smg58

Player Was Type Matt Holiday STL A Mets Jason Bay BOS A Red Sox John Lackey LAA A Yankees Joel Pineiro STL B Angels Aroldis Chapman CUB Red Sox Andy Pettitte NYY B Yankees Randy Wolf LAD A Mets Orlando Hudson LAD A Mets Felipe Lopez MIL B Pirates Noel Arguelles CUB Marlins Chone Figgins LAA A White Sox Mike Cameron MIL B Yankees Nick Johnson FLA B Giants Placido Polanco DET A Mariners Marco Scutaro TOR A Nationals Mike Gonzalez ATL A Braves Ben Sheets INJ Mets Miguel Tejada HOU A A's Rafael Soriano ATL A Mariners Rich Harden CHI B Dodgers Brad Penny SFG Giants Johnny Damon NYY A Yankees Billy Wagner BOS A Red Sox Jon Garland LAD B Cardinals Ryota Igarashi TOK Mariners Hideki Matsui NYY A's Adrian Beltre SEA B Phillies Erik Bedard SEA B Mariners Adam Laroche ATL B Braves Miguel Olivo KCR B Marlins Jason Marquis COL B Mets Pedro Martinez PHI Cardinals Carlos Delgado NYM B Mets

Jose Guillen hasn't had a better OPS than the .837 that Pagan posted last year since 2004. Cust has hit better than that, but not by nearly enough to make up for the difference in defense. If you want an outfielder, get somebody better than what we've already got.

Somebody told me that Mike Francesa suggested that the Mets wouldn't have to give up anybody of consequence to get Halladay if they also took Wells. The catch, of course, is that Wells is owed a ridiculous $107M over the next five years and rivals Ollie with his inconsistency.

A healthy Ryan Freel has enough upside to justify a minor league contract and a ST invite, but the past two years he's played hurt when he's been able to play at all. I'd give him a look and take it from there.

Marquis' ERA+ has hung around 100 for most of his career (last year was an outlier, but not by that much). That would correspond to a 4.10 ERA here. Not bad, but not open-your-wallet good either. I think he's worth 2 years and $15M, but I'll be surprised if that gets it done.

My problem with Piniero is that you have to go back to 2003 to find another season from him that would be worth the contract he wants. I'm always leery of overpaying for a guy's career year.

Don't forget to offer all your employees far more money than any other perspective employer would consider reasonable.

Shoppach is at least a borderline non-tender candidate, so I wouldn't be too quick to make a trade offer if there's a chance we could name our price for him and not have to give up players. He's tough to get excited about after blowing the chance to be a full-time player this year, but he's certainly worth a look if he comes cheap.

Halladay. Lackey will probably require a five-year commitment, and I don't trust his health enough to do that.

I'm not sure there's a more viable suitor for Castillo's services at this point than the Cubs, so I have no problem talking shop with them. Hudson's on the FA market and the Reds might be shopping Brandon Phillips, and that's just off the top of my head.

I realize that a lot of people's impressions of Holliday as a fielder are going to be swayed by that one bad play in the Dodgers series, but even if you give the sabermetric anaylsis of defense huge error bars, the difference between Holliday and Bay is enormous. The Fielding Bible has rated Holliday as above average in each of the last three seasons, and rates him third among leftfielders in 2009. Bay has been rated as strongly negative each of the last three years. Fangraphs likewise rates Holliday highly, although not as highly this year as the past two (in contrast to The Fielding Bible). And they just rated Bay as the fifth worst fielder at any position over the past three years. I have no problem playing coy right now. Holliday is not Teixeira, and doesn't deserve as big a contract. But some Mets officials really think Bay is a better fielder than Holliday? If that's true, then some Mets officials need to be fired quickly.

Overbay had nagging injuries in 07 and 08. This year he had an OPS over .900 against righties, which Murphy won't come close to matching. Evans has an OPS of .872 against major league lefties, so you'd be getting very good production out of first base while leaving nearly all your resources to spend elsewhere. Plus it would buy Ike another year of freshening, while leaving the door wide open for him next year.

Assuming that the new Padres ownership and GM aren't insane, a one-year fix at first base would be ideal for the Mets, and Overbay fits the bill. His ability to hit lefties is a question mark, but that would give Nick Evans something to do. I wouldn't miss Castillo. I don't buy the Hudson argument, though -- his asking price was hardly prohibitive if the Mets wanted him that badly. As for wanting him now, sure I'm interested but I'm worried we'd be buying high this time around. Whether this three-club deal works or not, I think talking to the Cubs about Castillo and talking to the Jays about Overbay (among other players) are good steps in the right direction.

It would be a horrible move on the Padres' part. They were very good the last two months of the season, they have a couple of promising young players, and they've freed up enough money to be buyers not sellers. Plus Gonzo's salary is $13M over three years, and the Padres would lose more than that in attendance if they send their fans the worst possible message by dealing him. That being said, you do have to ask what the price is, don't you?

Nothing personal against Havens -- I like the power and plate discipline -- but he's three years older than Tejada and played a level lower.

I can see a lot of incentives, but if he gets more than a million guaranteed his agent is a genius and/or some GM is nuts. Fangraphs pointed out that we have negative wins above replacement to show for that deal. Great.

Catcher's a place to look for value. You can overpay for established mediocrity (see Schneider, Brian) if you're not careful. Iannetta's somebody to ask about, at least. I'd also consider taking a cheap gamble on somebody like Ryan Garko. He's probably going to be non-tendered because he's not really more than a platoon player as a first basemen, but he caught in the past and was moved more because of V-Mart than because of his glove. His bat would have much more value behind the plate, though. The worst case scenario is $1M or so for a decent bat off the bench who could catch once a week and play first against lefties; the upside is a full-time catcher with an .800 OPS.

In more news regarding hyped prospects who underachieved, the Red Sox traded for Jeremy Hermida. Bobby Abreu re-upped with the Angels for two years. In the "this is not how you want your star player behaving" category, Tim Lincecum got busted for pot after being pulled over for speeding. So he brought some marijuana into the car, drove in a manner that drew attention to himself, and left his pipe where the cop could see it. Good thing your arm works, kid.

Rios will play center, Teahen right. And both will incur Ozzie's wrath for sucking early and often next year. That leaves the Sox with a hole at second base, and I'm still for selling Castillo while we can.

I turned it off after seven, thinking Rivera was coming in and that was it. But evidently that wouldn't have been sufficient torture. Look at it this way. The Phillies have gone from the team that made two improbable comebacks at the Mets' expense to being the team that let somebody steal two bases on one pitch. Oh, and kudos to Brad Lidge for refusing to get the third out. I understand Rollins shading over to second to anticipate a double play, but if you can't get back to a routine grounder hit to where you're normally positioned, especially with a righthanded batter up, aren't you overdoing it? I got really annoyed at McCarver complimenting Cano on running through a stop sign. Ruiz had the plate blocked, and the throw by Werth beat him there -- or would have, if it was accurate.

Beltran's a tough read. The Fielding Bible has him down for this season, and Fangraphs has him significantly down, but it was a year limited by an injury. The issue would be the lingering effects of the injury. Cameron's still comfortably above average; the Fielding Bible says he's not quite as good as a healthy Beltran, but Fangraphs would disagree. But he's at an age where a decline is certainly possible.

I see Cameron as plan E or F. I'm not getting into a bidding war over him, but if it's mid-January, there's still room for him in the outfield, and he's still available, the team could do worse.