smg58

This past year Hudson had a .717 OPS at home and a .738 OPS on the road, with .724 at home and .762 on the road between 02 and 04, so it doesn't appear that the turf helped him. His weakness is that he is not all that good right-handed: the lefty/righty OPS differentials are .774/.606 for 05 and .785/.616 for 02-04. That could leave an opening for Keppinger as a platoon player on this level, though. If the Jays could use Zambrano (or even Trachsel, if they have somebody else worth having to throw in), I'd be happy to talk shop with them. While we're discussing options, can anybody here familiar with the Red Sox comment on Bill Mueller's willingness or ability to play second base full-time?

Hudson's glove makes him a very viable option if no better alternatives present themselves. His OPS this year was as good as Matsui's in 04, and unlike Matsui he's proven he's capable of better. If we do a good job upgrading the offense in other places, I think he'd make a great fit. And the Jays might take somebodly like Zambrano in return. I see no reason not to pursue this.

Saw that one too. I'm not against keeping options open, but do we know if he's even healthy, and we need a closer more than we need set-up guys (although I might make an exception for Scott Eyre if he doesn't go above $3M a year). Counting Dotel as a potential closer, the market now has Wagner, Ryan, Hoffmann, Guardado, Farnsworth, Looper, and Dotel. Plus I wouldn't be surprised if the CWS put Dustin Hermanson on the block. Am I missing anybody?

It seems that anything the Mets do with Jacobs entails a risk, because at this point he is an unknown commodity with a potentially large upside. The options are: 1. Catch him, and risk his defense getting in the way. 2. Play him at first, and risk finding out that he is really no better a hitter than Agabayani and Spenser were despite their great starts, and the offense does not improve significantly from last year. 3. Block him by bringing in expensive guys at both positions, and risk wasting a good player. 4. Trade him, and risk seeing him turn into a basher for another team. I'm dead-set against option 3; whatever else, he's earned the right to at least compete for a starting spot. If other GM's treat him like a mid-level or worse prospect, I see no point to option 4. The risk for option 2 is easier to quantify than the risk for option 1, because I really have no idea how bad his defense is. I think first base is the position that leaves the most room for improvement on the team, and if we go with Jacobs there and he's ordinary, our run production won't be much different than this year. As far as option 1 goes, is he below average or way below average? That difference could matter a lot, and I have nothing to go by in that regard.

Our bullpen as it stands has Heilman, Bell, Padilla, one or both of Ring and Hamulack, probably Hernandez back, Aybar pitching well enough to warrant another look, possibly Bannister, possibly Zambrano, Soler at some point, and who knows Yates might even get healthy. Depth is not the problem. I think they do need to add one reliever to the top. Whether you go all out for one of the bigger names depends on whether or not you think you have a future closer in house, but keep in mind that it's a buyer's market for closers right now.

sharpie wrote: I think Jacobs would be a great hitting catcher and a good hitting 1b. I'm with Vic Sage on this one. Strap on the tools, Mike. Right. I think that Jacobs, or perhaps a Jacobs/Castro platoon, could match or exceed the offensive output of any catcher who's available. I might be more protective if I thought he were destined to be one of the game's elite hitters, but it will take more than a good month to convince me of that.

I think Bell will be fine on the major league level as long as he gets consistent work. Aybar might be working his way back into the bullpen picture, too. I think if the Mets find a good closer -- and there are a lot of them out there -- the rest of the pen will sort itself out. Hernandez appears to be making up for the hits he didn't get here. I hope he keeps it up.

Epstein might not have been perfect, but I don't see why putting a World Series winner on the field in Boston didn't earn him more respect from his own front office. They offered a lot more money to Beane, who still hasn't produced a team that's won a playoff series. Granted there's a huge payroll difference, but THE RED SOX WON A WORLD SERIES on Epstein's watch. I don't get this one at all.

I am against Soriano, but not necessarily Furcal. The Braves have Wilson Betemit, and they've let plenty of other guys walk in the past and survived. I'm not sure they'd be the Mets' primary competition. Furcal did play some 2B when he first came up, so he wouldn't be learning from scratch. I'm surprised by the home/road splits. I wouldn't have considered Atlanta a hitter's park, but perhaps it's an easy place to get singles or beat out ground balls? Does anybody know anything on that? I'm not sure he's a great option, but he might very well be the best option available.

We might be able to squeeze three years out of him, but I'd need some indication of what Jacobs could do defensively before I decided how eagerly I'd pursue other options. I do think Molina is a better choice than Hernandez, though.

It looks like a free (or already paid for, at any rate) boost to the bullpen, which is obviously a good thing. But how much of a boost?

Yancy Street Gang wrote: Do we? There's money, of course, but I'm not sure that the Mets have a whole lot of young inexpensive players that many other teams would find appealing. Not as appealing as Milledge and Petit, to be sure, but guys like Heilman, Diaz, Hernandez, Seo, and Bannister wouldn't be valueless. And the players don't have to be young to be dealable. Trachsel and Zambrano would command some market value, and Cameron could probably command quite a bit. The Mets might be in a position to deal other players as well, depending on their free agent acquisitions. (Hypothetically, say somebody offers us a good second baseman for Floyd while we sign Brian Giles.) On the subject of VORP's, keep in mind that the "replacement player" on the Mets would likely be either Steve Trachsel or Victor Zambrano, or possibly Jae Seo.

No surprises there, which is a good thing. The only thing with Trachsel, since he now has veto power over trades, is that the Mets should make sure they know where he would and wouldn't go if a trade came up.

I wouldn't defend Escobar -- he looked like he was ready, got his chance, and then promptly took several major steps backwards. I don't think the Mets handled the situation improperly, and the Alomar deal looked like a good thing at the time. The three high-end prospects the Mets have had since (Reyes, Wright, and Kazmir) are each coming off solid seasons (All-Star caliber, in Wright's case), but evaluating prospects is an inexact science. It's tough to know who's a keeper and who's expendable when you've never seen them play, but Milledge's recent performance suggests he's heading in the right direction and is worth keeping. At any rate, I think dealing him would be a much greater risk to the team than passing on a deal involving him when we have plenty of other resources with which to obtain good players.

="Elster88"]So Zito, a 27 year-old left-handed former Cy Young award winner, is not worth Milledge alone? He's a prospect, for crying out loud. First off, I am not at all opposed to looking into getting Zito; I think he could be a solid #2 starter in Peterson's hands, and while we're deep with starters, I don't think we have a clear #2 in house. That being said, he hasn't always been consistent in the past two seasons, and there's a limit to what I'd deal for him. Starting with the Mets' best prospects. You don't deal your best prospects unless you know you're getting an elite player in return, and Zito hasn't been quite that level of pitcher the past two seasons. If the Mets had traded Wright two years ago for somebody like Zito, we'd be regretting it now. Plus, we currently have eight guys who could be in somebody's rotation next year, along with four capable outfielders, and more than enough money to pursue free agents. I just don't see why acquiring players that could make us contenders should cost us Milledge or Petit.

I'm not sure that the Mets have a legit #2 starter, and I think Zito could fit that bill. That being said, he's not worth Milledge alone, much less Milledge and somebody. The Mets have a surplus of major league talent at certain positions to make deals with, so dicussing Milledge or Petit for anybody at this point is exactly the wrong way to handle this offseason.

]For those who believe that we DESPERATELY need a new righthanded slugger to bat cleanup (as I do. . .the debate for that is, of course, valid and can be discussed on the board, albiet preferably in a thread isolated from this one), I am posting this poll to discuss who the best option ought to be. OK, it's a debatable point, and I'll start a new thread. I think that focusing on righties isn't proper -- Wright is our best overall hitter, Cameron has 30 HR potential, and our park favors lefties. I still think Brian Giles is the best value free agent. Plus, if the D-Backs would more willingly part with Chad Tracy than Troy Glaus, I'm still returning their calls. And there's always the chance of somebody unexpected popping up on the block. The Mets could probably use a good bat from each side of the plate, but I don't think their current line-up is imbalanced, or that an imbalance would necessarily be such a bad thing if it means we bring in good players without killing our payroll and/or handing over our best prospects.

I'd look into all those guys listed, but I think you'd have to have some idea what each player would cost before making a choice between them. As far as focusing on righties goes, I'll start a new thread.

We don't have kick-ass minor leaguers. We do have three guys (Hernandez, Lambin, and Keppinger) capable of stepping in as utility men, possibly with one of them emerging to give us more out of 2B than we got this season (which was very, very little). The only thing that makes Matsui an option to me is his immovability. The no-trade clause doesn't worry me so much because I think he'd be happy to go at this point, but the Mets would either have to take on an expensive player in return or eat most of his contract and get nothing. You could possibly use him in a deal involving Manny to make the money exchange even up, but that doesn't look likely right now. I'm not convinced dealing Matsui would be addition by subtraction the way dealing Cedeno was, but I have no confidence in his ability to contribute, either. The other question is this: do you bring back Woodward and/or Anderson at the risk of blocking Hernandez, Lambin, and Keppinger?

Has Woodward passed six full seasons as a major leaguer? To put it another way, was he a free agent last year because he had reached six seasons, or was he non-tendered? That would matter because if he hasn't reached six years, then the Mets would still control him even if he's not under contract.

I'd be curious to know what his gripes with the organization are, or if he was just mad that Jake got the playing time in September. For what it's worth, the Red Sox agreed to pony up his buyout as part of the deal. Minaya got a similar offering from the Dodgers in the Ishii deal. So the Mets don't have to pay to free themselves of either of them.

Klapisch is allowed to speculate, just like everybody else. Presumably, if the Red Sox were the ones doing the pushing in July, Omar wouldn't need to push (assuming Klapisch is right and he wants to make this deal). I could see Piazza in Baltimore. I could also see Molina coming here, although I'd still look at younger options in deals first.

Podsednik in the regular season: 507 AB's, no home runs. Baseball is a funny game sometimes.

I'll go White Sox in 6. I can't see the Astros generating much offense in this series, while I think the Sox will score just often enough. I hope you like pitching.

I'm surprised the Braves didn't make much of an effort to hold on to him. As usual, though, I'll refrain from prematurely declaring an end to the Braves run of titles.