Pedro Martinez’s appearance at minicamp was for show, to let Willie Randolph and Omar Minaya know he’s all right. But, it’s easy for Pedro to say he’s fine now. He’s still two months from throwing.
Martinez has always been a gamer. Who can forget what he did while with Boston in the Cleveland playoffs? But, that was 10 years and countless pitches ago.
The Mets are saying July, but who really knows? Of course, everything Martinez does this spring will be examined and re-examined. Overkill. He’ll throw off the mound, say he’s fine and raise everybody’s hopes. Then, he’ll have a setback. We know this because most rehabs from rotator cuff surgery are like that.
Martinez’ uncertainty, in part, was behind the Scott Schoeneweis signing. We all know about the age at the front end and questions on the back end of their rotation, so the bullpen will be critical.
They’ll live on their pen, and Schoeneweis could be useful, especially against lefthanded hitters. Think Ryan Howard.
The pen is why Duaner Sanchez’s optimism overshadow’s Martinez. He’s promising to be back by Opening Day.
9 Comments
World Series Championships are built on pitching but not starters anymore. If you don’t have a number of power arms in the pen you simply cannot make it through October. In big games you have to work situational matchups to your teams advantage, and both Omar and Willie know that. Having a strong pen makes Pedro’s return easier, as he’ll not be expected to go deep into games, not that he ever was.
The staff seems to be designed to keep the team in games for 5 or 6 innings and turn it over to the pen and trust the offense to put up a few crooked numbers. It worked last year, and our offense is better with Alou (if healthy) and the maturation of Milledge (hopefully….), and and older, wiser Reyes and Wright.
I’d love Pedro back, and I’d love to see him pitching in big games for this team because he is a bulldog. With our pen, if we can get 5 from him if and when he comes back, that’s all we’ll need.
I wont be holding my breath for Pedro. I dont want to see him back if he is going to be a figurehead and another NO Vaughn.
Don’t be so negative on Pedro.
He was the ace at the beginning of the year last year. Glavine was consistant but Pedro is the fire.
I disagree with the other poster tho. To win you need 3 good starters. I don’t think we have that.
We are good enough to have a good shot at the playoffs, just not the ring.
Dave
Pedro Too?
Caught this on the mets site.
http://www.minorleaguebaseball.com/app/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070112&content_id=151616&vkey=news_milb&fext=.jsp
and Wright is so cool. Hope he stays the way he is.
Dave
yes we need 3 starters. I dont want to see Pedro the way Benitez turned out. he was good and got bad and terrible as clutch yet Valentine loved him and had faith in him and lost with him.
I rather have consistent. Pedro ace ,the 3 games he played, the fire was put out after every injury.
John, its not that you don’t need good starters to win, I think you do. It’s just that in the post season managers tend to exploit matchups more and have a shorter leash on starters, placing bullpen arms at a premium. Certainly you need starters to win, but outside of Carpenter, all of St. Louis’ staff was merely serviceable. I know, I know, Suppan won the NLCS MVP, but nobody would confuse him with an ace, or even a great pitcher. He got hot against the Mets. You never know when someone will rise to the occasion in a big situation like that. The staff last year was good enough to win; it was the offense that failed in the end. The Cards never blew the Mets out of any game.
Would I like 3 great or even good starters, you bet. But I don’t think that will preclude a team from winning it all, if the team can make up for that deficiency in the ‘pen. Omar seems to subscribe to that theory a bit with his off-season moves so far, although some of his decision-making is certainly colored by Pelfrey and Humber and not wanting to clog up the rotation with the available “bottom feeders”.
Having said all that, I’d be a lot more comfortable with one more solid, experienced starter.
R
John,
Question on Pedro…..i saw another paper reporting on his 19 year old son today…..now by my math, that means Pedro Sr became a Pappa around 15 or 16. So my question is this, with the suspicion of age with the Alfonzo’s and Edgars son seemingly being born when he too was in his mid teens, is it possible that Pedro may be a few years older than we think he is, thus futhering concern about his durability? He says he won’t play til 40, but i guess my question is, do we know for sure yet that he ISN’T already? Or is this simply just a cultural thing, and no reason to wonder? I could care less about the gossip angle of this, but the age thing concerns me, certainly.
JB
either he pitches, or he doesn’t, who cares how old he is or how he feels right now or what you want to think about him saying he’s fine, or why he was at the minicamp, it doesn’t matter, either pedro will be pitching for us, or he won’t. But this goes beyond just what you’re making of it, Pedro is a hall of famer, a legend in certain circles, history will remember this guy, and it’ll be a sad day if Pedro is forced to retire because he can’t pitch effectively anymore, a truly sad day for baseball.