Memories of Chin-lung Hu

[Edgy MD]

Performing respectably in the Australian Baseball League, he got signed away by the Indianfolk today.

After he got sent down last year, he supposedly got all screwed up and caught a case of the Knoblauchs. Took some time off to get his head on straight. Finished the year trying to put his mechanics back together all the way down with the now-extinct Gulf Coast Mets.

Inspirer of opening-day doggerel.

Wore 25, which could only bring up memories of Kaz Matsui to see it on an undersized Asian infielder again.

[Gwreck]

Arguably the worst player to make the opening day roster of the Mets in the last 15 years.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

It was easy to joke at first that his acquisition was about appeasing local Asian journalists but that's exactly what it looked like in the end.

He and Buchholz, Mets with issues.

[Guest themetfairy]

Opening Day was the highlight of his Met career. IOW, he didn't have any.

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

I don't remember Chin-lung Hu.

[Guest attgig]

he supposedly had a good glove coming up the minors and a passable offense for a MI, but once he couldn't throw a ball anymore, his value was nil.

You can't make a roster being the defensive replacement, and not be able to throw. of course his offense was absolutely horrible in the majors as well, not even passable.


And i don't think he was an asian signee for the asian population. I thought he was a Depodesta acquisition in the dodgers, and wanted to bring him over to ny.

[Edgy MD]

Did his throwing deteriorate in the bigs. I don't recall. I thought he noodle-batted his way back to the minors and there his throwing fell apart.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: It was easy to joke at first that his acquisition was about appeasing local Asian journalists but that's exactly what it looked like in the end.

Maybe, but I was more inclined to look at him as the product of a minor turf war in the Mets front office. They needed some options in the middle infield as they were coming to the end of the Castillo era, Murphy was an unknown and untrusted quantity at second, and Reyes and Murphy were coming off injuriuous years.

• Ricciardi backed the acquisition of Emaus, from his old Blue Jay organization.
  
• DePodesta backed the acquisition of Hu, from his old Dodger organization.
  
• Ricco backed Turner, acquired earlier by the Mets during his tenure.

From that perspective, Ricco was the winner. If that's so, fat lot of good it did him.

[G-Fafif]

Had a clutch sac fly at Washington in April to help rally the Mets after they'd been screwed by a terrible call at third (Jose has 99 triples in the records, he should have a hundred).

Sandy [crossout]Dennis[/crossout] Alderson the out-of-towner being fooled by the "Huuuuuu" greetings in St. Lucie into thinking Cl-H would be a "fan favorite," thus we better keep him. (Said words very much to this effect in a blogger conference call -- also gave it as a bonus reason for keeping Murphy...'cause fans liked to call him "Murph".)

Me trying to be patient, thinking, "He must be good or he wouldn't be on the roster," then deciding this burst of maturity on my part was misplaced.

[seawolf17]

Hu?

[metsmarathon]

hu was the only 2011 met to appear in a game and not merit a single of my schaeffer votes. i may have missed voting for other short-timers due to inactivity or bad luck, but hu is the only met not to have ever been one of the top six positive contributors in a game, per my reckoning.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Somebody did give him some Schaefer points. He totaled 0.77 points in 2011. Of 46 Mets to earn Schaefer in 2011, only Blaine Boyer (with 0.48) had a lower total.

[Edgy MD]

Fman game him 0.25 for this game: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=15875&p=405276

I gave him 0.02 for this game, but it got rounded down to nuttin': viewtopic.php?f=9&t=16169&p=413914

There's got to be more than that out there.

[G-Fafif]

From the second through the fifteenth game of 2011, Blaine Boyer was the Mets' leader or co-leader in saves.

Perhaps that's something Chin-lung Hu remembers (as this is a memories of Chin-lung Hu thread).

[seawolf17]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: It was easy to joke at first that his acquisition was about appeasing local Asian journalists but that's exactly what it looked like in the end.

That's honestly what I'll remember. That reporter who kept asking about Asian players.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Now that Greg mentioned it I remember that sac fly. That came during CF's early-season Game-Thread Win Streak.


http://archives.cranepoolforum.net/16000/f14_t16070.shtml

This team is so LIKABLE. Plus I'm drunk, it's a combination of factors.

[G-Fafif]

Gwreck wrote: Arguably the worst player to make the opening day roster of the Mets in the last 15 years.

Intriguing and depressing assertion. In a subset that includes Brad Emaus and Ricky Gutierrez, no less.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Fman game him 0.25 for this game: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=15875&p=405276 I gave him 0.02 for this game, but it got rounded down to nuttin': viewtopic.php?f=9&t=16169&p=413914 There's got to be more than that out there.

His big day was April 27, when he earned 0.62 Schaefer points.

Hu's remaining points came on April 2 (0.01), April 5 (0.02), April 8 (0.02), and April 28 (0.10).

Source

[G-Fafif]

Hu Fever spread like mildfire here. Or Hu-steria, if you will.

[Fman99]

Hu Flung Poo

[Gwreck]

G-Fafif wrote: Gwreck wrote: Arguably the worst player to make the opening day roster of the Mets in the last 15 years. Intriguing and depressing assertion. In a subset that includes Brad Emaus and Ricky Gutierrez, no less.

I had forgotten about Ricky Gutierrez. The two that immediately came to mind when considering him for "worst ever" were Rey Sanchez and Tim Spehr.

I think Hu was worse than all 4 though.

[G-Fafif]

Gwreck wrote: Gwreck wrote: Arguably the worst player to make the opening day roster of the Mets in the last 15 years. Intriguing and depressing assertion. In a subset that includes Brad Emaus and Ricky Gutierrez, no less. I had forgotten about Ricky Gutierrez. The two that immediately came to mind when considering him for "worst ever" were Rey Sanchez and Tim Spehr. I think Hu was worse than all 4 though.

Thought about those two. I had an outsized distaste for Rey Sanchez. I'd be happy to let him have the Hu Award for 2003. As for Spehr, kind of the Emaus of catchers. Two hits on Opening Day, March 31, 1998, three for all of April, gone by the first week of May.

But, yeah, Hu.

[Edgy MD]

Are we talking worst as far as ability, or worst as far as performance?

Because if it's the latter, I'm a big Jay Bell fan. Huge.

Guillermo Mota too, for that matter, if we're looking at total volume of negativity introduced.

[G-Fafif]

Mota was never on a Mets Opening Day roster. Acquired in August '06, suspended after the season for the first 50 games of '07.

I don't know if we're taking into account overall suckiness or just suckiness as a Met. Bell would be there on the latter despite a nice career. And Gutierrez went from the brittle early '04 Mets to the eventual world champion Red Sox, so maybe it was us more than him.

Hu keeps looking better in this discussion, which is to say worse.