A Boy Named Seo

Sasaki will sign as an amateur free agent, so he'll be getting a little more than Griffin Canning buck$ from whoever signs him. Everything about this team has got to be appealing, you'd think. Marquee city, huge earning opportunities, Japanese mentor. He'd almost certainly be on a 6-man rotation here so he could acclimate a little easier and stay on something more resembling a Japanese schedule. The only thing working against the Mets is that New York isn't on the west coast. Let's hope he hates good Mexican food and traffic.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: The Athletic wrote: Mets lose two in Rule 5 draft In the Rule 5 Draft, the Mets lost right-hander Mike Vasil to the Philadelphia Phillies and left-hander Nate Lavender to the Tampa Bay Rays. In Triple A last season, Vasil had a 6.04 ERA in 134 innings (27 starts). The Rays can stash Lavender, who is recovering from Tommy John surgery, on the 60-day injured list, provided they keep him on their 40-man roster until spring training. “You never want to lose any player in a Rule 5 draft,” Stearns said. “We simultaneously wish them well and also hope to get them back.” If Vasil (this year) and Lavender (next year upon his return) can't stick on the major-league roster for their respective teams, they have to be offered back to the Mets. If I'm reading this correctly, it sounds like Tampa Bay would have to keep Lavender on their roster throughout the 2026 season? (This is how I'm interpreting the "this year" for Vasil and "next year" for Lavender.) The wording is confusing. I think next year still means ‘25 for Lavender. He had surgery in May of ‘24 and can probably pitch again sometime in the second half. So presumably the Rays can stash him on the IL until he's healthy, then move him back to the 40-man if they have room this summer. But I honestly don't know.

If I'm counting right, it looks like the Mets lost 7 pitchers, a catcher and shortstop today, including the minor league phase. They only added AA righty Michael Hobbs from the Dodgers. On one hand, it's good the farm had so many prospects worthy of picking. On the other hand, it sucks the farm had so many prospects worthy of picking.

Yes, I am posting this so I can make a Creed reference, but this certainly seems a nice add to the Scouting Dept. "Ken Guthrie, the Orioles scout who helped sign Jackson Holliday, Heston Kjerstad and Creed Willems, has departed the organization for a position with the Mets, two sources said." https://www.si.com/mlb/orioles/news/baltimore-orioles-lose-top-scout-to-new-york-metshttps://www.si.com/mlb/orioles/news/baltimore-orioles-lose-top-scout-to-new-york-mets

Nothing was keeping that Pete blast in the park, but I thought Schwarber's and Winker's were both gone off the bat. Citi playing big early.

Me, I am. If anyone's in the house on Monday against the Sawx and wants to say hi, I'll be in 107 having a beer. Shoot a DM, I'll try to keep an eye on email! Your pal, Seo

Who the fudge knows, but... https://twitter.com/brendan524/status/1779155272906236339 The hat doesn't match the other "leak" but the rest seems to (the purple, the "concrete" gray). I was fully prepared to loathe these, but if this is it, I like them better than most City Connects we've seen. They would seem to be shouting "WE are New York City", and the transit lines and the subtle bridge on the hat, the NYC on the shirt all pile on. Very relieved it's not a black top, but I guess they'd wear this at home and other teams could wear a colored softball top? Also interesting the dude in this pic looks like he's wearing blue sleeves. The purple is used so sparsely, it doesn't really clash IMO.

Bridges, subways, crosswalks, whatever. Queens is the real connective tissue to New York. I hope this is cool.

Your score: 24 out of 41 And I was the recipient of some luck to even land there.

I'm relieved the Mets didn't have to risk losing one of those three relievers, even if this just kicks that problem down the road a bit. And I guess this injury is legit and not a paper-shuffling exercise in the post-Billy Eppler era!

Luke Voit was released today. Pretty expected after signing JD. Is Choi still around? Should I work on my thread title puns? The OD rosters is pretty damn close now...

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I imagine that this means that Choi (and Voit, the "oi" duo) will leave the organization, but Vientos and Stewart should still be around. Very possible. Apparently Choi has a late March opt-out and Stewart has a minor league option, but that seems kinda unlikely.

I like this move at every angle. If the Mets really are a bubble team and JD is worth between 2 and 3 wins, that's huge. And if he misses 50-odd games like he did last year, we should be plenty covered with Vientos/DJ/Baty/Choi, etc. Plus it gives Vientos a little safety net to not be awesome right away. Good job, Steve and STOINS.

*** spoiler stuff *** I just watched it, too. This feels decidedly cowardly to say, but I can see merits of both the glowing and damning reviews of this movie. It was visually cool to look at (maybe a little heavy-handed with the wide-angle and fisheye stuff). Emma Stone was incredible (and Ruffalo's English accent was incredibly hilarious). I think the messages of female empowerment and sexual autonomy and telling "polite society" to **** off all landed pretty well, but it was still also a movie about a literal woman with a baby brain created by a man with the intention of being the property of a man. Even Dafoe's character laments he can't **** her because he's a eunuch, and seemed bummed that he found his weird-ass paternal instinct, which resulted in predictably terrible "paternal" decisions. I kept wondering how many degrees removed from Weird Science this movie was and I'm still not sure I know. You have to trust a lot in the intent of the writer and the message of female sexual empowerment to be delivered. Cause without that, IMO it veers into Kelly LeBrock Frankenstein territory. Am I way off on that? But I still think it was very good art and it got people debating, so that's good?

Edgy MD wrote: Centerfield is posting from Seo's account. Don't insult poor CF like that

I'm 1000% with you

The Angels are pissed I didn't include them. Their #1 graduated prospect is 1B Nolan Schanuel but they think he and Pete could co-exist as some 1B/DH duo. MLB ranks the Angels system as 30th out of 30 teams so it's hard to find a decent trade here. TRADE #4: Angels get Pete Alonso Mets get #3 prospect Caden Dana (A RHP),#5 prospect Ben Joyce (MLB graduate, fireballing RHP reliever), #12 Ryan Costeiu (A RHP), and maybe some other dude. The Angels system is thiiiiin so finding feel-good prospects here is kinda tough. But a huge contract for Pete seems very much like an Arte Moreno thing. The Mariners and Marlins also seem like a great fit on paper, but I can't see either team throwing a huge contract at Pete Alonso and Pete in the NL East seems like a terrible idea anyway.

Chill out, it's just an exercise. But for fun, let's trade Pete Alonso! We all know why we shouldn't trade him, but here's why we should: 1) Including Verlander's $17.MM vesting option (you kinda have to count on that), the Mets currently have ($155MM) allocated to just 8 players in 2025. That is already 61% of the $241MM tax threshold which we know Cohen wants to dip under. That leaves around $2.6MM on average for each of the 32 remaining roster spots on the 40-man. If you give Pete somewhere near $30MM of that, that leaves only ~$1.8MM for the remaining 31 players. Not counting arbitration or pre-arb guys (Peterson, Megill, Lucky Lucchesi), the Mets only have Senga and Manaea contracted for the 2025 rotation. That's not really great. (my reference for salary stuff, as always --> https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/new-york-mets/payroll/2025/https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/new-york-mets/payroll/2025/) 2) Pete will be 30 and 30-old guys don't get younger and tend to not get better. So what could the Mets get for Pete? This is where it gets kinda ugly. As I speculated in the other thread, the Cease trade might be a little instructive here, but there are differences. Cease is a year younger than Pete and offers 2 years of team control. If a team acquired Pete today (pretty much 0% chance he's traded before Opening Day), that team only has Pete for one season before he becomes a FA. Also Cease outperformed Pete by fWAR three years running. Not everything, but it's definitely something. These teams were the worst in MLB in fWAR at 1B last year (the Mets collectively had 8.9) so here seems like a good place to start: 30) Pirates -2.2 29) Royals -1.6 28) Rockies 0.3 27) Astros 0.7 26) Detroit 1.0 It seems very unlikely the Pirates or Royals would be in the market for Pete Alonso and Detroit has Spencer Torkleson so I'm giving them the boot. That leaves the Astros, the Rockies and I'm throwing the Cubs in cause I think there's a potential match there. TRADE #1: Astros get Pete Alonso Mets get #6 prospect Joey Loperfido (AAA OF/1B), #10 Colton Gordon (AAA LHP), and #28 Camilo Diaz (Rookie League SS) This feels light to me, but compared to the Cease trade it feels decent? Potential low-cost 1B replacement, pitching depth and SS lotto ticket. Maybe the Stros add a better third guy to get Pete mashing at Minute Maid. TRADE #2: Rockies get Pete Alonso Mets get #6 prospect Zac Veen (AA OF), #10 Benny Montgomery (A OF), #15 Joe Rock (AAA LHP) Veen is the prize, I guess. He used to be heralded but his stock has dropped. Benny's kind of a lotto ticket and Joe Rock just has a great name. Rockies have to find a place for Kris Bryant which complicates things but Pete at Coors is scary. Like the Astros deal, the Mets could maybe squeeze a little better second or third prospect. Trade #3: Cubs get Pete Alonso Mets get #11 prospect Ben Brown (AAA RHP), #15 prospect Matt Mervis (AAA 1B), #30 Josh Rivera (A SS) This one I kinda like. Brown is another guy who was maybe more heralded a couple years back but has great stuff, Mervis can start at first right away and the Mets add another athletic shortstop which they love to do. Cubs move Bellinger back to the OF and Pete tortures Wrigley for the next 7 years. Are these trades nuts? Or kinda in the ball park? I think I'd do the Cubs one and then sign a big FA pitcher and cry myself to sleep at night for the next decade. What is your Pete WATP?

https://twitter.com/DanClarkSports/status/1768151332563923449 Let's see Daniel Clark sports guy with the flamin hot takes

I'm not far off from BG. I fear a little regression, what with a tender arm and the fact that he slightly outpitched his peripherals last year. May I please be wrong like I am about most things. 9-6, 126 IP, 140 K, 3.89 ERA.

A Boy Named Seo wrote: Very curious to see what the prospect cost for the Padres is for 2 years of Cease. You an cease wondering now Cool. I think that's the Pads #5, 7 and 8 prospects (per MLB) plus a good major league relief pitcher for two years of Cease. There's no direct comparison to what a Pete Alonso trade might look like (I can't stop thinking about our future with and without Pete), but Pete is one year older, has one year less of team control and Cease has been worth more fWAR than Pete for each of the last three seasons (that surprised me!). If the Mets traded Pete today, all these things would be factored in even if the two star players are completely different varieties of stars. And if the Mets suck and teams come sniffing for Pete in July, I'm sure any hope that the return would be greater due to desperation on the part of contending teams would be offset by Pete only having a couple months left of service time by then. Fair warning, I may start a Pete Alonso WATP thread.

Frayed Knot wrote: Edgy MD wrote: We need a new Dylan. Bruce? Donovan? John Prine, Loudon Wainwright? I love him, but I don't think Prine's available for the gig.

Very curious to see what the prospect cost for the Padres is for 2 years of Cease.

Severino's spring ERA down to a tidy 1.00.

Edgy MD wrote: A Boy Named Seo wrote: Have the Mets had a captain since Wright? No, they haven't. I like captains. On my team, I'd do it like soccerfootball, and there would be a captain on the field at all times. Same. I nominate Lindor as Captain and Nimmo and Pete as Vice Captains. And for the guy in question, Nimmo has been very consistent the last couple years. Maybe a shift to left will let him be bat-first and have maybe his best year. I say .270/.370/.470 with 26 bombs, 105 runs scored and a career-high 8 triples.