Centerfield

JD Drew and Brian Giles were douchy. Jim Edmonds was king of douchy. Ty Wigginton was a swell guy. Love Ty.

Benge up to a .736 OPS on the season. .798 OPS in August after an .801 OPS in July. Trending upward.

I was at this game. It was terrible. At that point I was so sick of the Mets and their shitty losing. Beatles night was fun, and the Mets took a lead. But Helsley and Raley couldn't get anyone out. Just awful. And Citi was drowning them with boos. Seattle tacked on more the next inning. And for the only time I can ever remember, we left the game early. Everyone was looking at me like "really"? And I was like yeah. Fuck these guys. I can't stand to watch anymore. We were in the car when Shortcenter says to me "it's 11-9". So then we ended up turning on the radio just to hear them go down gutless in the 9th. It's crazy how bad things have been these last two years.

When Kodai Senga becomes our lockdown closer we’re all gonna have a hard time remembering he was once a bad starter.

I'm torn on this. On the one hand, I'm old school. I generally don't like flashy celebrations or big bat flips. And when Americans get showy, they tend to do it in a dickheady, "in your face" way. But, I have a soft spot for quirky foreign players when they celebrate big. Kinda because I feel like they're not doing it to show up the opponent. Some do it because they're just so damn excited and weird. I loved Cespedes's bat flips. I loved every weird thing Shinjo did. Even if some opponents didn't like it. And with Yan, it looks like his celebrations are coming from a place of joy. He's a journeyman who was out of baseball and has finally made the bigs. I'm probably at 40 now. But I suspect this will start to get old pretty quick, and I can see myself going lower. Also repeat what Seawolf said. He shouldn't be jumping on balls in play.

Sometimes I watch Hiro. And I wonder if he thinks to himself: “wtf dude. Can you just say something normal?”

One can certainly conclude that years were the determining factor, given that the Mets decided to give nearly as much money to Bo Bichette ($142M) as they declined to give to Pete Alonso ($155M). Consider that Bo's money is due over 3 years, instead of 5, and the value of the picks you gave up for the QO, it's possible that those deals are of fairly similar value. For his career, Alonso has been a better hitter, and is a better hitter again this year. Pete is older, and so the decline risk is there. But is it unreasonable to think that their production may be similar over a 3 year period? So if that's the case, even if Alonso is a bench piece the last two years, doesn't the Alonso contract provide more value?

Agree with this. And if the market is softer, then you can't really blame Stearns for that. It just sucks to be on the wrong end of it both years. I doubt that Stearns took less than what he could have gotten, or that teams offered less because it was Stearns. My only criticisms are: 1. Weaver. If the return was this little I would have kept him. Now, I have no idea how good Sammy Stafura is, but I know he's not ranked in the Top 100, and doesn't appear to be in the Mets Top 10 after the deadline. 2. Brazoban. You could have held onto him with such little return. I know Brazo is old, and relievers are unreliable. But is the 2027 version of Brazoban worth more than the lotter tickets we got? We'll know in a few years. 3. Peralta. We could have held onto him and offered the QO. Of course, if you're not willing to QO Peralta, then you have to take what you can get. I would have been fine to take a 1 year flyer on Peralta for $24-25M. ON EDIT: I think I'm wrong on Stafura. I just saw Joe DeMayo's top 30 and Stafura is #2. I thought I saw a list yesterday that had the top 10 without him. Not sure what list it was, but it was obviously some other list, or it was incomplete.

To be clear, I have no issue with thinking too much. And I don't want my thoughts to be misconstrued into an "analytics suck" position. I think there's nothing wrong with analytics, or analyzing info, or thinking or generally trying to be smarter than your opponents. I think all of those things are good things. I don't think David Stearns proves that analytics suck. I think David Stearns has proven to suck at analytics.

Had a big hit in a comeback win in Philly. I wish I could remember which game it was. That AB in game 161 changed Met history.

I would try Senga as a single-inning reliever the rest of the season. Go back to his best two pitches and let him air it out for one inning. If he's good, then maybe we can get some value out of that salary.

I think it’s hard to heavily criticize the deadline deals. There are some I would have done differently, but once you decide to sell, it’s just a matter of taking the best offer. Stearns can’t control the market. As far as his overall performance, I’m largely with Radar. I can’t think of an executive in history that has done less with more. His best year was 2024. An 89 win season with a $330M payroll. They won the third WC via tiebreaker. Two miracle HR made that season memorable, but they were a pitch away from being a disaster. 2025 was a disaster and 2026 is even worse. Over a billion spent in payroll and they’ve never once contended for the division. How is that possible. And the trend is headed in the wrong direction. Every so often I ask myself is this rock bottom? And for the last 200 games or so the answer is no. He cleaned out coaches that had some success before he got here and replaced them with guys who think like him, and the results have been the worst team imaginable. I’m at the point where any good move is tempered by my fear that the Mets will ruin him. “Hey we got a good pitcher. Let’s change his arm angle and teach him a cutter”. Should we feel good about the young guys? Sure. Ewing looks good, but Benge is a corner OF that’s slugging below .400. So maybe he can be good but he’s not good yet. I like McLean and Scott. I’m hoping Thornton is good while understanding his realistic outlook. Ive said before. Billy Eppler is kinda like a B- student. A replacement level GM. With a replacement level GM we make the playoffs all three years. Stearns thinks he’s an honor student, but right now he’s failing out of school.

Of all of these, I’m underwhelmed by the Peralta return, and I would not have traded Weaver. The return on Holmes is exciting.

He's going to hit 50 HRs. The Mets will pick up his option and trade him for Ohtani.

The arrogance is key here. And I don't mean "He's smug, i want to punch him". I mean his unwillingness to adjust. He's been pretty steadfast about his philosophies since he got here. No long term contracts. Beat the aging curve. Sign guys with traits he likes, even if the results are mixed. Well that pretty much blew up in his face. The last two years have been disasters. Different types of disasters, but both miserable. The downside to his "short term only" philosophy, is the type of player open to taking that type of deal. (Injury prone/inconsistent/unproven/old). He clearly thought the market would come back to him last winter and had to make panic moves when it didn't. As far as player performance, he cleaned out all the coaches, some of whom had success before he arrived, and put in his own guys. Guys who believe in his philosophies. That was a disaster too. I've never seen a team underperform so badly. It will be interesting to see if he's humbled and learns from his mistakes. Or if his arrogance causes him to double down.

Read up on him. He's on the smaller side. Maybe he'll be as good as Dilson Herrera! Kidding aside, I like what I'm reading. Let's call him up.

Rojas seems highly rated.

Yeah. My reactions before this: "Hey, we got Benny Abgayani's son" "That's it?"

Yes. The premises of my thinking is that the team would want Freddy back on a one year deal, $25M deal. I would be all for this. I think there's talent there, and someone should be able to help him get back to what he was. (whether that someone exists on the Mets' coaching staff is another story) If you don't want Peralta back at that price, and I can certainly understand those that don't, then yes, you have to take whatever you can get.

With this little coming back, I would have given serious thought to just retain Freddy and offer the QO. If he walks, you get picks back. And maybe the picks aren't as good as the guys you got, but there's a least a chance he accepts the QO. And Freddy Peralta on a one year deal isn't a bad bet. Also, you dampen his market with the QO. You have to figure his market is down after having a bad year. Maybe some teams would be willing to sign him to "prove it" deals, but that gets much harder when the guy has a QO attached. Very few GMs are dumb enough to players attached to a QO to one year deals.

You keep Weaver if this is the type of return being offered. Would have kept Brazo too. If all you get for Holmes are lottery picks then keep him and offer the QO. Ultimately resigning him is our goal, and the QO will dampen his market.

Would have just kept him if this is the return.

One of the many frustrating parts of this season is how many times they screw up fundamental baseball. It sounds like making the turn here wouldn’t have made a difference. But there’s no excuse not to play this out correctly. A baserunner knows the difference between a third base coach camped at third windmilling (“you’re scoring”) versus a third base coach getting down the line signaling to come to him. That baserunner knows to take the turn hard, but knows the next sign will be either a windmill or a stop sign. Here. The next sign would have been a stop sign, and nothing changes and the Mets still lose. But they didn’t do what they were supposed to do. By slowing down the runner before the bag, Lieper removes the possibility of scoring on a bobble, a ball in the dirt, an overthrow. Just bad baseball. The 2026 Mets have been one of the worst fundamental teams I’ve ever seen. It’s like they’re being coached by guys who never played the game. And I realize the coaches have played the game, which makes it all so puzzling.

Either way, it’s correct to get down that line and have your runner make the turn. They’re not going to risk throwing behind him. And you never know what will happen. A bounced throw. A bobble. The runner knows by how you wave him that the brakes might come on.

I haven’t been paying as much attention as I should. Who’s spot is Stock taking?