towards future payroll
Murphy is one of the only guys on this team that has proven he can hit in NY. Lock him up with a 3 year extension. Murphy and Wright are the only proven bats on this team. Lagares has looked good to date but its only been 2 months and he's been on the DL twice. Duda is heating up but there are still concerns. Murphy shouldn't go anywhere. Pay the man and lock him up.
Uhhhhh, why isn't Wilmer Flores a 2B replacement option? Nobody seems to believe in him has a SS. He's basically becoming the right handed murph anyway, and he would also obviously be a cheaper 3 yr option.
Mack,
At times Murph is an adventure to watch, and his erratic baserunning can cost the team in a key moment, but he is far from the biggest problem. I think we tend to overrate his offense somewhat given how pathetic the rest of the Met offense is. His current OPS is close to his career, which is mid .700s, and his OBP is merely league average given his free-swinging tendency. This year, he is hitting lefties well, but his career splits show him as a liability vs. LHP. Now in his prime years, he needs to push that OPS up to .800+ and maintain a good split vs. LHP, in order for the Mets to consider extending him. At .750 OPS, below avg. vs. LHP, and so so in the field at best, Alderson and the cheapskate owners will likely deem him not worthy of the $8 to $12 mil price that he could likely command in his arb-3 and FA years. They surely cannot afford to lose any more offense, so should they part with him in a trade the return better be good.
Anonymous -
and a big thank you to Stephen Guilbert for chasing all the info down.
I just put up today's open thread and I'll be adding posts all day on the Mets picks
Anonymous - I haven't checked the 'wires' let, but I think we're going to have to wait awhile for that player to be named. The speculation is it is RHP Neil Kozikowski, who didn't sign until late and, thus, won't have his name released until later
I'm with Thunder on Murphy. The Mets don't have much with a bat in their hands and he's about as clutch as they come
Hi Anonymous
A lot of focus today, rightly so, on this year's draft. You do mention a black hole at SS, but perhaps that is premature.
Speaking of drafts, in the 2nd round of the draft just 2 years ago, we drafted Matt Reynolds....now playing SS in AA...and hitting .371 with a .450 on base %. .371 is extraordinary.
Maybe he fills the black hole - darned good #'s at a high level for a guy drafted just 2 years ago. He has about 80 more minor league games this year to continue to present his case that he should be the future SS. Let's see what Matt can do.
One can speculate that he might be the main reason the Mets passed over drafting Mack's favorite Trea Turner and taking Conforto instead.
Interesting pick with Conforto......I like the assessment his own coach made, that his defense is better then advertised and his hit "tool" is the best in the draft (our future LF'er).
On a side note, I think our first draft pick (OF) is telling with regards to what we may be getting from the Pirates (PTBNL). If the player was JaCoby Jones, we probably don't pick an OF'er.........we passed on a SP (Newcomb), so we may be getting a SP instead (hopefully a lefty).
(was Turner my favorite ?)
Hey Thomas -
I'm still a little numb over last night, both on the Conforto pick (my wife's maiden name is Conforti so I'm going to happen to listen to the comparison jokes forever) plus the Cubs series.
I've got a post coming up later today on Conforto.
As for Reynolds, if you check the standings, just about every team in baseball is still in it for the wild card... the problem is most of these teams have more talent and make better decisions.
Why do you not use the replay call if you can clearly see the runner at first was out?
Who's looking at the replay here, Jay Horwitz?
I do want to keep reminding fans that the PTBNL is like having a 2nd round draft pick this year. In the end, it all worked out.
ATTENTION EVERYONE - COME ON OVER TO THE DRAFT THREAD THAT IS UP AND LET'S DISCUSS ALL THIS ALL DAY
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