Saying no to Santana
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- November
- 27
Johan Santana is a marvelous pitcher. Perhaps the best in the game. But, it would be a mistake for the Mets to pay the price. The bar was set for pitchers last winter with Barry Zito at seven years and $126 million.
Santana is clearly better, but you pass because of the price and long odds of staying healthy. He will cost at least three prospects, and the Mets’ farm system isn’t deep to begin with. Yes, the Mets can afford the salary, especially moving into a new park.
However, seven or eight years is a huge gamble for a pitcher. I’d rather spend it on two 14-game winners and fill two spots in the rotation and have money left over for the bullpen or bench.
Santana is great. There’s no doubting. Let the Yankees overpay and risk him blowing out his arm.
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on Tuesday, November 27th, 2007 at 10:35 am by John Delcos.
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I agree…as much as it is hard for me to swallow as I love Santana, i’d rather take a chance for Dan Haren with our prospects and hope like crazy that Santana makes it to free agency next year. If he does, I could care less how many years and how much money it will cost the Mets to do it..you just do it. Imagine the rotation going into Citifield…Santana/Haren/Maine/Perez/Pedro….sounds great to me!
JD, who do you suggest? If it is some of the names you have posted like Silva and company. I’d rather see Pelfrey out there. My garbage (the Mets farm hands) might stink it up, but at least it is my garbage.
I hope the two SP you are thinking of are not L Hernandez and C Silva. You would end up paying almost as much for those two and come Oct they are not going to win you a championship.
We need a guy who is #1 or close to it. You can overpay for guys who might win 14 games too. Plus when it comes to relivers, the best guy available in a thin crop is gone to Cincy. Who is left? Pretty soon the Mets will settle for Shawn Chacon and Ocatavio Dotel (in another NY paper this morning).
If the guy is not named Haren, Santana, Bedard or of that level, I don’t want to hear the Mets tell me “My season is now” w/Silva, etc…
To Scoopcoop: (RE: Who?)
I want Haren and I wrote last week I’d go after Bedard. Pelfrey is as good as Silva, so I’d stay in-house. Chacon and Dotel leave me yawning. Cincy did well.
If I go after Silva or Livan it is for the back end of the rotation. I don’t think either is as good as John Maine. However, considering the durability issues of Orlando Hernandez and possibly Pedro Martinez (he’s not a guarantee to me he’ll go all season without a setback) you have to look at depth, also.-JD
I can see what John is saying but I am reminded when Nolan Ryan left the Angels in 1978 after going 16-14 someone in the organization (Buzzie Bavasi?) said it was no great loss, all they had to do was to get two 8-7 pitchers. The Angels and Astros were roughly equal the next 10 years so they may not have missed him too much. But could Ryan in 1982 or 1986 have brought Gene Autry a championship he so desperatly wanted? It’s a tough choice but championships are forever and worth A LOT to us fans. And even if Santana does leave could the Mets use the draft pick like they did in 2000 (selecting David Wright for Mike Hampton)?
No risk no gain. It is a flawed policy to take no risk. You want to achieve to the highest level, you must take the highest risk. When Omar took the job he took risks and the team improved dramatically. Now don’t take a risk?? Don’t improve. He took no risks last winter and the team deteriorated by what about 10 games or so…..
I know having a rotation of # 3, 4 and 5 starters may get you sometimes to the playoffs, but in the big game I want the ace out there. You give me Silva I want a Beckett out there.
As for the offense, filling the holes with injury prone outfielders like Alou and damaged and trouble making catchers isn’t filling a hole well, It leaves you with a mediocre ball club. Every team fields a team but you don’t win with second rate players. Rf OK if you really mean you’ll go with a kid, but he said it in 06 when he traded Nady and a month later here comes a washed up Green.
As for overpaying, the market is high for every type of player. 4 years for middle relief… too high… don’t get anybody… 18 million for an outfielder, too high? don’t get anybody… etc. I think we should move the Mets to Omaha if we can’t compete with the Reds for a FA or can’t take a risk with the Wilpons’ money.
Sadly, we all know that if Santana goes to the Bronx, he won’t ever get injured… Everything they touch turns to gold…
We don’t have the horses to pick up Santana… I’m not sure we have the horses for any top line starter… My personal favorite is Bedard…
Ten years ago the ace on the market was Pedro Martinez of the Montreal Expos. The Cleveland Indians elected to keep young pitching prospect Jaret Wright who went 9-4 in half a season, beat the Yankees and left game 7 of the World series with a lead. The Red Sox traded young pitching prospects Carl Pavano and Tony Armas Jr (who they got in a mid season trade for aging catcher Mike Stanley) for Martinez. They then signed him to a six year deal. Who got the better of the trade? Obviously the Red sox. The Indians with a great hitting team saw Wright spend years on the DL and couldn’t win post season series with a group of 3 and 4 starters.
Aces are so rare in baseball you have to do virtually anything (legal) to get one. I won’t knock Minaya if he gives up a lot and makes a maximum effort attempt to sign Santana. Even if the Mets get burned.
Why are Met fans happy without getting the best??
If I went to a Yankee or Red Sox site would they be saying don’t take the risk or its too much money? I doubt it. The Wilpons have brainwashed too many of us into worrying about their pocket books, while they fleece us at the park with their different value games, and their horrible food at good food prices.
And every team has its top prospects but how many become good, not many, and how many become great hardle any. When you can get great why do Met fans want good or average????
Theo Epstein takes what many believe are ridiculous chances and all he has to show his fans are 2 WS trophies. Please give me two trophies in 4 years Omar. Please please please….
JD: You blew me away giving Omar Kudos for filling holes. All he did with a flawed team is dump one bum and replace an average catcher with an average catcher. Alou will be hurt and Catillo still has to prove his knees are OK. And Estrada had 2 surgeries already this off-season, and we have no depth anywhere except the outfield. And why the need to look at Silva and Livan for depth. We all know why. Because OMAR screwed our depth last Winter dumping Bannister and 4 relievers for nothing. And the Omar defenders will say “How could he know….” Well, he gets judged on the results and they all were bad. Oh I have so little hope for the next couple years!!!!!
Dan: The problem with that part of the theory I believe is that Pavano and Armas were comparatively much higher rated than any of the Met top pitching prospects right now.
Tom What you write is so wrong. Just look at Carl Pavano as a recent example. The difference between them and us is when they get screwed they just shrug it off and get another guy. We don’t do anything because the payroll will jump. Hence we did nothing to replace Pedro last year and we went down hill.
Dan Gurney: I agree with you 100%.
I think also the plain truth is that the Yankees have much better prospects to give up for Santana than the Mets do.
Another example like Dan Gurney said was right in Queens. We got Hampton and many Met fans were bitching because we gave up too much in Dotel and Cedeno.
Hampton didn’t stay long but we at least got to the WS while Cedeno vanished and Dotel was just OK overall. Think we’re in the 2000 WS with Dotel? I don’t.
And we gave up Seaver for lots of young bodies but who won that trade. I don’t think it was us. No flags for us after that trade for a long time. Couldn’t build a team around Zachary.
I agree with the “get two for one” idea from a farm/fiscal standpoint, but it’s a different story in the postseason. Who do I call on to shut the door – a reliable 14 game winner, or a lights-out, no holds barred ace?
JD, Bedard or Haren are fine choices but I don’t see how the Mets get them for that much less than Santana.
It has been reported that the A’s want Milledge, Heilman and another P (probably Mulvey or Humber). The O’s have been reported to want about the same.
Are you suggesting the Twins will want the above plus any other guys who are touted like Gomez, Martinez, Guerra, and Mulvey? That would be 7 for one. If that is the case it does clean out the farm and I’d be against that.
Haren at the front end and Livan at the back end is fine w/me. But only if the issue is giving up all-all of-your prospects/young players to Twins. If the issue is only money, the Mets should get the Best of the best—-Santana.
I agree with Scoop.
You pay what you need to get primo talent. However you cannot overpay for every scrub who comes along. If you want to look at recent examples look across the river. They have the best team $$ can buy and they get spanked in the postseason.
I would go get one of the top 3 pitchers everyone is mentioning. One of them is probably available for either young non essential major leaguers or the unproven AAA/AA type. No way you give up the Reyes/Wright/Beltran troika.
You go get the primo talent when it is made available and you mix in the young ( cheap ) homegrown talent that can provide drive/energy/hunger. Again going over the river I believe Jeter/Rivera/Petite were homegrown examples that helped make the team.
For us we imported Carter/Knight/Hernandez but we also had Straw/Doc/Hojo/etc so you need both.
Dave
Theo traded Hanley Ramirez and Anibal Sanchez, his top prospects, for Josh Beckett. The Marlins made him take expensive Mike Lowell and Guillermo Mota. I´d say that that risky move paid off for the Sox.
I agree with whoever above said that aces are rare, and you need to do almost anything legal to get one. So if we can get Haren, I´m completely happy to trade Milledge, Heilman and Pelfrey.
This idea that Theo took a big risk trading for Beckett is straight up fallacy. The Red Sox have one of the deepest and most talented farm systems around. They traded Hanley and Anibal, so what? They still had: Pedroia, Delcarmen, Bucholz, Lester, Ellsbury, and Papelbon (you could also say Youkilis, who is still a young player)as prospects they hung onto… and these are just the guys that made appearances on the MLB level. They supposedly have even more in the minors.
Omar is trying to build a premier franchise and as it stands they don’t have the depth of resources prospect wise that the Red Sox have.
Suppose we back the prospect truck up to the Metrodome and dump out a bunch of guys. What happens to our organizational depth? The only reason why last season wasn’t a complete disaster (and the reason the Mets were in a position to collapse) was because we had the depth to bring up OFers who filled in admirably while all 3 of our starting OFers spent time on the DL.
Bottom line, you need to make the best use of your resources to build the best team possible. Everyone is talking about winning playoff games when we missed the playoffs completely last year.
We missed the playoffs b/c Delgado had a down yr and Omar got outbid by the Sox for Dice k. If we had an ‘06 version of Delgado and DK, we win 95 games.
If this off season goes by w/o an impact player brought in who can add 5 games to the Mets win total and a couple of role players to fill out the SP/RP we will be a .500 team.
If this off season ends w/an impact player brought in who can add 5 games to the Mets win total and a couple of role players to fill out the SP/RP we will be a 95 win team.
Which still puts us in 2nd place according to Jimmy Rollins who said the other day the Phils will win 100. I hope he is wrong this time. But I wish we had some guys like him, Utiley and Rowand who play with fire and grit.
How do you have this team going from .500 to 95 wins by adding a player who can add 5 games to the win total? Makes no sense.
This is essentially the same team as last year, and we can expect to see continued improvement from our young guys (Wright, Reyes, Milledge, Maine, and Perez) and a bounce back year from Delgado (in his walk year.)
I agree, they need to add a front line starter and possibly a back end innings eater. If they did this, I think it would take a lot of pressure off the pen. The pen wasn’t that bad last year; they just wore out in the final month.
As strange as this may sound, I won’t be crushed if we don’t make the playoffs next season. We have the beginnings of a really nice team. There is no reason to overpay in terms of prospects for one player. I’d much rather see Minaya turn the Mets into a premier franchise that competes for a title every year.
Teams are going to have injuries and players will slump.
I believe we lost for 2 main(e) reasons.
1) Attitude. no fire, no grit, etc.
2) Starting pitching is weak.
If we get a front line starter who doesn’t spend half a season on the DL we save the pen. That one thing alone makes us an overall stronger team.
I think we have the offense to win. In general we play good D. If our pitching comes around I think we can win 95. If our pitching is like last year .500 is not unrealistic.
Dave
Exactly. Maine and Perez will be better equipped to handle the workload next year and shouldn’t fade down the stretch like they did.
Whatever Pedro gives us, I’ll take. I personally see Pedro+El Duque = one pitcher.
Then we sign a back end guy to soak up some innings and keep us in games, and I would say the Mets are set.
Of course teams are going to have injuries and players will slump. But consistency is usually the last thing to come for young players, and I expect Wright, Reyes, Maine, and Perez to gain some more consistency. And the reality of injuries is why you don’t gut the farm for one player.
I guess people can’t read.
I said an impact player (#1 SP) that adds five games, a Delgado bounce back and more SP/RP depth. Add it up and you can get 7 games over last yr=95 wins
But don’t add the above and you can go 7 games lower than 07=81 wins.
Pretty simple math if you read my post.
I have to disagree with you scoop about why we lost. We lost because Omar gave Willie a minor league pen to work with. We had only 4 releivers who could be trusted and Willie had to burn them out. We lost because Omar didn’t get a pitcher to replace Pedro when he knew before 06 eneded that Pedro was gone for most if not all the year. Omar totally misread Pelfrey’s readiness for the bigs. Hi backup plan was Chan Ho and Lawrence and Williams. Give me a break.
Delgado’s down year was not even equal to the down year of Floyd and the absence of production in RF after Nady was traded in 06. If you need every player to have his berst season then you aren’t redy for the playoffs.
Keith If the Mets took Lwell as an add on Met fans would scream and cry about what a stupid risk it was. Maybe the Sox system is deeper but that doesn’t mean the Mets shouldn’t take risks. The Sox if you are right, are the ones who don’t need to take risks but if they think a player will make them a ttle better they go for him. we go for any piece of junk that fills a vacancy and pray we hit a jackpot. Also Keith I think your assumtion about improving players is not with much merit. Wright can’t get much better. Reyes hopefully will have a full good year, Delgado broke his hand at the end of the season whoch could keep his power dow again, Castillo will not improve, catching is a wash from last year, Alou will be hurt and he won’t improve, Beltran pretty much hit his career numbers. So where is the improvement? Rf only, if Milledge doesn’t become a problem child.
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Scoop, ok, I see your point now.
And sloppy, you have it backwards. The Red Sox CAN take risks BECAUSE they have a deep farm system. They used prospects the same way the Yankees use cash. They gave up a low for Beckett and took on a bad contract, but they can do it because they still have a really deep farm system that they have used to fill holes.
I don’t see how taking on Lowell is a risk for a team with the financial muscle the Sox and Mets have. If he works out, as he did (and Fenway was the perfect park for him), great, but if not teams with the resources the Sox have can just write him off as a sunk cost.
My points about Wright and Reyes is that they should both become more consistent, which would make them better over the course of a season. Plus, they’re both still really young. Who’s to say a 24 year old can’t improve? Regardless, they can still become more consistent.
I believe Milledge will be a big improvement over Green (if he doesn’t get dealt). He is a dynamic player who can contribute to many facets of the game even if he isn’t hitting so hot. Castillo maybe won’t improve, but we’ll have him for an entire year next year, as opposed to the carousel we had at 2B and in the 2-hole last year. Agreed with Beltran and Catching being a wash. I also disagree about Delgado. He had a down year, but he still belted out over 25 homers if I am not mistaken. Who knows what he will do next season, but you have to assume he will be putting forth his best efforts in a walk year.
I also happen to think Maine and Perez will become more consistent as well. They’re both entering their “prime”, so it isn’t unreasonable to expect a slight uptick in production from both.
Lastly, could you please explain this comment to me: “we go for any piece of junk that fills a vacancy and pray we hit a jackpot.” First of all, doesn’t this philosophy qualify as the “risk taking” you are claiming the Mets shy away from? And who exactly qualifies as “any piece of junk?” You can’t have an all star at every position, you know. Nor is it advisable to build a team such a way if it were possible. Role players are all too often overlooked and dismissed.
Forget Santana—-JD is right
Just saw that Omar is down in DR at the Mets BB academy. He will also attend Carlos Gomez’s wedding and Moises Alou is the best man.
Can’t imagine you trade a guy in a wk or so after you attend his wedding and Alou is his best man.
And if the Twins are high on Gomez and not Milledge that means Haren…sounds silly I know…
Keith,
I hope Maine can go a full season and be more consistent. Hopefully he learns to pace himself and has learned from watching Glavine/El Duque/Pedro how to prepare.
Ollie I have less confidence will get better. He has been a major league player for longer and is inconsistent because he lacks focus and does not stay within himself. I expect he will do about as well as last year. Have some great games and then fall apart in others.
I do not feel that Lastings is a given to be better than Green. For all his athleticism I think he is about the same defensively until he comes in with an empty cup and fully embraces what his coaches want to teach him. He also got hammered late in the season when opposing teams found he can’t hit junk. Until he can he is not more than a platoon/bench player. If I am Omar I get OF insurance. At least Green knows how to hit 270 even without any power. I am not saying we should keep Green, there are better options available, but if we keep 2 barely major league outfielders to man the corners with Endy as super sub we will have problems.
Dave
Dave
OP will have a great yr for one reason….
It is his walk yr and w/a good to great yr in 08 after a good 07, you can be sure that a hard throwing lefty who is 27 and who’s agent is Scott Boras, he will be primed to get that big contract.
Maine had some tenderness in his hip in the 2nd half of 07. They thought it was a hernia but said it wasn’t. I never saw what they felt it came from. Whatever it was/is I hope the off season calms it down.
Andruw Jones could be the RF. Reported by several “experts”.
Hi Keith:
My point about the BoSox is that if they have the depth they have the tlent they don’t need to make moves and take risks, like they did with DiceK. They alredy had the tools according to you. They thought he’d make them better and outbid Minaya by over 10 mil to get better. We needed DiceK more than they did. But we’re nit picking.
My point about garbage versus risk taking is this. Risk taking is taking on a ig contract when there is risk that the guy will get hurt. Pedro is perfect example. Omar took risk and won and then kinda lost this year. But to me he won on that. Risk taking is going after Zito and then getting hi, Not what Omar did. Omar wanted him, wastd the Winter chasing and then folded. It doesn’t matter what Zito did this year. Omar chaesd what he felt was the best but wouldn’t take the big risk. Garbage is getting released players or marginal player and hoping they fill a hole. Valentin, Mota, Newhan, Chavez, Park, Lawrence, Gonzalez, LIMA, etc. When Omar gets lucky with one, he’s saved the world and does it 10 more times.
I don’t put guys like Maine and Perez in this group. They were trades and we gave up talent to get them so they were actually good risks on his part but not major ones because they weren’t stars and they still aren;’t stars. They are good and I love em both, but they aren’t aces.
Roll plers are guys like Anderson and Easley. I give Omar a plus there. And we don;t need stars everywhere but I see guys like Estrada and Alou and I see below average players. Alou can hit but he can;t field more than I can and he’s doesn;t play much. Thanks for the debate points. Respond and I’ll answer tomorrow.
scoop:
a walk year is not a guarantee of a great season. Just ask Andruw Jones! If the Braves offer him arb I think he will take it because of his rotten season.
Keith You say you don’t gut the farm for one player. How about the Omar strategy of gutting the farm’s relief corp for absolutely nothing and nobody. The best strategy yet!
The Mets farm is a joke. The only prospects are in the outfield and starters. Where is the depth you are so worried about. And when we need help we use Lawrence in a September drive vice Humber/Mulvey. Did I have a nightmare in 07 or did we really choke because the bad Omar moves killed the team?
Sloppy, aside from he pitchers you mentioned, only Valentin has started regularly and he wasn’t even brought in to be a starter. You can’t really complain about the season he had in ‘06. Last year was rough because he got hurt. He’s been a useful player throughout his career.
I also disagree with you about role players. Guys like Alou and Estrada are role players. They are complementary to the bigger stars of the team. All we’re asking is that they be league average, because league average players are more valuable than you think. They’re certainly above replacement level.
Dave, Milledge hit 7 homers in about 200 atbats and Green hit 10 in roughly 450 atbats. Further, Milledge had an OPS+ of 105 to Green’s 104. Sure, it may seem like a negligible difference, but Milledge is younger, more athletic, and has a much quicker bat than Green. Plus, with his speed he adds another dynamic that Green can’t add. Personally, I feel he is an upgrade over Green in RF because he can get to more balls and has a stronger arm. He’s also going to be 23. Compared to most prospects not named Wright or Reyes, Milledge is ahead of the curve. Green is on the downside of his career and may even retire. I could argue the Mets played some of their best ball with Lastings in the lineup last year. The only way he’s going to learn to handle junk is if he plays. Unless he’s traded he should be in RF and stay there.
Oh yeah, and Sloppy, that’s the point, we don’t have a lot of depth at the high levels of the minors, but there are some nice players. I’d rather make a smaller move and save some of those pieces for later in the season be it for injury or a trade in season. Plus, you don’t know what prospects will assert themselves this season. Joba wasn’t even on the radar last spring. Not saying we’ll being up a Joba, but players mature and shoot up through the system fast.
And yes, Minaya struck out last offseason, no way around it. But let’s not forget all of the good he has done as well. The simple fact that we’re having these debates is a testament to how he has turned this sorry franchise around.
How can you call a guy who batted 5th and 6th a role player? And your # 1 catcher is a role player? The guy who has to keep the game under control is much more than a role player. Valentin was an accident that Omar brought in when he screwed up and didn’t resign Marlon. And of course, instead of realizing he was lucky, Omar brought him back as the regular last year and he returned to his over the hill status real fast.
And based on Omar’s history why do you need “chips” for July? He needed help badly last year and he did nothing. In 06 he didn’t use chips when he was desperate. He used Nady who was what you would call your ideal role player. He protected the stars very well. Omar doesn’t have a clue what to do with the farm system. He gutted the pitching corp for Ben Johnson, Adkins, Bostick and Vargas. Gee wouldn’t it have been nice to have some help for the pen last year! totally misread the talent of our own guys and gives Mota and Schoeneweis multi year deals. I give him credit for this?
The main cogs in our offense are Reyes, Wright, Beltran, and (supposedly) Delgado. The idea is to build your team around those guys. Alou was supposed to be no more than a role player, however Delgado stunk it up, so he assumed a greater role than was expected of him.
I look at it this way, if you lose a player indefinitely and it is a crushing blow to the team, they are a main player, if they are replaceable, then they are role players. In my view, you gamble on Alou because if he stays healthy he gives you very good production, however, if he goes down, you can slot in a Gomez or a Chavez and the team will still win ballgames because Alou is essentially a role player. We saw this last season.
But say Wright went down… we would be in trouble because he is one of the players we built the team around. I agree with what someone posted above. Delgado having a subpar year was very bad for us, because he is one of the cornerstones of this offense.
However, if you recall, we played some of our best ball with LoDuca, Castro, Green, and Valentin on the DL and DiFelice, Alomar, Gotay, and Milledge getting significant playing time. By no means do I mean to insinuate that I would prefer the latter group to the former, although I do prefer Milledge to Green, but the reason why losing the former group wasn’t crippling is because they are complementary, or role, players.
You’re position on the matter of Omar benefits from 20/20 hindsight. I concede that Minaya has mostly whiffed since the Nady trade, but his track record on moves up to that point was very strong. Click on my name, I do a 3 part analysis of Omar’s transaction history on my blog. Obviously, any sort of analysis benefits from 20/20 hindsight, however, I think you will find I am fairly neutral and fair in my analysis.
Sure, Omar has had his ups and downs, but, personally, I think he has had more ups, although the downs have seem to be prevalent lately.
A few disagreements.
I think Omar has had one up and one down. The down began with the Nady trade. In hindsight people rve because he got Olle. But in fact he could have had Ollie for a Mota type since the Pirates had given up on him. He has not had an up since then.
Yes, all my comments are in hindsight but I didn’t like the trades with all the monor leaguers last Winter for what I saw as junk and still do. I didn’t like the annister trade, especially with Pedro gone already. Inhis brief time he proved he had guts when he was in trouble, and had proven he could get out of jams. I didn’t like the Alou signing from day one, and by thw way his injuries did hurt this team tremendously because we had a void in both corners for half the year.
Losing LoDuca and Green ar enot crippling because their mediocrity helped cause the failed season. Green was so damaging in right field with his lack of range that his BA became irrelevant. LoDuca’s deterioration makes him not important but replacing him with a guy coming off double surgery and a rep as trouble in the clubhouse makes for a worse team not even an equal team.
We played ou best ball the first 50 games. Not because of the offense, or who was hurt but because the bullpen wasn’t worn out yet and the league hadn’t figured out Smith yet (or he didn;t get his dead arm yet. We’ll find this out next year).
Talk about stars going down. Last year when Utley went down the Phils made a trade. When Pedro went down Omar did nothing. Nobody can adequately replace superstars but we couldn’t even adequately replace a mediocre catcher! We couldn’t replace Mota, not that Omar wanted to I suppose! It took us two months to replace Valentin!
I’ll check your site. It should be interesting. Hopefully, its not like the Metsblog dudes who apologize for every little thing done by Mets management.
We agree on his moves from last offseason. I didn’t like the Bannister or Lindstrom/Owens trades either, but I understood the Bell/Ring trade (although I have always liked Bell.)
I also submit that he is not replacing LoDuca with just Estrada, but with an Estrada/Castro time share. Personally, I think Castro could be better than most catchers in the league, however Omar had to cover his butt here since Castro hasn’t proven to be able to stay on the field.
It seems that our only real point of contention is Alou. I liked the Alou signing and I think he is a worthwhile gamble, especially since we don’t need to commit years to him. I also kind of like the fact that Omar doesn’t make rash moves. He seems to value our prospects more than most, and I trust his judgment as a scout (despite his misreading the prospects he dealt last year.) It’s not like last year or this year is the last baseball season ever to be played. I think the organization is going in a nice direction, and signing guys like Alou, Valentin, and Estrada provide short term placeholders until the Milledges, Gomezes, Martinezes and future catching prospects are ready to assume full time roles.
I think this is a big year for Omar though. As you will see, I like most of his early work, but his recent moves are less than impressive. I like moves like the Keppinger for Gotay deal, but hated the Bannister for Burgos. Sure, Bannister could have been useful as a 5th starter, but he is the exact kind of piece you send to a small market team like the A’s in a deal for Haren.
Keith,
I am not really comparing Green vs. Milledge because I do not think either should be the starting RF for us in 08. I think we need to go outside the organization for our RF.
But to Lastings; in Aug he hit 318 in Sep 224
Green; in Aug 293 in Sep 407.
This shocks me. I am not saying Green is better. I am saying it is a wash with Lastings having much more upside. But you should get better not worse. I do not see Lastings as an everyday OF on the Mets in 08. At least not if you want to win. He may win the starting OF job, but he needs to take it not be given it.
On Valentin – He was a surprise to all and I was a supporter of his resigning. He is a very good defensive 2b for the Mets and handled the bat well. I have no criticism of his game in 06 or 07. He got hurt and lost his job. He is old and probably won’t be with us next year because of Castillo and Gotay.
Castro is not an everyday catcher. Never was never will.
Sloppy –
I agree with your criticisms of Omar up to a point. I think he did well as a GM until last year. I think for this year to improve the club he needs to get a frontline starter. If he can land Santana/Haren/Bedard or even Blanton he will have done his job. That is what he needs to do in the offseason. If he cannot get the above or someone like them then we will have another flawed club and his star as a GM will have dulled.
I would confess to you all that my criticisms of Omar are exaggerated but that would stifle the discussion!
In all seriousness, I would like Omar to do one fo the following: Either trade for an ace starter, and if he can’t pull off the deal, do nothing about a starter and let the kids try to develop without the pressure of being returned to the minors in favor of a washed up guy.
Signing Livan or Silva alone would be an insult to the fans.
Secondly, if he’s serious about an ace, do whatever $$$ is needed to sign either Rowand or Jones so he can trade whenever out of strength, and not need to find anther stop gap in the outfield for the next 2 years.