Frayed Knot

Joe McEwing's name gets a mention this morning courtesy of "an industry source". Such news is of course accompanied by the standard misleading info concerning him and Randy Johnson. 'Super Joe' has spent the last six years as a coach for the ChiSox including this most recent one as the bench coach. I'm a bit disturbed by the fact that every mentioned candidate so far has NYM ties, as if that's a requirement going forward and anyone without such credentials is being ignored. Hard to say from here if that's really the case or merely that the more familiar names are the more obvious candidates and therefore the ones being thrown out there in the early stages of a job search that isn't even officially on yet. I'd prefer to think that the Sandy era -- assuming that's still a thing -- has closed the book on being so strictly provincial.

Twins finally sewed up the 2nd WC spot, not by winning themselves but by waiting for the Angels to lose which pretty much sums up how that AL WC race went. Twins have gone 13-12 in September so far and built a gap of five or more games on everyone else. So all the AL teams are set with the only remaining battles left are those for seeding. The Yanx/Sawx is really the only consequential one. Sox have a 3 game lead and a magic number of 2 which means it's going to take a sweep on one side and maybe on both over the final four games for the Yanx to avoid the WC play-in which Joe Girardi suddenly thinks should be 2-of-3. The one thing the Yanx have going for them is that the BoSox host Houston who have a minor incentive in that they're only one game in back of Cleveland. Yanx: Rays x1, Blue Jays x3 Red Sox: Astros x4

Why next year? They'll be home this weekend.

MLB unanimously approves the sale to the Sherman/Jeter group pending only the finalization of the financial stuff between them and Loria expected to be completed by next week. So Jeter is free now to go about firing people - or more accurately to have someone else do it for him.

One of the things about the b&w photos is that, while you may not know the guys, you do get treated to some great names. Recent scans have turned up Bugs Raymond, Chicken Wolf, Nig Cuppy, and Ginger Beaumont

Players who -- willingly or otherwise -- will never grace an ML field again. Brandon Arroyo - Of course it's not the first time he's done this, but this time he seems to really mean it. After sitting out 2015 & 16, the now 40 y/o Arroyo came back for 14 starts in his second go-around with the Reds but that only lasted until mid-June Matt Cain -- Great seasons from 2009 thru 2012 -- 45 wins, nearly 900 IP, CY votes in each year, but is 19-40, 4.86 in the five seasons since with less than 100 starts total. And still just 32 y/o

OK, here we go: Top seven draft picks across an eleven year span (2000-2010) Some of the guys picked in these years are still active and therefore could still alter the outcomes somewhat. 1st picks Cumulative WAR = 224.4 (best of the seven groups) Players with career negative WAR = 1 (Bryan Bullington - 2002 Pirates - RHP, Ball St U) Players who failed to reach majors = 0 Players with 10.0 career WAR or greater = 6 (in order from highest to lowest): Mauer, Adrian Gonzalez, Price, J. Upton, Harper, Strasburg Not so much success for Tim Beckham (4.7 Car WAR) although still just 27 y/o and suddenly seems to be finding himself in his second org. Or for Luke Hochevar (3.1), Delmon Young (2.5), Matt Bush (2.4 - although at least he finally made it to the show), or Bullington (-1.1) 2nd picks CUM WAR = 160.0 (4th best of the seven) Negative WAR = 2 Failed to reach majors = 0 10.0+ WAR = 6: Verlander, A. Gordon, Prior, M. Upton, R. Weeks, Moustakas 3rd picks CUM WAR = 86.4 (6th) Negative WAR = 4 Failed to reach majors = 3 10.0 WAR or > = 3: Longoria, Machado, Hosmer NYM pick = Philip Humber (2004) 4th picks CUM WAR = 65.4 (7th) Negative WAR = 1 Failed to reach majors = 1 10.0 WAR or > = 2: Zimmerman, Gavin Floyd 5th picks CUM WAR = 172.6 (3rd) Negative WAR = 1 Failed to reach majors = 3 10.0 WAR or > = 5: Teixeira, Braun, Posey, Wieters, Pomeranz 6th picks CUM WAR = 92.7 (5th) Negative WAR = 1 Failed to reach majors = 3 10.0 WAR or > = 2: Greinke, Rocco Baldelli 7th picks CUM WAR = 185.6 (2nd best) Negative WAR = 1 Failed to reach majors = 2 10.0 WAR or > = 5: Kershaw, Tulowitski, Markakis, Fielder, Harvey NYM pick = Harvey (2010) Not that every similarly sized sample would wind up the same way but that's part of the point also. Would I rather have higher picks than lower ones? Sure, but not at the cost of advocating tanking as a team strategy, nor is there anything here that makes me want to root for failure down the stretch so as to move up the chain by a slot or three. And I guess the other lesson is Mamas don't let your babies grow up to be fourth picks.

Yeah, he hasn't hit much of anyone lately. Article in one of the papers this morning about him being worn out from the long season and hoping to come into ST next year in ... wait for it ... the best shape of his life (or words to that effect)

Centerfield wrote: Do you have numbers on picks 1, 2, and 3? I didn't, although that stuff is easily findable ... maybe I'll do it later if the game gets dull tonight. And I suspect those players will be demonstrably better since in those cases where there IS a consensus stud or two (I don't believe there are ever years with four or five) out there -- Harper, ARod, Griffey, Strasburg -- the #1 or #2 picks that year are generally undisputed and are most certain to eventually pan out. It's like the link you posted when this topic came up a month or two ago where some guy was making the case for striving for the better draft picks even in baseball. He was citing those rare superstar players as a way of saying that getting really high picks is better than getting only sort of high - a strategy which works in baseball as well as football or basketball, and, not surprisingly, Grateful Dead concerts. But it's still not a guarantee as not every year has a Griffey come out and not every Griffey shows his Griffeyness so early: see Trout, Mike - drafted 25th overall on the Angels second pick of the round Also, in order to secure the #1 pick this season for the next Carlos Correa (assuming one even exists) the 10-15 record the Mets have in September would have had to devolve into 4-21 -- this in a month where we faced or will face the Reds (x4) the Braves (x7) and the Phillies (x6) -- and that would be just enough to drop us into a tie with the current DFL Giants, and then we'd have to out-suck them over this final week as well. That would be almost impossible to do on purpose, maybe even tougher to watch/endure, and you STILL couldn't be sure that all the other sucky teams weren't going to out suck YOU down the stretch and steal the pick away anyway.

Yes it’s far too early, but discussions of 'all this winning is terrible' are making a comeback so this bears a fresh look. A couple of things first: - tanking is really hard in baseball. Really bad teams win 30-some pct of their games which makes it quite unlike the NBA where teams can go years without winning 30% even once. - how exactly would one go about tanking, especially when you’ve got a team full of guys trying desperately to get jobs next year? Was Taijeron supposed to intentionally whiff last night during his first, and possibly last, chance in the majors so as to make sure the Mets would lose and possibly gain a slightly/maybe better draft pick? Was Terry supposed to bench deGrom back in August while subjecting another not ready for prime time pitcher up from Single A as if HE has a stake in next year’s draft pick? Reyes? Cabrera? Aoki? Nimmo/Smith/Rosario? - and of course you’re competing with all the other teams who are likely to win and lose their share of games down the stretch at random levels as well BatMags has brought up, at least twice now, that folks are touting next year’s draft as some sort of super group, a claim which I flat out don’t buy. Not saying that he didn’t read that somewhere but I don’t buy the accuracy of that kind of prediction particularly not five months prior to the college/HS seasons even starting. Think things aren’t going to change between now and then, or that the true value of that draft is going to be known even five years from now? And then there’s the idea that there are not only a couple of Darryl Strawberrys available next June (and you can never have too many temperamental alcoholics on your squad) but that you can proactively identifying which ones those are. Towards that end I did a bit of research here. I took eleven years of drafts (2000 - 2010) and picked out the 4th thru 7th picks in those years. Why those years and why those picks? Because the years are recent enough without being too recent and the Mets are at the moment teetering on the verge of the 5th/6th pick so could conceivably rise to 4th with a bad final week or drop to around 7th by running the table. So which picks out of those years fared the best based on cumulative WAR? By far it was the 7th picks, followed by the 5ths, then the 6ths, and worst of them all, and it wasn’t even close, were the 4th picks 7th picks: Cum WAR = 185.6 led by Kershaw, Tulowitski, Markakis, Fielder, Harvey 5th picks: Cum WAR = 172.6 led by Teixeira, Braun, Posey, Wieters, Pomeranz 6th picks: Cum WAR = 92.7 led by Greinke, Baldelli, Ricky Romero, Andrew Miller, Zack Wheeler 4th picks: Cum WAR = 65.4 Ryan Zimmerman, Gavin Floyd, Jeff Niemann, Tim Stauffer, Brian Matusz 9 of the 44 picks never spent a day in the majors: one 4th pick, three 5th picks, three 6th picks, two 7th picks

I've been somewhat disappointed that he hasn't shown the defensive savant traits I was expecting to see. Maybe that's partly overly optimistic expectations on my part, but when the prospect mavens were touting his 'plus-defense' as ML-ready a full year or more prior to his eventual promotion, I took that to mean that he was a more polished defensive player. Instead, what we've seen to date has involved some backhand unsteadiness, a double-pump habit that he uses even when there's no time for it, an occasional scatter arm (fortunately Smith's glove IS all it was touted), and just some plain old fumbles on some not too difficult balls. Now this isn't to say I don't think he can play the position. He's certainly not a bad SS and I fully expect him to be the everyday man out there and likely improve on his first time jitters. But at the same time, I think a lot of us looked at the Plays-Not-Made syndrome we had in the first half with Cabrera and Reyes and expected a significant step up once Rosario was promoted and the change turned out to be not all that dramatic.

Like it's an either/or decision.

Run expectancies is an overall average which suggests that, like playing roulette, you'll come out on the short end the more you play. But that's not to say that you should never play and deciding to never bunt is almost as idiotic as was the knee-jerk reaction that you were always supposed to bunt every time the leadoff runner got on regardless of the inning/out/score/lineup situation was at the time. And last night's game had nothing to do with run expectancies as all you were playing for there was one. I just didn't like it because he didn't look like Rosario was any good at it, didn't like keeping it on with a favorable count, and didn't like the odds of Taijeron cashing in on it even if it was successful. Happily things worked out. And if you're going to eschew certain strategies because you're afraid of running an pulling hamstrings then it's time to get out of the game and take up chess.

There was a report in one of the papers a few weeks back saying that Warthen had originally planned on retiring at the end of this season/contract but then was hoping for at least one more as he didn't want to go out on a year where all his pitchers were injured and/or underperforming. But of course that was never going to be entirely his choice and it sounds like Sandy et al -- and I do hope these are more Sandy's calls than F&J's -- are more in a clean sweep frame of mind.

Didn't like the bunt there w/Rosario, and hated it after the count got to 2-0 Nice AB by Taijeron to win it though!!

Edgy MD wrote: Not sure why Reyes didn't tag. If that drops in, he can certainly score. Nah, that's not a tag play from 2nd IMO. If it drops and bounces in a way where you CAN'T get two bases on it you've been handed the lead but gave it back. And if you do tag and are right then you merely go from 2nd base with two outs to 3rd base. The upside isn't nearly as high as the downside is low there.

So tonight was R. A.'s 400 ML game and 300th ML start. And it could be his last. If it is, his was one of the more unusual career arcs in recent memory.

The biggest problem with Nimmo to date is that he's selective at the plate to a fault sometimes. At this point I've lost rack of how many times he's tossed the bat aside on a 3-2 pitch ready to head to 1st only to be called out on a borderline -- or sometimes not so borderline -- pitch. It's not a fatal flaw, or at least it shouldn't be as he gains more experience and learns that you can't always let those pitches go with runners on base while thinking that a walk is the best possible outcome. With Conforto quite likely not ready to start the season there should be plenty of opportunity for both him and Lagares to get regular playing time as they are now. How this all works out once Conforto comes back remains to be seen, but I'm perfectly comfortable with a Nimmo/Lagares platoon in CF and there will always be the inevitable injuries, days-off, and other opportunities for both to get playing time if and when they earn it.

They tried hard to lose it but failed. Six batters in that 9th inning; none hit the ball hard yet the Braves scored twice and stranded the tying run in scoring position. All in a game where the Mets had runners all over the place early yet managed to bang hard into four GiDPs in a 5 inning span. 'd'Arnaud's tack-on HR wound up as la differance

Frayed Knot wrote: Do these SOBs ever hit a ball AT anyone?!!?!?? And now they finally do but Dom Smith has a brain fart.

Do these SOBs ever hit a ball AT anyone?!!?!??

Strained core maybe.

d'Kong76 wrote: Apple malfunction on a d'Arnaud homer in the 8th. Fixed. I just assumed the Apple was on the DL

In the nightcap, the Mets have 5 hits -- including 3 doubles -- thru 4 innings plus have been on the receiving end of 2 HBPs, 2 Atlanta errors and an added misplay or two. Problem is they've managed to total all that into just two runs thanks mainly to two poorly timed (are there any other kind?) GiDPs and some less than aggressive base running decisions. I mean, it's one thing when a single with a runner on 2nd that was also bobbled by the left fielder fails to score a run, but when it fails to advance a runner ...

Nido, whoa oh oh oh