The Mets have had problems developing relievers — even when they already had one on their roster.
Veteran sidearming reliever Darren O'Day announced his retirement from baseball last week after 15 MLB campaigns. Age and injuries had slowed O'Day down quite a bit over the last few seasons, but he enjoyed an excellent major league career. He started with the Angels' organization as an undrafted free agent in 2006 after pitching for the University of Florida in college. This was back when the amateur draft was 50 rounds long. Hundreds of players were drafted who never even sniffed the major leagues. Meanwhile, O'Day went on to appear in 644 major league games, all in relief.
O'Day broke in with the Angels in 2008, appearing in 30 games out of their bullpen. But they failed to protect him in the rule 5 draft in December 2008, and the Mets selected the young righty. The Mets would have to keep Darren on their roster all season or offer him back to the Angels. He didn't pitch all that badly for the Mets in April, appearing in 4 games and allowing a pair of unearned runs. For a team that would go on to lose 90 games and finish a distant 4th in the NL East, holding on to a promising reliever who hadn't pitched all that bad might seem a no-brainer. However, after consecutive collapses in the previous two seasons, GM Omar Minaya was on his way out and desperate to cobble together a contender from what was left of the great 2006 club.
I don't even remember the exact move that led to O'Day being offered back to the Angels, but they declined, and Darren was put on waivers and selected by the Texas Rangers. Darren O'Day enjoyed two terrific seasons with Texas, then went on to pitch effectively over 7 seasons for the Orioles. Age and injuries caught up with him after that, but it was a hell of a career for a pitcher not deemed good enough to be taken by any of the 30 MLB clubs over 50 rounds of drafting.
Now, every club makes mistakes from time to time with personnel decisions. What irked me about the Mets' decision on O'Day was that their bullpen was not a strength for them that season, and O'Day went on to immediate success with the Rangers. This wasn't a fluke, either. During O'Day's prime, which began in 2009 through the 2015 season with Baltimore, O'Day appeared in over 400 games, pitching to a 2.07 ERA, striking out a batter per inning while stingily allowing only 6.4 H/9, 2.2 BB/9, and 0.9 HR/9. The Mets could have really used that guy.
The other thing that really bothered me about the botched decision on Darren O'Day was that it was a pattern of failure with the Mets in the 21st Century. Even as they struggled to develop bullpen arms from within the organization, there were some mighty poor decisions made with pitchers they actually had on their roster, like Darren O'Day.
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2 comments:
Mike,
Some of us old timers have seen the Mets trade away some of MLB's best relievers over the years.Two that I remember are Jeff Reardon and Rick Aguilera.
I am sure there are several others the readers can remember.
Reardon for Ellis Valentine made no sense at the time, and then Valentine performed worse than expected. At least the Mets got Frank Viola in the Aguilera deal, and he pitched well for them. But imagine the great Mets teams later in the decade with Reardon, Jesse Orosco, Roger McDowell, and eventually Randy Meyers. That would have been one hell of a bullpen.
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