Welcome Gary Matthews, Jr.

[bmfc1]

Brutal reports on Matthews from Olney's ESPN column, today:
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After the Mets completed their trade for Gary Matthews Jr. on Friday, committing about $2.5 million and a middle reliever to land him, one talent evaluator dug into his team's scouting reports, wondering if maybe his general impression that Matthews was a player in decline was wrong.

The reports for his team were clear: Matthews is a player to be avoided. Slow bat. Declining range. And above all else, a player who wants to be a regular and will be an unhappy distraction in your clubhouse when he's not in the lineup every day.

Said an executive with another team of the Mets' efforts to acquire Matthews -- which have been extensive, including the discussion of one possible four-team deal this winter: "Baffling."

The Angels signed Matthews to a five-year, $50 million deal after he had a strong 2006 season, in which he reached a career highs in batting average (.313), homers (19) and OPS (.866). It wasn't long after that Matthews was linked, with intense scrutiny, to past acquisition of human growth hormone.

His OPS the last three seasons: .742, .675 and .697; the last number ranked 90th among 104 outfielders with at least 300 plate appearances. His slugging percentage of .361 ranked 96th among 104 outfielders with at least 300 plate appearances. He is now 35 years old.

The Mets are seeing something in him that other teams are not seeing -- especially the Angels, who also have a need for an extra outfielder but essentially ate $21.5 million just to get Matthews off their team.

I asked a scout with a team not involved in this deal for his observations on Matthew's play. His response:

"I still see Matthews as an expensive extra outfielder," said the scout. "The Angels knew they were fooled by his Texas numbers before they went after Hunter. He should still be able to play center field while Beltran is out, but he hasn't shown any sock since he was outed for receiving shipments of HGH a couple years ago. His bat has been dragging through the zone the last couple years. Nevertheless, he should benefit from getting more consistent at bats in NY than he had been getting in Anaheim."

His defense? Well, Mark Simon of ESPN Research sent along his year-by-year UZR/150 ratings from FanGraphs. Let's just say there's a trend in the numbers:

* 2002: 23.8 (1st among 107 outfielders with at least 500-plus innings)
* 2003: 6.6 (33rd of 105)
* 2004: 21.3 (9th of 107)
* 2005: 18.7 (15th of 112)
* 2006: 1.0 (46th of 108)
* 2007: -12.2 (88th of 108)
* 2008: -13.7 (94th of 112)
* 2009: -24.6 (109th of 115)

The winter's market has had other guys who could've fit the role of extra outfielder. Randy Winn. Jeremy Reed. Endy Chavez, who reportedly is making progress in his rehabilitation.

To sum up the view of Matthews within the game: He can't hit for average, can't hit for power, his defense ranks statistically among the worst outfielders in the majors, and, to top it off, rival scouts have been reporting that in recent years he has been a clubhouse negative.

If Matthews were a free agent, he would be a player who might get a $500,000 non-guaranteed minor league deal with an invitation to spring training. And yet the Mets opted to commit $2.5 million to get him, as well as trade a serviceable pitcher in Brian Stokes, to get a player whose effectiveness might have ended years ago.

Very strange.

[willpie]

Yikes.

[MFS62]

But he's nice to small animals?
So, with some lower cost alternatives still out there, ....., why?

Later

[metirish]

I don't think anyone here is surprised by what is in Olney's article , as bad as it reads even,

[Frayed Knot]

The parts about his defense are disturbing.
Other than that, all it's essentially saying is that he's no longer anywhere near being a starting outfielder - which is fine seeing as that's not how we're planning on using him - only 3/5 of the way through what might qualify as the worst FA contract of the decade.

As far as the alternates mentioned there:
- Winn has been discussed here before, but can in part call his own shots and is he going to agree to take a job where he'd be battling for a 4th/5th spot?
- Reed ... been there, done that, no thanks
- Endy ... much better defense but BTDT too, plus he's recovering from a pretty severe leg injury

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Just to brighten things up a bit... I thought I'd point out a couple more things:

1) Remember how shitty Jeremy Reed was last year? Remember how about 2/3 of us-- as much as we diverged on other matters-- agreed that he didn't even deserve top-30 consideration among last year's Mets? How, the year before, he'd been pretty damn iffy, too?

He was more valuable over the last two years than Gary Matthews with bat and glove (-0.9 WAR vs. -1.6 WAR, as per Fangraphs).

2) Team player Gary Matthews, it seems, is likely expecting to start, and, according to ML-front-office scuttlebutt (as in the Olney article) doesn't suffer in silence. From October, LA Times:

�I�m ready to play for an organization that wants me to play every day. This organization has other plans, and that�s OK.�

Ultimately, this isn't a terrible trade... it's just kind of pointless; there's so much more "Why" than "Why not" to this, especially considering the alternatives. Among the cheap, potentially better options still out there are guys like Rocco Baldelli and Gabe Gross. Even Johnny Damon-- plus bat making up for slightly-below-average glove-- would be better at his likely price. (Yes, there are concerns with all. Yes, they are both significantly better than GMJ.)

(Dammit. I broke my promise.)

Edited January 23, 2010 by Guest

[metirish]

Davidoff

Yuck. I think all you have to know about this deal is, over the past three seasons _ since Matthews enjoyed a breakthrough 2006 that quite likely included HGH usage and resulted in a huge contract - Matthews has put up a combined rWAR of -.6. In other words, during his time with the Angels, when he was making $10 million a season, he was worse than your standard, Quadruple-A player. Brian Stokes? He has a .1 rWAR in the same period. He's a tick better than your Quadruple-A player. And just counting, 2008 and 2009? Stokes' figure goes up to .9. Matthews' goes down to -2.2, thanks to apparently deteriorating defensive skills. Omar MInaya mentioned the "change of scenery" thing, and hey, stranger things have happened. Matthews clearly grew deterred after the Angels, deterred by Matthews' poor 2007, relegated him to fourth-outfielder status by signing Torii Hunter. But $1 million per season is not worth a "change of scenery" risk. Not when Matthews, for the most part, hasn't been a very good player. Very bad trade.

[Guest Edgy DC]

So, accepting everything he says as true, the Mets are on the hook for $1 million per over the next two years for a player he says should be making $500,000.

I can give them the benefit of the doubt on that one.

[Benjamin Grimm]

The only thing that can make this a bad trade is if they end up desperately needing Stokes.

While I suppose that's possible, it's pretty likely that they'll uncover someone sufficiently Stokes-like.

[Vic Sage]

Make no mistake: This is a deal of a seventh reliever for a fifth outfielder. That�s nothing. This means very little in the grand scheme of things. But it�s frustrating and a little frightening because it shows, once again, how the Mets seem to judge talent in a way that departs so severely from the stats they should now have at their disposal, then overpay to acquire that talent.

http://www.tedquarters.net/2010/01/22/the-issue-here/

[Guest attgig]

Make no mistake: This is a deal of a seventh reliever for a fifth outfielder. That�s nothing. This means very little in the grand scheme of things. But it�s frustrating and a little frightening because it shows, once again, how the Mets seem to judge talent in a way that departs so severely from the stats they should now have at their disposal, then overpay to acquire that talent.

http://www.tedquarters.net/2010/01/22/the-issue-here/

[Guest Edgy DC]

I wouldn't recommend allowing yourself scared over something you're speculating. Experienced bench players have a price also.

The real issue is whether or not he has something to contribute while Beltran heals and/or Martinez develops. I don't know.

[Guest attgig]

I wouldn't recommend allowing yourself scared over something you're speculating. Experienced bench players have a price also.

The real issue is whether or not he has something to contribute while Beltran heals and/or Martinez develops. I don't know.[/quote:2059a7lp]


well, those other deals i mentioned scare me too.
and yeah, the issue at hand now is can matthews contribute to the club now that he's here for 2 years...i think he gets cut mid-season after briefly auditioning at 1b....

[Ceetar]

I wouldn't recommend allowing yourself scared over something you're speculating. Experienced bench players have a price also.

The real issue is whether or not he has something to contribute while Beltran heals and/or Martinez develops. I don't know.[/quote:3973yeul]


well, those other deals i mentioned scare me too.
and yeah, the issue at hand now is can matthews contribute to the club now that he's here for 2 years...i think he gets cut mid-season after briefly auditioning at 1b....[/quote:3973yeul]

Basically the same as Sheffield last year, which some people seem to think he contributed to the team in some positive way. I view GMJ much the same way. You can through out all the 'advanced' stats you want, but everyone interprets these different. To the Mets, they feel the gamble that GMJ can provide some adequate defense in a pinch, maybe have a hot streak here and there, be halfway decent in an emergency is greater than the gamble that Stokes develops into anything of value. Especially given they've already made the mistake of keeping Manuel, who views Stokes as having little value. So no reason to compound the mistake of keeping Manuel by keeping guys he won't utilize. (Which is another reason we can't bring back a guy like Tatis, who Manuel will bat like it's 2008 no matter what the stats say)

[Guest Edgy DC]

I wouldn't recommend allowing yourself scared over something you're speculating. Experienced bench players have a price also.

The real issue is whether or not he has something to contribute while Beltran heals and/or Martinez develops. I don't know.[/quote:3iqjuh1y]


well, those other deals i mentioned scare me too.
and yeah, the issue at hand now is can matthews contribute to the club now that he's here for 2 years...i think he gets cut mid-season after briefly auditioning at 1b....[/quote:3iqjuh1y]

I don't think he ever makes it to first. But yeah, there's a good chance he doesn't get through the year alive.