Ceetar

You really got be high on catcher metrics to want Maldonado. I'll keep Plawecki's bat, thanks.

I mean, they should tender him a contract because he's not completely useless and therefore should be kept. I don't know that catching is actually at a premium, there are at least two solid guys available on the FA market and another via trade. but d'Arnaud hasn't actually been good since 2015. Perhaps some of his 2017 numbers were bad luck, a .250 BABIP, but he also walked less than average. He did manage a 92 wRC+, which I guess if you figure it was a little bit of luck gets him up to around an average player. His 2016 was really bad though. And last year he basically didn't play at all. I mean, give him the job in April, hope he stays healthy and proves the bat is viable, and try to flip him then? But if so you might just want to keep him. I mean, maybe this is where you can try to play #LOLMets to your advantage. convince someone that Lagares and d'Arnaud are getting hurt because of something about the Mets, not because of something about them. Ask their agent to leak an anonymous quote that suggests the Mets did something whacky with them that caused the injury. Give d'Arnaud 4 million and just keep him. I don't think they're seriously considering non-tendering him though.

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: I used to get mad at Boras and think he's bad for baseball and all. I mean, he probably is on some levels but I've begun to get a kick out of his zinging the Mets. Fred's btw is a Memphis-based discount chain that's something of a combination of Rite Aid and Dollar General, and doing very badly as business. I find his silly analogies zany and amusing (though this one probably misses the mark since few in the NY area probably know what Fred's is) there's just a squeaky wheel aspect to them that bothers me a bit. Thought it does make me look at the Nationals roster and laugh sometimes.

oh, he still pretends he plays baseball? I thought he was too busy excusing college football deaths.

41Forever wrote: I don't think they were shopping at Fred's when they signed the Cespedes contract. I get that he's trying to get bigger contracts for his players. "You say you're not cheap? Prove it! Sign my players for what we say they're worth." The media loves these quotes. It's great content. When we get a little closer he can count on them to drum up a lot of extra specific talk about his player.

Citi Presale day. www.mets.com/citipresale I mean, you need to know the first six digits of a Citi credit card, which everyone knows begins with 5424. Not that you have a Strawberry's chance in hell of guessing the next two digits. Kids have apparently kept me from buying from mets.com directly the last few years. The 'select a seat' thing is not available, and the damn algorithm is giving me the crappiest random seats for Opening Day in the butt end of the tiers. So screw it. I didn't buy them. If it costs me $10 (what I paid last year compared to what it is right now) more to sit 7 sections closer and 7 rows closer, so be it.

Boras is an asshole.

seawolf17 wrote: (big) IF he's handled properly and given rest when needed. May 14, 2019 BREAKING: Mets LHP Andrew Miller, who has pitched in 40 of the team's first 45 games, will miss the rest of the season because his arm fell off. in order, Miller's best pitching comes on Zero days rest, 4 days rest, 1 days rest, 2, 6+,3,5. His 'average' falls between the 6 and the 3. So he's actually worse than his norm on 3 and 5 days rest.

Granderson made $5 million more than Nelson Cruz in 2014. Granderson in an injury plagued year, had 1.2 fWAR. Cruz had a whopping 1.6. Most of that was defense, because Granderson played all outfield positions, somewhat decently and Cruz is and was worse than Jay Bruce. Cruz was coming off THREE sub-average years going into that offseason. Maybe you could make a case after he had a nice year with the Orioles they could've scooped him up, but one good contract year in 4 isn't exactly 'must sign' territory. Especially with a hot prospect like Michael Conforto almost ready. And then the Mets went out mere months later and traded for Cespedes. No one, literally no one, thought Cruz would do what he did with the Mariners. Also no one anticipated the juiced ball that come in the second half of 2015. Also the Mariners, with Cruz, and Cano, etc, did not exactly succeed.

Or maybe you mean guys in their 30s? Like when they gave a big contract to the 32 year old Curtis Granderson coming off an injured year with the Yankees. Guy must've had a dozen trips to the DL over 4 years with the Mets right? No way he'll put up 10+ fWAR or help lead the team to two playoff appearances.

d'Kong76 wrote: I don't know, Ceets... go through it sentence by sentence and each one is (at least on some level) true. David Wright is in fact God, yes. I mean, sure, I'd definitely prefer the Mets sign guys that HAVEN'T won the MVP before. And only guys that were healthy last year. Those are a lock to not get injured next year. Guys like Todd Frazier. Above average hitters with good defense, always healthy. Great pickup. Or Jay Bruce. always healthy. Not particularly great but at least his one tool was pretty good. Coming off a good year and a decade of health. Frazier was 24th in games played over the last 5 years. Bruce was 55th. Solidly healthy guys. Clearly only the Mets though. The Cubs swiped up the cream of the crop, Yu Darvish, and he must've been somewhere in the top 10 of Cy Young voting right?

batmagadanleadoff wrote: If the Mets did get him, it'd be classic Mets: getting an MVP years later and in serious decline. Oh, and he's well into his 30s so expect even more decline. Because these cheeseball cheap ass owners can't do anything without cutting corners and coming up with a plan that depends on the Hail Mary. And so they'll get what they fucking deserve. You'd figure that the team from New York City would just flex their muscles and grab the Giancarlo Stanton or Bryce Harper the way Trump grabs whatever pussy he wants to grab. But not these fucking deadbeats. They'll go for the Mo Vaughn hoping he'll drop 125 pounds and rediscover his stroke from eight years ago. That's always the plan. They'll never learn. It's Michael Cuddyer all over again. And Waiting for David Godot Wright. This is some seriously useful analysis and insight.

Frayed Knot wrote: And here, as if on cue, is an article on Donaldson examining his plusses and minuses. STATCAST! This is a Mike Petriello article, so happily it's got lots of data. Steamer? 2019 Steamer projection .256/.366/.484 in 560 PA, 131 wRC+, 27 home runs, 4.5 Wins Above Replacement Hell, if he gave you 4.5, 4, 3.5 in a slow decline over three years, that'd be a steal at 3/58 (as group-thought by Fangraphs readers) I wonder if you could get him to bite at like 3/50 if you offered it like right now, early, while maybe others are looking at Machado.

Vic Sage wrote: Donaldson's war since he peaked at 8.5 (2015, age 29): 8.5 7.6 4.8 1.2 he'll be 33 next month. No thanks. The 4.8 would be closer to 7 prorated. and the 1.2 would be closer to 4, not even accounting for the idea that maybe he was hampered early by the injury. It wasn't a lot of time. Obviously do your due diligence and look at what you can. He only had 60 PA for the Indians, but he mashed the damn ball. He hit it hard, he hit it far, his walk rate was above his average and his strikeout rate below his average. all that on basically no minor league rehab(no advanced A partials in late august, one AAA game on 9/3, he hit a grand slam) and not having played since May. I actually just looked and it looks like he also had a brief shoulder inflammation issue in late April that sidelined him for a few weeks. Then he played most of May at an league average-ish pace and went down with the calf. Do with that what you will. Players get hurt. is he MORE likely to now? Breaking down? Maybe. Or maybe he finished healthy and will be in a groove again now. Even with all that, he's 16th in fWAR over the last three years, and 6th in wRC+. 6th! Machado is 36th. I'm really coming around on Josh. Get him.

'something like that' is roughly what they did last year so I don't see why it'd be unrealistic. Of course, Donaldson isn't signing for 1/20. That seems ridiculous. I guess the idea is that he had an injury plagued season and wants a healthy one to really cash in, but it was a calf injury, and he came back from it and played. (Although drama around that injury trade!) Looks like he missed a few games in 2017 too, but still put up 5.1 fWAR. he mashed in small sample with Cleveland, though didn't do much in the tiny sample 3-game loss to the Astros. Donaldson is really really good. Like, much better than Machado. Unless you think he's completely shot, if you could get him for like 3/60? or much less if 1/20 is really what teams are thinking, do it. Hell, give him 4/60 with an opt out after 2.

Ashie62 wrote: Isn't Machado kind of a dog who has torn up one knee already. No thanks No

Frayed Knot wrote: I still don't particularly like the idea that they do this: pre-announce that only these three candidates can possibly win each award, and I'm not sure what prompted them to adopt this strategy over the last few years. reality TV probably. But I've come around on it. It's gives 'em a day to tweet out clips and graphics and other #content that's good for engagement and all that jazz without having to go deep to like 10 MVP candidates or anything. It's not really 'finalists' so much as a slow-reveal. no deGrom on the MVP list though, stupid writers.

Frayed Knot wrote: On the plus side he can really hit and throw and, at 32 next August, isn't quite as old as I would have guessed. Downside (besides, y'know, the rusty hinges)? -- In a foot race with the Molina brothers he'd finish in a dead heat for last with Benji. And that's Benji now not Benji during his career. Ramos? bottom 4% of the league the last two years in sprint speed. (22.8 ft/s) 648th in the league last year, 97th at his position. The Major League average on a "competitive" play is 27 ft/sec, and the competitive range is roughly from 23 ft/sec (poor) to 30 ft/sec (elite). I don't know how he's 648th in the league though, when I sort the sprint speed leaderboard it only shows, minimum 10 sprints, 549 guys. Only Brain McCann, 22.7 and Albert Pujols, 22.2 are behind him.

I always feel like the Amaro thing (And the Collins thing) are really just "hey, sit in the meetings with us and we'll keep paying you" and a way to keep feelers out. Amaro probably has a network of contacts outside the Mets usuals and it's worth keeping him around just to occasionally ask "Hey Ruben, can you call So and So and ask him what he thinks about 'player in the Phillies system'" or some jazz.

This is probably residual Callaway stuff rather than Van Wagenen right? He mostly kept the staff in place, but now that he's a little more settled he's going to adjust.

LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr wrote: Never mind "should"s... I don't know that we HAVE the chips to get this done. Depends what they want. maybe we don't have as many top-flight quality guys and they're not willing to make it up with quantity. Also maybe it's a bigger hit than a deeper farm system might be, and that makes it less worth it to the Mets. I dunno, but there are tons of players i'm sure Miami would make use of some of them.

Fman99 wrote: I want to see him in Flushing. Although him starting the season down the street from me here in the 'Cuse is a nice consolation prize. get there fast, cause it's only gonna be about 3 weeks barring Joey Votto. He improved his walk rate in 2018, good to see. Steamer is estimating about a 112 wRC+ but only 212 PA which seems way off. 0.6 fWAR which would be like 1.8 over a full season. That's okay, and not particularly good for first baseman. Not that I buy much of Steamer projections. I think he can be a good and useful part of the 2019 Mets, even if he's not a rookie of the year contender. But he's almost definitely at the pinnacle of his value right now, and if you can capitalize on that for a great player, you do so and roll with Frazier or find a decent guy to fill and and go with it.

If you really really want a catcher, hunt Grandal or Ramos and don't forget that Kevin Plawecki is not bad. Realmuto had a career year and you have to give up prospects. Seems like a buy high situation. On the other hand, he HAS improved every year, particularly in BB%, so maybe you can believe that it's only his career year until next year, and the year after that. It doesn't feel wise to get into a bidding war where you give up a lot of talent for him though, and he has no control over it, unlike where Stanton just vetoed every other team so the Yankees got him cheap.

Even if they decide they can and will afford Machado, there's still 29 other reasons why they might not get him.

41Forever wrote: sharpie wrote: Todd Frazier is/was one of BVW's clients. Would be interesting to see if he would jettison Todd in the interest of signing Manny. Machado seems like a total jerk but I'd love it if he were my jerk. If the guy won't hustle in the World Series, what is he gonna do in a May series against the Pirates? Seems like if he is one of those guys that we invest $100 million in and he becomes a headcase, it will hurt the team for years. Certainly a high risk, high reward, because he sure can mash. And if he'll play third, he fills a big hole. Similar questions about Bryce Harper dogging it. He's put up the 13th most fWAR, averaging 5 a year, while supposedly 'dogging it'. So, that's probably what he would do in a May series against the Pirates. Mash.