Centerfield

Never sees Flushing this year.

I thought Jae Seo would have a better career than he did. I thought he could pitch 10 years, be a Bobby Jones type of guy. I also kinda felt like Dillon Gee was a white Jae Seo.

It's funny how this offseason has played out. I think two unexpected moves have made for a somewhat awkward bench. The easy one is Cespedes/De Aza. I think that if they knew they had a chance at Cespedes, no way they sign De Aza. Marlon Byrd makes much more sense once you move Lagares to the bench. And the other is Zobrist/Walker/Cabrera/Tejada. I think they went in expecting to sign Zobrist, so you need Tejada to back up Flores. If Zobrist spurned them, maybe they would sign Cabrera to play second, in which case you still need Ruben as a backup SS. I think the Walker trade surprised them, and they were able to fill 2B without an outlay of money, so this allowed them to updgrade SS, relegating Wilmer to super-sub. (whether it was an upgrade or not is a different story). And so, oddly, they have this 25 man roster that has 3 centerfielders, and 3 shortstops.

Physical took longer than usual because they couldn't find a doctor with hands big enough to, well, you know...

Frayed Knot wrote: Know your 2016 Nats (as of 1/27): Rotation: Out from last year are Jordan Zimmermann & Doug Fister. To replace them, 2014 starter Tanner Roark bounces back from pen to reclaim a starting job, and Joe Ross, originally a 1st round pick by the Padres dealt to the Nats last winter. He pitched for the Nats part of last year including two starts vs the NYM during last year's crunch-time series [12.2 IP, 5 runs, 8 hits] Those two will join incumbents: Strasburg, Scherzer, and (LH) Gio Gonzalez Bullpen: Papelbon hasn't been dealt (at least not yet anyway) and Aaron Barrett & Blake Treinan also return. But Drew Storen, Felipe Rivera, Casey Janssen, and LOOGY specialist Matt Thorton have either been traded or left via FA-gency. Newcomers in the pen include a couple of guys with NYM connections: Oliver Perez, Yusmeiro Petit. Also Trevor Gott acquired from the Angels plus an assortment of young guys from their own org round out the pen as of now. On the infield they're dealing with the loss of Ian Desmond (who still hasn't signed anywhere!!) and Yunel Escobar from whom they got a lot more than they had any right to expect in 2015. 1B - Ryan Zimmerman back by Clint Robinson, the 30 y/o rookie with a surprisingly strong 2015 2B - some guy they picked up in the off season SS - This is the only real open position. They'd like speed-burner/former 1st round pick (by SD) Trea Turner to win the job. If he's not ready they signed Stephen Drew and still have utility knife IF Danny Espinosa (both of whom will probably replace Muffy in late innings often) 3B - Anthony Rendon OF - Jayson Werth in LF. Ben Revere was imported to replace the better, though more-oft injured, Denard Span both in the leadoff spot and in CF. MVP Bryce Harper in RF. Michael Taylor and/or Matt den Dekker will back up at all three spots - particularly for Werth who is increasingly a liability with a glove on his hand. And finally there's the massively experienced Dusty Baker in for first-timer Matt Williams to run the dugout. They're not going to have a catcher? Nice! We're going to win this thing easy!

We should be getting word soon. No? Where is HVAC guy at the Hospital for Special Surgery?

I loved it. Saw it twice and loved it even more the second time. I grew up loving Star Wars. And after the prequels, I guess my bar is really low. I was praying it did not suck. And it didn't. Much to my delight. Other than that, I liked: 1. It respected the first three movies. Didn't ruin any of them. 2. Better acting than any other Star Wars movie. 3. Daisy Riddle is a star. Tough, vulnerable, funny, compelling. You can't take her eyes off of her whenever she is on the screen. And it's not just because she's easy on the eyes. Even the way she eats her green meal on Jakku is compelling. If you asked me before the movie, who is worthy of taking over the Falcon, I would have said no one. Never. Impossible. But when she did it, it was seamless. When she called that lightsaber, it made you want to stand up and cheer. 4. Great dynamic between the three new stars (Rey, Po, Finn). 5. The moments between Leia and Han are really touching. All this time, I wondered how they would handle that. Having them be estranged was a huge risk, but it worked out well. When they are standing there soaking in what the other looks like after all these years, the audience is feeling it too. Sure, there were parts I didn't like. The similarities to the first movie, obviously. (I like how they were like "It's no just like blowing up the Death Star. It's at least THREE TIMES BIGGER!") StarKiller base wasn't as significant in the story line as the Death Star was in the first, so it blowing up didn't feel as monumental. (so, yes, even when they copied, they didn't do it as well) And I am still not sold about Han Solo dying. It kinda seemed like the easy way to give the movie and the new villain some depth. But we'll see how they play this out.

Some wanted September 21 against the Braves. I agree this would have had significant meaning, but I see the drawbacks. His career was not all about that one HR, and on Sept. 21 there may be some pretty intense baseball going on. Kudos to the Wilpons again (becoming a theme around here) for giving Piazza a whole weekend and retiring his number on a Saturday night. If I remember correctly, Gary Carter Night was some bullshit weekday game.

Per Heyman, the deal from the Nats was 4 years, 100 million, plus the opt out. Some money deferred, but man that is really a lot of money to walk away from.

MFY fan that lives in my building this morning: "I don't know what's wrong with Cashman. Look at the Mets. Coming off a World Series, they go out spend and sign a star player in his prime. We'll get him when he's 35 and washed up. We can give him Beltran's uniform."

I love both covers, but went with "YES-PEDES". Love the expressions. Dead Nats. Green arm sleeve. Conforto's coming out party was great, but when the Mets swept the Nats I was dancing. Plus the MFY's are tumbling in the top banner.

I'm surprised that a Daniel Murphy or NLCS cover didn't make it through. When scrolling through the possibilities way back when, I really didn't think it would come down to these two.

I think Mex's question was why 4 years for Zobrist, but not for Cespedes. My guess is that the 4 years for Zobrist was fueled by PR (above), and they didn't go 4 years on Cespedes because they realized at some point that they didn't have to. Once they decided that they were in on Cespedes, they played it perfectly. I get what you are saying about Conforto versus Herrera. I would counter that even though he is younger, he's had nearly 2000 professional PA's and he's hit at every level. That's why I distinguish him from say, Amed Rosario, who is just potential but no actual results. Look, he may end up sucking, but he has nothing more to prove at AAA and I think he deserves a shot. I'm glad that they brought in a short-term solution.

dgwphotography wrote: Why fake a Jim Gosger? I'm thinking that he signed it at a card show without looking at it too closely. This is funny. Of all things, you'd think you'd be able to recognize yourself. That's really mailing it in.

And Zobrist spurning the Mets ended up being the best thing that could have happened. If Zobrist had signed, we don't get Walker, and there would be no way Cespedes returns, no matter how much his price dropped. Like with Carlos Gomez before him, we were lucky Sandy's first choice fell through. It's funny that the end result, in both instances, ended up being Cespedes. Let's hope it works out anywhere near as well as the first time. As much behind-the-scenes reporting as there is, we don't know everything and so people are going to believe what they believe. But for me, I don't buy the "good fit" argument for a second. You can make just as many baseball arguments, better ones in fact, against signing Zobrist long-term as you can against any of the elite outfielders. Edgy said he hoped the Mets were not influenced by PR. I would hope so too, but that's not reality. I think the Zobrist move was all fueled by PR. After taking a step back and looking at how the offseason developed, I believe that the Mets came into this offseason targeting Ben Zobrist as the one "big name" free agent that they could afford. I think they knew that this would block their 2nd best position prospect, and that it probably is not a good idea to give an old guy four years, but Zobrist was their only chance to save face. He was a good enough player and had enough star power to offset the backlash they would get when they passed on Cespedes. They would cite his actual stats (which are pretty good), him being a "winning player", the "no-holes in the lineup approach", and enough people would buy into it that they could sell it. They would make their other supplemental moves, raise payroll slightly, and then go into the season. I think they gauged the market and saw that they would have to go 4 years to ensure they got him, but that no one else would match that. And I think they were shocked when the Cubs swooped in and got him.

It's kind of a strange article. It jumps, somewhat awkwardly, between the Mets and his role as a CEO. It seems to lay out some ideas, but lacks an overall point. And as such ends up being just a bunch of cliches and platitudes. I like this part though. Reiss: How did the Mets end up with perhaps the greatest group of young homegrown pitchers of this baseball era? McCann: If, as they say, baseball is all about pitching, then building a winning team is all about planning. You need to have a plan and you need to stick to that plan. And the Mets have had a long term plan to build a core of great, young pitchers that they could then build a team around. The team’s front office is filled with some really talented baseball minds. They’re focused, very analytical and willing to take the heat from the media – and a sometimes impatient fan base – to build a winning culture and organization. Great. So it was the fearless and innovative Harvard minds working together to create that rotation? Well, actually most of it was put together by their likeable but mostly in-over-his-head predecessor who had trouble putting coherent words together to form a sentence.

Another way to put it, the topic of this thread is Zobrist versus Cespedes. In the Zobrist pursuit, only the Mets and Cubs offered four years. Applying Chuck's logic, this means that most other clubs believed Zobrist was too much a risk. Which means that the Zobrist contract, is a bad idea. And unlike the Cespedes contract, no other club offered significantly more than the Mets. Meaning it's even worse than the Cespedes deal. You cannot apply the standard to one player as justification but not apply it to others.

But the logic of the argument is faulty. RealityChuck wrote: But the Mets aren't the only ones who thought a long-term contract was a risk. Washington's bid was a desperation play, but most other teams thought that Cespedes was too much a risk. Players usually sign with the highest bidder. This mean that in most cases, no team thinks that any free agent is worth the contract they sign besides the team that signs them. Most people liked the Blevins deal, but most likely, no other team thought he was worth $4 million. That doesn't make it a bad contract. The Cespedes contract is unique in that it's the rare instance where there actually was a team that bid more that was left at the altar. Were they motivated by desperation? Maybe. Maybe not. How do we know what motivates any team? If you are using "what other teams were offering" as a gauge of the strength of a deal, the Cespedes deal should pass with flying colors.

Let's all go.

RealityChuck wrote: Zobrist is more an OBA guy, a skill that doesn't erode so precipitously. Even toward the end of the contract, he'd be useful. "RealityChuck speaks truth. Four year deals to aging second basemen who's primary skill is OBP are totally a good idea." - Luis Castillo, age 32 at the time.

I'm really eager to see how Montero looks. I wonder if he can beat out Bart for 5th starter.

Frayed Knot wrote: I would describe scouts as being intrigued by Herrera, based mostly on his age and power potential in a middle infield spot. But he's hardly the kind of sure thing that you arrange your ML roster around, especially how we know that even can't-miss prospects can and do miss. Compared to him (and to Cecchini and to Rosario) Conforto and Lagares are MUCH more proven at this point. Really? Much more proven? Conforto has 25 more AB's than Herrera (174 total). This is hardly enough time to prove anything. Even if you count his 30 post-season AB's, I think the sample size is too small to conclude anything. Look, I'm with you on Conforto, but your position seems very arbitrary to me. You're basically saying Conforto is "much more proven" after 174 AB's. So much so that you give him the starting job and forego all the other options available in free agency, even though the best hitters available are corner outfielders. But with Herrera, he is "still only a maybe" after 149 AB's. And so you give a 35 year old a 4 year contract at 2B. Now, I get that Conforto is off to a much better start for his major league career than Herrera, but I think it's a mistake to block either of them.

The guy in the pinkish shirt in the second row is sportin' the burns too. Looks like .73.

My lineup against Lefties: 1. Lagares CF 2. Wright 3B 3. Cespedes RF 4. Duda 1B 5. d'Arnaud C 6. Conforto LF 7. Cabrera SS 8. Flores 2B 9. Colon DH Couple of key notes: *Lagares over Granderson here. Splits say this should work out. Hopefully Yoenis can handle RF. Certainly has the arm for it. *I'd be inclined to let Conforto play every day, at least initially. I think he will do fine. But if he struggles, he can platoon with De Aza, in which case De Aza and play RF and Ces and slot back to LF. *I wonder whether Terry will employ a strict platoon with Walker. Walker sucks against lefties. Wilmer crushed them last year. On paper, this is the right choice, but Walker will object becoming a platoon player going into his walk year.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I also agree with Edgy's lineup prediction, except perhaps we'll see Walker batting second and Wright third. And bat two lefties in a row? Sacrilege!