Ceetar

Is he even pitching for AAA? i think he's in extended spring training. at the very least, I briefly looked last week sometime and couldn't find a professional apperarance for him the Nats minor leagues.

on a strict performance to dollar ratio, no way he's worth the $14 more they'd pay him if he vests, however there are other factors. If he presents himself as the best closer available, then that extra money becomes money that makes the team better. The problem is determining if making the team X amount better is worth spending Y, and if spending Y keeps you from acquiring Z which might be greater than X. then you have to factor in A. if you'll get draft picks for him. (something that's possibly going to be taken away via collective bargaining) and B. if getting those draft picks is enough to tip the scales in favor of letting him walk. Then of course, there is the possibility that you don't need to spend any money to reacquire a different closer that will be somewhat lesser than Frankie, and might be able to use a guy like Parnell or Beato. or whoever from within. This is somewhat predicated on Alderson and Collins not being married to the idea of having to have an established closer, something they haven't really shown any inkling of lately. I still feel like if the Mets never get above .500 he'll probably not get enough opportunity to close games and won't vest, and if they are indeed competing for a playoff spot in August-September, the increased revenue and interest and whatnot in the team will result in more revenue taht will mitigate the hit in overpaying him.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: Interesting idea, BML. Precedent-breaking aside... would it matter that the Mets had proposed the "illegal" contract clauses originally? My hunch is that it wouldn't matter whether K-Rod or the Mets suggested the clause. If K-Rod signed the contract (which he did) then he agreed to the terms. K-Rod agreed to the terms just as much as the Mets did, and that's what matters. By the way, I also believe that those "milestone clauses" in A-Rod's contract should be voided. To illustrate: David Wright entered this season with 169 lifetime HR's as a Met, 23 HR's behind Hojo's 3rd place Met mark of 192 HR's. Wright must hit 24 HR's to pass Hojo in 2011. If a bonus clause in Wright's 2011 contract that vests if Wright hits 24 HR's is impermissible, the parties shouldn't be allowed to circumvent that prohibition by rephrasing the vesting condition as "passing Hojo's mark" instead of "hitting 24 HR's" -- no matter how that bonus is phrased, incentives would still exist for Wright to swing for the fences even when he shouldn't. Makes sense to me. It'd be easy enough to put phrase the bonus as "Passing Carlos Delgado's career HR mark" instead of "hitting 100 home runs over the next three years" or something.

I want answers. 0-14..19 left on, no grand slams ever. (well, none in 2008, 2010 or 2011 so far) 'bad' teams don't get that many guys on and have record lows in driving them in. So what are they doing wrong? I wanted to blame Manuel's bunting and HoJo's failure at teachingthem situational hitting, but..

I don't know how I missed that. I'm blaming the cold again.

Edgy DC wrote: One thought I once entertained was to allow uniformed coaches to enter the game in thse wars of attrition, but only if the entire regular roster has otherwise been expended, so there's little motivation keeping a recently retired still-in-shape player as firstbase coach to serve as a secret weapon, because you have to expend all your extra pitchers before he can enter the game. That reminds me of the conspiracy theory last year that McGuire was going to suddenly be activated for the playoff run by the Cardinals and have his Hall of Fame eligibility pushed back five years to when people are possibly more friendly to those like him.

I'm with Greg. With the exception of Howard's opposite field flick at the worst possible moment, the Mets pretty much dominated that game. There wasn't really any nailbiting other than the 7th and 8th. No runners on 3rd less than one out, no points where it looked like the Phillies would win on an out. Meanwhile the Mets were bashing the ball right at people, Hairston hitting it 400 feet for an out, and them just generally flailing with RISP. I particularly enjoyed the announcers going on and on about how awesome Polanco was in clutch situations and have him fail to come through each time. And as long as we're drawing parallels, when the towers went down the Mets were defending NL champs. Now Osama is dead and the tower[crossout:2h06w7g1]s[/crossout:2h06w7g1] is going back up. Good omen? Yeah, did we see Gload all weekend? edit: Phillies outfielder Ross Gload was not with the team Sunday. He was attending his grandfather's funeral. And Oswalt wasn't there either. They were rapidly running out of bodies in general.

The Second Spitter wrote: Can somebody please pinch-write my Giants KTE. I'm still in a lot of pain. I'm sorry. I'll do it. I'll be breaking my KTE cherry to do so.

batmagadanleadoff wrote: John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Seaver's controversial 1976 contract was loaded with performance boosters that resided on the very edge of legality. I do believe Seaver in an interview (where did I see this? I can't remember) said it was based on wins. Am I remembering this right? Perhaps the prohibition against stat based bonuses didn't exist in the mid-70's. I remember that Kingman's first contract with the Cubs included a bonus for breaking the franchise RBI record. I think career milestones are different. A-Rod's got a new clause for passing people on the all-time list right? $30M marketing agreement based on home run milestones ($6M each for reaching 660, 714, 755 and tying and breaking major league HR record)

batmagadanleadoff wrote: As we saw from last night's game, a road pitcher in the 9th inning of a tie game with a vesting option based on games finished -- like K-Rod-- might be inclined to blow the game intentionally in order to ensure another finish for himself, especially where that pitcher would likely be removed from the game once it goes into extra innings. Whether K-Rod himself would actually blow a game intentionally under those circumstances is irrelevant. The mere possibility that a player could do that should be enough to void performance bonus clauses based on games finished, for the same reason that most other stats can't be used to trigger bonuses. Yeah, I kinda think these clauses, all around baseball, are skirting the line of this rule. I'd prefer none of them be allowed, including games played/started. Who's to say pitchers can't lie about injury/fatigue and start the game? Even if they get pulled after a batter, or 3IP when they tire, they get the statistic. A guy that's got a hurt knee or something could say he can't play the field but it doesn't hurt to swing and go up there and just take take take because it DOES hurt to swing, but he gets a GP anyway.

Paulino 2.5 Young 2.5 Beato 1.0 Wright 1.0 Buchholz 1.0 Beltran 1.0 Rodriguez 0.5 Bay 0.5

Edgy DC wrote: Let's send Lee back to the dugout early this evening. well..2 innings of crappy relievers at least.

Gwreck wrote: Buster Olney tweet: "part of reason Mets started Davis is because lefties hit Lee." Gwreck: Other part is that Mets don't have a right-handed first baseman. I'm all fuzzy. I blame the cold...who would be the backup 1Bman?

Also, in terms of second guessing the managerial signing, Bobby V suggested bunting Turner in the first.

Edgy DC wrote: Lee at 47 pitches through two. Can't let up on him. The Mets have worked pitchers early before, only to start getting sloppy and let them through 6+ anyway.

Play good tonight please. None of these one innings lapses that turn wins into losses.

My other thought that although Buchholz curve is different than Niese's, I might've went with something a little different than what they'd been seeing.

Edgy DC wrote: Reallly? He was having a turrible inning. I just wish they went with a pitcher higher up on their depth charts. It's true, but he's a better pitcher than Buchholz. I was hoping the Halladay out and the turning over the lineup would help him buckle down. I mean, he's the starter. that's his job. I was worried after the walk to the crappy catcher guy that maybe he was tiring a little bit, but he hadn't thrown a ton of pitches or anything either. Did he have flu symptoms this week too?

I know it's partially that I'm just frustrated that they lost, but I'm annoyed they pulled Niese.

Ceetar wrote: or not. Worley's thrown a bunch of pitches through two, helped by the errors. Let's see how they pick him up the second time through. A little better, but not enough to do anything. a couple of walks. 77 pitches through 4.

or not. Worley's thrown a bunch of pitches through two, helped by the errors. Let's see how they pick him up the second time through.

metirish wrote: Odds of SNY showing Geno's and Pat's tonight? 1/2 on probably better than that. it's a virtual guarantee. you can get better cheesesteak in new york anyway.

So who's getting promoted? The team is destroying the league which must suggest someone would benefit from a little steeper competition no? Didn't people say the Mets over-stacked the Cyclones lineup last year too?

Mets Reyes-SS, Murphy-2B, Wright-3B, Beltran-RF, Bay-LF, Davis-1B, Thole-C, Pridie-CF, Pelfrey-RHP [crossout]Phillies[/crossout] Victorino CF, Polanco 3B, Rollins SS, Howard 1B, Francisco RF, Ibanez LF, Orr 2B, Schneider C, Worley P Paulino activated (to be number 90...8?) and Nickeas down.

bmfc1 wrote: One use: the ball was segregated from Willie Harris's bat to end the game last night. and most nights.