Black Eyes and Blue Ribbons: The Sandy Alderson Scorecard

[Edgy MD]

Obviously, the player-by-player score doesn't matter so much as winning big and losing small, but this is one way to look at it --- sort of like looking at batting average instead of OPS. Signing Jason Isringhausen, for instance, is a solid win for the money --- an unambiguous base hit --- if certainly nobody's idea of a homerun.

Obviously, some of these can switch columns going forward.

1. Letting Hisanori
   Takahashi Walk
2. Signing DJ
   Carrasco
3. Signing Ronny
   Paulino
4. Drafting Brad
   Emaus
5. Signing Taylor
   Buchholz
6. Signing Blaine
   Boyer
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

1. Mike Antonini
   for Chin-lung Hu
2. Letting Henry
   Blanco Walk
3. Signing Willie
   Harris
4. Trading Francisco
   Rodriguez for
   Danny Herrera
   and Adrian Rosario
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

1. Letting Raul
   Valdes Walk
2. Drafting Pedro
   Beato
3. Letting Sean
   Green Walk
4. Signing Chris
   Young
5. Signing Scott
   Hairston
6. Signing Dale
   Thayer
7. Trading Eddie Kunz
   for Allan Dykstra
8. Claiming Mike
   Baxter off of Waivers
9. Trading Carlos
   Beltran for Zack
   Wheeler
   
   
   

1. Letting Mike
   Hessman Walk
2. Extending R.A.
   Dickey
3. Letting Pedro
   Feliciano Walk
4. Signing Chris
   Capuano
5. Letting Chris
   Carter Walk
6. Signing Tim
   Byrdak
7. Signing Jason
   Isringhausen
8. Letting John
   Maine Walk
9. Releasing Luis
   Castillo
10. Releasing Oliver
    Perez
11. Signing Miguel
    Batista

Looks to Be a Solid Loss	Looks to Be a Modest Loss	Looks to Be a Modest Win	Looks to Be a Solid Win

I wasn't not sure how to judge the early returns on the Beltran and Rodriguez trades. Both players continued to perform well (for big money) after dealing them. But the bounty for Beltran immediately progressed and increased in equity, while the bounty for Rodriguez did not, and as ceetar will remind us, Rodriguez's arm was missed by the Mets, no matter where the team was going. So, while it could change, one went in the positive and one in the negative (even if getting out from under a vesting option was the primary goal of the Rodriguez deal).

[metirish]

Good work, had totally forgotten about some of those players. I need to temper my expectations that Alderson based on I'm not even sure(moneyball status?) would unearth gold from crap.

[TransMonk]

Good work. I agree with most everything listed here.

[Edgy MD]

What I didn't include is the decisions on players he retained at arbitration time in the 2010-2011 offseason. I guess those include Pelfrey (trending bad, but it's hard to say whether his 1.4 WAR wasn't almost kinda worth the $3,925,000 he got paid) and Pagan (ultimately bad, but at least good enough to traded for Torres and whatshisface).

[Centerfield]

Looks to be the type of loss that rips your heart out and leaves you bleeding to death:

Loss of Jose Reyes

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Was Capuano really a "solid win"? He was barely WARring above Pelfrey.

[TransMonk]

Looks to be the type of loss that rips your heart out and leaves you bleeding to death: Loss of Jose Reyes

There may be plenty of blame to go around the organization for not being able to retain Reyes, but I don't assign any of it to Alderson.

[Edgy MD]

Was Capuano really a "solid win"? He was barely WARring above Pelfrey.

Yabbut far cheaper than Pelfrey. For $9.95 plus shipping, he held down a rotation slot all year.

But we can certainly toss that into the modest win pile. (Fangraphs has a dollar number for what a point of WAR is worth, right?)

[Edgy MD]

Unless I'm misreading this, they say he gave them seven bucks of production for one and half bucks of salary.

[Ceetar]

I could nitpick some of it I guess. I think guys like Boyer and drafting Emaus were more modest losses. Capuano too. Barely cost anything.

Jason Isringhausen wasn't really that good. That's more of a modest win in my eye. On the same token, letting Perez and Maine walk to me falls to modest win just based on how bad the pitching was. It's not like we got Dickey-like innings by not pitching them..we got Carrasco-like innings which we've already put in the 'big loss' column.

As Herrera is still on the roster (and the other guy) I'd probably transition K-Rod to the modest win dept as we've got some reliever depth now. (On the other hand, he's much better than Rauch and ended up signing a somewhat reasonable one year contract. It may have been impossible for the Mets to work around the option and negotiate with him the way the Brewers did though)

I'd tentatively put losing Fernando Martinez in the modest loss column too, as it's guys like Armando Rodriguez and Carrasco that get to stay as a result.

[metirish]

Capuano to LA for two years and $10 million seems reasonable, considered a loss?

[Centerfield]

Looks to be the type of loss that rips your heart out and leaves you bleeding to death: Loss of Jose Reyes There may be plenty of blame to go around the organization for not being able to retain Reyes, but I don't assign any of it to Alderson.

It's tough to know for sure, but I don't think one can automatically absolve Alderson completely. I've maintained that the time to re-sign Reyes was Winter 2010, not Winter 2011. Alderson was on record saying he wanted to see how Reyes played. If he's covering for the organization because his hands were tied, then I can't pin this on him. But if that was his call, he fucked that royally.

Not that I'm trying to take blame off the Wilpons. Fuck the Wilpons.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Edgy DC wrote: Was Capuano really a "solid win"? He was barely WARring above Pelfrey. Yabbut far cheaper than Pelfrey. For $9.95 plus shipping, he held down a rotation slot all year. But we can certainly toss that into the modest win pile. (Fangraphs has a dollar number for what a point of WAR is worth, right?)

Marginal wins cost about $3.4M for pitchers in 2010 (haven't found any numbers for 2011, but 2010 was a decade low in terms of FA marginal-win value). Capuano gave us 1.6 WAR for $1 million. If Emaus-- who cost a couple of games and $25K-- is a "solid loss," then Capuano's like finding a mint Honus Wagner card on the F train.

[Edgy MD]

Ceetar wrote: I could nitpick some of it I guess. I think guys like Boyer and drafting Emaus were more modest losses. Capuano too. Barely cost anything.

As I try to make clear, while they may be "modest" as volume of impact, I'm trying to rate them as far as the clarity of the success or failure of the deal. And they were unambiguous failures, if not enormous disasters.

The only thing that keeps the Hu deal from being more unambiguous is that Antonini could make it worse by someday providing some productivity to the Dodgers, or even somehow make it better by getting the bigs and sucking even more power from a roster spot than Hu did. That's unlikely.

[smg58]

It's too early to assess the wins and losses from this offseason. Personally I don't think Reyes will be worth his contract, and I'm fairly certain that Capuano won't.

A few of the "losses" were of negligible cost. (Mike Antonini has a chance of giving the Dodgers more than the Mets got from Hu, mainly because Hu gave the Mets nothing, but he wasn't a mystery to AA hitters for the third straight year.) When you throw a bunch of cheap gambles on the wall, it only takes one or two of them to stick to be a net win.

I'd put the Beltran-for-Wheeler deal as a solid win right now because it didn't really hurt us, it didn't help the Giants enough, and the long-term upside is huge.

I think the K-Rod deal is a push. It certainly hurt our pen more than we thought it would and it's not clear that we got anything, but doing nothing and paying K-Rod $17M this year would still have been worse.

[Ceetar]

Looks to be the type of loss that rips your heart out and leaves you bleeding to death: Loss of Jose Reyes There may be plenty of blame to go around the organization for not being able to retain Reyes, but I don't assign any of it to Alderson. It's tough to know for sure, but I don't think one can automatically absolve Alderson completely. I've maintained that the time to re-sign Reyes was Winter 2010, not Winter 2011. Alderson was on record saying he wanted to see how Reyes played. If he's covering for the organization because his hands were tied, then I can't pin this on him. But if that was his call, he fucked that royally. Not that I'm trying to take blame off the Wilpons. Fuck the Wilpons.

A little of both I imagine. And he's looking to make the same mistake with David Wright. The Mets projected payroll steadily dropped from the time Alderson picked up the option but didn't extend him, and when he got the offer from that other team. At the time he was basically suggested a payroll in the 120-130 range, which would've added Reyes to this team, and hey, probably an Oswalt or something too.

[Edgy MD]

smg58 wrote: It's too early to assess the wins and losses from this offseason. Personally I don't think Reyes will be worth his contract, and I'm fairly certain that Capuano won't.

Yeah, I stayed away from that. I hope this thread can.

smg58 wrote: A few of the "losses" were of negligible cost. (Mike Antonini has a chance of giving the Dodgers more than the Mets got from Hu, mainly because Hu gave the Mets nothing, but he wasn't a mystery to AA hitters for the third straight year.) When you throw a bunch of cheap gambles on the wall, it only takes one or two of them to stick to be a net win.

I think I tried to speak to all of this.

smg58 wrote: I'd put the Beltran-for-Wheeler deal as a solid win right now because it didn't really hurt us, it didn't help the Giants enough, and the long-term upside is huge.

I don't know about enough. It's never enough, except perhaps for one team. We haven't got gotten anything yet but six good starts in St. Lucie. The Giants got 1.0 WAR. I'm trying to stay away from speculation, but there's value in what Wheeler is right now. It should eventually move to the solid, but as it is now, Met fans missed out on Beltran's last 54 hits, including seven homers. I hate to think value doesn't matter if it doesn't get you in World Series.

[TransMonk]

I can't blame Alderson for Reyes. Sandy may not have always been telling the truth regarding the team's reasoning for waiting or not signing Jose, but I think the proper financial tools to negotiate with Reyes were never granted to Alderson.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Edgy DC wrote: I don't know about enough. It's never enough, except perhaps for one team. We haven't got gotten anything yet but six good starts in St. Lucie. The Giants got 1.0 WAR. I'm trying to stay away from speculation, but there's value in what Wheeler is right now. It should eventually move to the solid, but as it is now, Met fans missed out on Beltran's last 54 hits, including seven homers. I hate to think value doesn't matter if it doesn't get you in World Series.

Well, it's not that such value doesn't matter, homesnake. It's that it has... well... less value.

[Edgy MD]

Yeah, but I disagree that "it didn't really hurt us, it didn't help the Giants enough...."

Beltran gave them everything they could have hoped for. The one who didn't help them enough was, well, Andres Torres.

Difference maker? Unfortunately, no. I am optimistic the trade will work out for us, but at this juncture, the Giants have banked their money while the Mets still have their chips on the table.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

I'd go with, "It didn't really hurt us, and we got a gigantic, really-we-got-HIM potential value in Wheeler... a value that outstrips anything Beltran could've done the rest of the year in blue-and-orange, short of throwing a no-hitter in his last game."

[batmagadanleadoff]

smg58 wrote: It's too early to assess the wins and losses from this offseason.

I agree. I'd even extend Alderson's wait and see beyond this offseason. It's tough for Sandy to impress so soon when his mission impossible is to replace five million dollar players with bargain bin cutouts. If Sandy succeeds, it'll likely be through the players that went through the Mets minor leagues on his watch. Why judge a turkey based on how it tastes after just 15 minutes in the oven?

[Ceetar]

batmagadanleadoff wrote: smg58 wrote: It's too early to assess the wins and losses from this offseason. I agree. I'd even extend Alderson's wait and see beyond this offseason. It's tough for Sandy to impress so soon when his mission impossible is to replace five million dollar players with bargain bin cutouts. If Sandy succeeds, it'll likely be through the players that went through the Mets minor leagues on his watch. Why judge a turkey based on how it tastes after just 15 minutes in the oven?

Because that was plenty of time to taste the appetizers and get a sense for the cooks ability.

[Edgy MD]

I'm clearly just keeping score with the work in progress, not filing a review.

[G-Fafif]

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: I'd go with, "It didn't really hurt us, and we got a gigantic, really-we-got-HIM potential value in Wheeler... a value that outstrips anything Beltran could've done the rest of the year in blue-and-orange, short of throwing a no-hitter in his last game."

Beltran's failure to throw a no-hitter as a Met proves he was never a New York type of player.

[ashie62]

Edgy DC wrote: I'm clearly just keeping score with the work in progress, not filing a review.

And a fine review it is. What I get from the list is Sandy has had a very limited hand to work with and will continue to do so.

[Edgy MD]

Here's the deal with Beltran. Fangraphs suggests that the Giants got $5 million in production from him. I'm thinking, Well, the Mets' deal was backloaded, so the Giants probably paid him more than $5 million for the third of a season that they had him. So I check Cot's Baseball contracts and indeed he was owed $6,5 million at the time of the trade.

Good, right? But then I read on and see the Mets sent $5 million along with him to help pay that salary. Left with only $2.5 million to cover, the Giants paid $.50 on the dollar for him. So yeah, it's not hard to look at as the Mets being in a deficit on that trade until Wheeler starts producing for the big team.

[G-Fafif]

Andrew Keh of the Times notices shopping at the dollar store doesn't necessarily yield bargains.

But when Hu � who went 1 for 20 as a Met in 2011 � and Carrasco, Ronny Paulino, Russ Adams, Blaine Boyer and the others who have been acquired are taken as a whole, they provide a stark narrative of just how much the Mets� financial problems have restricted Alderson and left him to nickel-and-dime his way to 25-man rosters both last season and this season.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I guess what I'd like to be convinced of is Sandy being better at picking stuff out of the junkyard than his peers.

We should expect more losers than winners overall but it's a matter of degrees with I guess.

[Ceetar]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: I guess what I'd like to be convinced of is Sandy being better at picking stuff out of the junkyard than his peers. We should expect more losers than winners overall but it's a matter of degrees with I guess.

All GMs have the Hus of the world.

a better example of nickle and diming is Gee and Tejada IMO.


I'm not sure Sandy is better at finding gems in the junkyard, but perhaps he's better at putting down the junk he thought was a diamond but turned out to be merely cubic zirconia