When Will
This Team Be Competitive –
We
seem to spend so much time talking on Mack’s Mets about the future, trading for
quality bats, free agents, trades for a top level SS and LFer, but frankly, we
sort of ignore the fact that unless the Wilpons change the way this team is
operating, everything we are talking about are just dreams that won’t become
reality.
We’re
also being told by all the baseball experts that the Mets farm system is
currently one of the best ones in baseball, but we also know that most of that
projected talent is years away.
So,
if the current operation will remain in the same payroll range, when exactly
will the Mets field a team competitive enough to, say, win their division?
Current
payroll, per Cott, is just under $85mil.
My
guess is the Mets will trade Bartolo
Colon in the off-season
($11mil), and release Eric
Young Jr.
($1.85mil). This will give the Mets $12.85mil to deal with the nine members of
their squad that is currently being paid under one of the arbitration levels.
Pitching
wise, the Mets are set for the remainder of the decade with both young arms
that will be in their rotation, but also other starters that will eventually
wind up in the pen. This doesn’t mean more won’t be signed internationally or
drafted in future drafts but the only concern the Mets should have here is the
health of their staff. It looks to be set up to be one of the finest in the
league.
‘Bat
wise’. Things aren’t that easy.
2015
will bring a few new players to Queens. Catcher Kevin
Plawecki should
be MLB ready by July 2015, but the Mets probably doesn’t need another starting
catcher for many years. SS Matt
Reynolds might
be ready by opening day 2015, but is he just another version of either Ruben Tejada or Wilmer Flores?
2016
will definitely add two of the Mets top prospects. 2B Dilson Herrera should perfectly be slotted
into the year that Daniel
Murphy leaves via free
agency and CF Brandon
Nimmo will be added to
the outfield mix.
But
it seems that 2017 will the year the rest of the top Mets ‘bat prospects’ come
of age… 1B Dominic
Smith, SS Amed Rosario, 3Bmen Jhoan Urena and Eudro Garcia, and OFers Michael Conforto and Wuilmer Becerra could all be added as full time
players.
No,
I’m not going to predict what happens to David
Wright, but I will tell
you that, if the Mets continue to fund this team like they do now, they have no
chance, talent wise, of competing in their own division, no less the rest of
baseball, until 2017.
Dark Chat –
Comment From
Sandy Alderson - Why is every other Fangraphs
writer extremely optimistic about the Mets future considering their pitching
depth and vastly improved farm system… but you really don’t like their future
at all….? Not hating…. just wondering what you’re smoking.
Paul
Swydan: There’s the hiccup question, on
the Mets. First, I don’t know that every other FG person is high on them, but
as for me, pitchers go boom all the time, and even if they all come through,
the Mets don’t have enough spots for them. They need hitters, lots and lots of
hitters. They’re unlikely to find them unless they get proactive in trading for
some, and the team has not shown the proclivity to be proactive about anything
under Alderson’s regime. Everything has been slow down, let’s think about this.
Mack
– He’s absolutely right.
The
Mets do have enough pitchers to reach all their objectives, if they can keep
them healthy.
This
is why I am a big proponent of trading Noah
Syndergaard before
the next hiccup happens here. He’s not producing the dominant kind of numbers
we had expected from him in Vegas, but the scouts from the Cubs and Rockies are
still high on him. We could probably solve our shortstop problem with a 1-for-1
deal with Chicago for one of their young middle infielders or put together a
multi-deal for Tulo starting with Thor.
Alderson
has to learn he can’t keep everyone and there just isn’t enough quality talent
in the system (at the AAA/AA level) to improve this team over the next two
years.
I
was going to spend some time here trying to speculate who the call-ups will be come
September 1st; however, the assumption is most or all of them would
come from either the AAA club (Las Vegas) or the AA Binghamton affiliate.
Well,
Vegas sits solidly in first place in the southern division of the PCL while
Binghamton is fighting it out with Portland for first place in the Eastern
League eastern division.
There
seems to be a good chance then that we may not see anyone called up until the
playoffs are completed for these teams.
Bob
Klapisch on things
awaiting the new Commissioner -
Uniform
financial requirements for ownership. - It wasn’t hard to identify Selig’s
enemies (Frank McCourt) and for whom he had a
soft spot (Fred Wilpon). McCourt was booted from
the game as Selig took over the Dodgers, and for good reason. McCourt used $108
million of the Dodgers’ money to fund his lavish lifestyle.
The Wilpons,
on the other hand, were given a much wider berth, including an emergency $25
million loan from Major League Baseball in November 2010. Selig didn’t push
Wilpon for repayment, instead letting it linger until March 2012. It was only
after the Wilpons sold minority stakes for $240 million that they were able to
write a check to MLB and Bank of America.
There’s no
way of knowing if the next commissioner will be this lenient or this subjective
invoking the powers of his office. The Mets are in better shape today than they
were two years ago, but their best friend is about to pack up and leave.
Random
Thoughts –
Okay,
I didn’t enjoy the Rafael
Montero outing
earlier this week, but he needs to pitch and he needs to pitch at this level.
Keep him here and let him stay in the rotation until Jacob deGrom comes back. Then, send him to
the bullpen and send someone there back to Vegas. I still think his future (as
a Met) is in the pen.
The
Mets still need to find a roster spot for Dice-K, who is due back in the next
15 days. It’s frankly too late to market him, so I’d send him to Vegas and let
him join their rotation for their playoff run. He also would serve as an
emergency call up if anyone else got injured this season.
The
2nd annual donation drive continues here at Mack’s Mets. It’s when
we try and raise some money to help defray some home and uncovered medical
costs Mrs. Mack and I have to pay because we both are prevented from working
anymore.
We
like this drive to be transparent. All we are looking for this time is a total
of $1,400.00. Once that figure is reached, we will shut this down and not start
it up again until the spring.
So
far, one day one (yesterday), we received $25.
The
process is simple and includes one of three return gifts to you for your
generosity (as you may remember, my wife is an award winner baker and hosts her
own baking/cooking web site online).
All
you have to do is donate $24.95 to our Paypal account (name: macksmets@gmail.com) and you will receive your
choice of a box of Pure Butter Almond Shortcake, or
Chocolate Brownies (no nuts) with no icing (doesn’t ship well with icing). It takes
around a 4-5 day turnaround to get this in your mouth and get a taste before
the holiday season is upon us and you might want to order more for your friends
and relatives.
Naturally,
we take donations for more than $24.95 also, but that’s up to you. Mack’s Mets
will always be a free site, other than these two semi-annually drives.
Anyway,
no one that has ordered the shortbread in the past was disappointed and we hope
the addition of the brownies might also generate some interest.
And
I promise to stay out of the batter.
19 comments:
I prefer a Thor for Javier Soler if the Mets are going to match with the Cubbies. Natural RH OF with good pop and thought to stay in RF. If his bat matches the IF prospects, I would prefer that swap. He just started AAA, so not that far away, middle of next year at latest and efforts in Minors have been solid in average and power
Matt Reynolds continues to press forward - he could be our starting 2015 SS absent a trade. I'll touch on Matt in my Sunday Scoop article.
Also, Dilson looks like a future star to me. As in near future.
Maybe I just have rose-colored glasses on.
I would love Tulo but their asking price has to drop now. So now I turn my sights on Elvis Andrus and Matt Kemp.
Elvis would fit in pretty nice at top of our batting order and playing great defense. From what I recall not too many injury issues. They would have to pay a bit of his salary but a package of Plaweki, Flores and Montero should be adequate enough.
You would have to tell Kemp he is our corner outfielder. His bat is coming along pretty good and is still relatively young. He has some injury issues but would be a great middle of the order bat for us. A package of Niese/Gee, Familia, and Matt den dekker should be sufficient.
We might have to add a low minor leaguer in for both deals but that would work for me.
Speaking of prospects, is it time to stop calling Cesar Puello a top one? Can't help but notice that Puello, even with kirk and den dekker getting called up, still can't get in the starting lineup every day.
Another random thought, can the Mets compete for the playoffs with their captain batting third, and hitting singles?
Another random thought, did grandy stop hitting again?
Another nother random thought, I want Matz to pitch atleast one inning in September, and get me excited about something on this team.
Paul Swydan mentions something in his response that I think has been/is/and will continue to be a major problem in Alderson's team building. His tendency to ALWAYS sit back, waiting for the market to settle not just on free agents, but also in trading. He may be wonderful when sitting on a golden commodity that everyone else wants. His passive approach certainly helps to extract a high return.
The problem is some times an aggressive approach is needed. The Mets are entering such a time period. The Mets really could be close to something special, but hitting is needed.
The problem is that hitting is needed by many teams.
Alderson can not act like the "prettiest girl at the dance" waiting for all the best hitting free-agents to come running for an opportunity to be part of the Mets. He can't wait and wait for other teams to just throw their best hitters at him in trades.
Alderson has not given any indication over his reign as gm to target a weakness on the major league team and aggressively act to strengthen that weakness to the best of his ability.
Instead he targets the weakness and attempts to fill the farm system to strengthen the weakness years later.
Yes I believe the Mets are in a much better position than they were before Alderson began his reign.
I do believe also though that Alderson is largely responsible for delaying the Mets opportunities to be better than they currently are because he is too passive and arrogant like that previously mentioned "prettiest girl at the dance" approach or the famous " smartest-man-in-the-room" ego.
The Mets could be really really close to something special, but they need to hunt for big-game now. Their gm needs to hunt for proven above average hitters. This will require their gm to be the aggressor calling other teams first, possibly working the phones in order to set up multi-team deals, calling teams back when he hasn't heard back from them, creating a market for players, be willing to not have to win every trade by historic margins.
Where as the Mets may be close talent wise.
I fear Alderson's approach as gm makes them much further away from capitalizing on their potential.
No thanks on either Andrus or Kemp, too much money with not enough guaranteed upside. if either one of these players were acquired, it would evaporate any available resources to add other pieces for the foreseeable future
@bob gregory I WISH Sandy Alderson had waited as you characterized. Then we wouldn't have been saddled with Chris Young and Curtis Granderson. No, he acted swiftly, decisively and, apparently, foolishly. These results will probably reinforce the sit back and wait approach once again.
I have no problem if he wants to trade for minor leaguers, but this time around he needs to target ones in AAA or who just finished the year strongly in AA so that their arrival in Queens will happen sooner rather than later.
Reese
Chris young was always a non move in reality.
Alderson punted on this season before it began.
Young's one year contract meant nothing to Alderson.
It was always just a "shut-up" move aimed at the fan-base.
Granderson I do acknowledge as Alderson's one move for a hitter. Even there though questions arise. If Alderson was more aggressive wouldn't he have aimed for better than such a low average hitter?
There was a lot of reporting at the time that Alderson was forced into making that move by pressure from ownership and a fan-base revolt to at least do something.
If we're already so pessimistic about Murphy leaving as a FA, we should bite the bullet and deal him this winter.
As far as a replacement, I'd give Reynolds every opportunity to win the 2B job next year, all the kid does is hit. People say he came out of nowhere, but did he really? Sure, his first year of professional ball was an adjustment, but he was a 2nd Rd pick so his development shouldn't be that much of a surprise. Others might want to dismiss his production in the PCL because of the league's rep, but he was doing just as well at AA where the men are seperated from the boys.
Scouts already have him as a better all around player than Tejada and he has more athleticism than Flores.
He needs to work on his K rate, but he still gets on base at a very solid clip - 50-60 points higher than his BA.
Also
remember.....There was nothing at all swift about acquiring Granderson.
And Young fell into the "smartest man in the room" arrogance I mentioned. Alderson believed he knew more than everybody else. That Young's decline was suddenly going to time warp back to his productive years
Syndergaard is 21...way too early to give up on him.
You want Kemp and Andrus, then LA and Texas are eating a ton of salary. Otherwise forget it.
Mchapel
I don't think it's a matter of giving up on Syndegaard. It's just that something of value has to be given in order to get the value you want back.
It is a compliment to him that his value could be high enough to be worth the offense the Mets need.
You always have to give to get. To me, the fact that the Cubs and Rox are heavily interested in him gives me pause about trading him away. If they want him in spite of his lackluster performance tells me they still see him as a #1.
The article seemed to have the tone of dealing him before his value drops. I think he has an upside higher than Wheeler and even a Harvey and I think we'll really regret moving him.
Personally, I'd go into sell mode on deGrom and maximize his value. I'd also deal off Colon, Gee, and Murphy. I don't expect them to bring back a bat on their own, but together Sandy could cobble together a solid basket of prospects to add to deGrom and Plawecki to make a deal.
I would try and be creative and find a way to hold onto our 4 aces (Harvey, Wheeler, Thor, Matz) and Niese.
I really hope we don't have to have Granderson around for the full length of that deal.
Did anyone else read that Klapisch article? It sounded to me like he wants to bring back greenies as a way to compensate for the rigors of travel and to boost offense.
Quote from the article:
However, in his effort to rid the game of all performance enhancers, the commissioner led the effort to wipe out stimulants, too. It’s a noble thought, trying to make the game as pure as possible. But watch the action on any afternoon after a night game and you’ll have a greater understanding how tired the players are. Such exhaustion, compounded by shorter series and increased air travel, has a corrosive effect on reaction times and bat speed. That, in turn, lends itself to inferior hitting. It’s a phenomenon that merits a closer look when the next collective bargaining agreement is negotiated in 2016.
My personal input on boosting offense is to set a maximum distance that the outfield fence can be from home plate. Parks get to keep their individuality, and HR's go up.
You are are looking to the future of this team.
Good.
That's all you can do.
@bob gregory Curtis Granderson was signed on December 6th prior to the Winter Meetings -- that was a fast timetable by anyone's standards and downright nanoseconds by Alderson's track history.
Reese
yes the date was early but remember at that time all of the bats that were thought of as being helpful to the Mets were committing elsewhere or not interested.
Remember Alderson was receiving an enormous amount of flak from fans, media, and even ownership for not making any moves (remember Peralta and Jeffy Wilpons statements about believing something would or better be done soon)
Yes Granderson was extremely early for Alderson but it appears reasonable to believe Alderson was pressured into that move.
Overall regardless of Granderson the Mets gm needs to be more proactive and open to working hard to find the offense this team needs.
Don't want to spend high in prospects? Then someone like Kemp that was rumored to be available at a reduced prospect cost with salary relief like earlier this year needs to be pursued. Probably too late now that Kemp is improving.
Don't want to spend money? Then Alderson has to trade prospects or atleast trade off the likes of Colon in a mult-team deal that would require him to actively hunt for what the other team wants and not just sit back waiting for teams to come to him.
Post a Comment