Daily Archives: June 14, 2005
I’m proud to announce the debut of MetsTalk.net, formerly NYMfans.com, a one-stop shop for Mets talk and analysis…
As
many of you know, as MetsBlog has grown in readership, and with it has
come the idea that the comments section that follows each of my posts
is a sort of message board type forum. In actuality,
it is simply a place to leave a comment, feedback or even
additional information regarding the post, such as, “Also, this
stat counters or agrees with your point, Matthew,” or, “You’re crazy,
Cerrone, and this is why.”…
The comments section will remain open
for this exact purpose. However, to discuss the post in more
detail, in a forum, I will begin referring you to MetsTalk.net’s
forums, as will also be the case for the chatter that occurs during the
game, typically within my GameNotes posts. You will also find a
link to their forums in the header of MetsBlog.com…
Additionally,
this will help conserve bandwidth for my gracious host, BlogHarbor,
which is the least I can do to help repay all that they have done for
MetsBlog…
Lastly, as my relationship with MetsTalk.net grows, you
will begin to see special features, such as a central hub for
predictions, ticket and merchandise give-always and a master rumor mill
to debate potential acquisitions, all spawned by MetsBlog content…
Best of luck to MetsTalk.net…
…in mets competitor news…
According to the Associated Press, Phillies LHP Randy Wolf may need Tommy John surgery after an MRI exam revealed ligament damage in his pitching elbow…
Wolf was placed on the 15-day disabled list Monday…
Rob Tejada will start in place of Wolf on Friday night in Oakland…
…thanks, cver, for the head’s up…
…i’ve received a ton of emails that read as follows…
A lot of experts have said the Brewers will not trade Lyle Overbay because Milwaukee believes they can contend this season, but mostly because Prince Fielder, Overbay’s future replacement, is not ready to play fulltime at the Major League level. Well, Fielder was promoted yesterday. So, what’s taking the Mets so long to trade for Overbay?…
…listen, i would love, l-o-v-e, to bring in lyle overbay…he’s slumping right now, but overall he is a very balanced hitter…reminding many people of a young mark grace, who i was also a huge fan of…the kid has some power, little speed but is a good base runner, he’ll walk as many times as he’ll strikeout, he plays a solid first base with quick hands and he’s just 28–years-old…
…he’s not perfect…but he’s as perfect of a young fit that this team will find to help meld with the infield as it moves into the next phase of this organization…
…that being said, fielder was promoted, not to oust overbay, but because the brewers, like the mets, will have the designated hitter slot available to them over the next ten games…so, in need of a dh, the brewers will showcase their youngster and get a look at what he’s capable of…from what i’ve been told, even if fielder rips the cover off the ball for ten straight days, he’ll still be demoted after interleague play…
…overbay will not be traded until the off-season…sorry…i don’t like this as much as you, believe me…he is making $455,000 this season, and is arbitration eligible next season…at which point it becomes quite cost-effective to move overbay and start fielder for the league minimum…also, towards the trade deadline, most teams spend so much time overpaying for pitching, that positional players tend to go for less than they are truly worth…it is in the brewers best interest to trade overbay in november, as opposed to now…
Further adding to the discussion surrounding Jose Reyes as a leadoff hitter, Sports Illustrated’s Jacob Luft weighs in, concluding, “he isn’t quite as damaging to the Mets’ offense as his OBP would suggest,” simply because he’s ultimately scores like a leadoff hitter…
…my head hurts over this debate…
As the Mets head West to take on the A’s for a three-game series starting in Oakland tonight, I called our friend Susan Slusser, who covers the A’s for the San Francisco Chronicle, to get a quick run down on the Mets competition…
…to listen to my conversation with susan, click the play button below…
…the conversation will run roughly five minutes…note that if you hit refresh or try to post a comment, the audio will stop…
Regarding the A’s offense, Slusser described it as strangely constructed, noting the team rarely hits for power, but also has a hard time playing small-ball, while adding should the Mets come with top notch pitching the A’s will have a very hard time scoring…
As for the three pitchers the Mets will face this series, RHP Joe Blanton, RHP Dan Haran and RHP Kirk Saarloos, Slusser doesn’t appear to be worried for Mets fans…
According to Slusser, the A’s genuinely believed they could contend this season, despite the departure of Mark Mulder and Tim Hudson. Injuries, however, wrecked their plans. Approaching the trade deadline, she seems to think Oakland will look to deal Erubiel Durazo, Scott Hatteburg and Eric Byrnes regardless of where they are in the standings, Barry Zito is another story. Beane prefers to hang on to Zito, she states. However, having lost Octavio Dotel, Beane’s primary trade chip, should the season get away from Oakland, Beane may have no choice but to get what he can for his ace now…
…thanks, susan…
Mark Simon has created an interesting blog that is, for now, as he puts it, “devoted to cataloguing New York Mets walk-off wins.”…
Today, Simon re-tells the story of Steve Henderson’s walk-off homer the night of June 14, 1980…
…for younger fans, unaware of random moments from the team’s past, be sure to check out mark’s site…he is well-written, funny and is a very good storyteller…
…there has been a lot of ink spilled over the last week or so about jose reyes, his inability to get on base and willie randoplh’s tolerance for it…i’m tired of reading the same story over and over again…
…so, i tried to think about this in a different way…
…everyone keeps saying he needs to walk more, that he needs to be more patient…
…the thing is, if he just can’t stop swinging the stick, than maybe he just needs to not swing and miss so much…ichiro and juan pierre come to mind…
Last season, Ichiro Suzuki batted .372, tops in baseball, and had a .414 on base percentage, ninth in baseball, yet he walked just 49 times, which ranks well in the bottom half amongst Major League hitters and comparable to guys with OBPs in the mid– to-low .300 range. He struck out just 63 times in 704 at-bats, though. Amongst all the league’s .300 hitters, only Jason Kendall, Shea Hillenbrand and Juan Pierre struck out fewer times per at-bat…
Speaking of Juan Pierre, whose 2004 stat line, a .326 AVG, .407 OBP, 45 SB and 100 RS, would be a reasonable season for Reyes in the early half of his career while batting leadoff, has not walked all that often either. During 2004, Pierre drew just 45 walks, again, ranking him amongst the bottom half of all hitters. However, he rarely struck out…
If the 2004 version of Pierre or Ichiro was batting leadoff for the Mets this season, while posting the .310 AVG and .371 OBP that Pierre sported at this point in June, or the .335 AVG and .382 OBP sported by Ichiro, along with their signficantly low walk totals, do you think we’d be reading as many columns being posted by journalists and bloggers about their need to walk more…
…i doubt it…
Yeah, but, Cerrone, at this point last June, Ichiro had 20 walks and Pierre had 22 walks. Right now, Reyes has just eight…
…fair enough…
Add 12 walks to Reyes’s current total, to bring him up to Pierre’s and Ichiro’s total of 20, and Reyes’s OBP is just .329, still at the bottom of the pack amongst leadoff hitters…
However, cut his strikeouts down from 38 to 13, to equal that of Pierre’s from 2004 at this point in June, and assume he’d hit .300, as was Pierre and Ichiro from opening day last season through June, which we know Reyes is capable of, and Reyes’s batting average jumps from .277 to .330 and his OBP goes from .290 to .367…
Walks are not the problem. Putting the ball in play is the problem. Reyes doesn’t need to develop better patience at the plate. He needs to develop better control with his bat…
…tell me he should take more pitches to put him in a more advantageous count, and i can accept that…though if you look at his numbers, you’ll see that the more pitches he sees, the less chance there is of him getting a hit, oddly enough…
One thing Reyes can start to try and do is put the ball on the ground more. Last season, Ichiro hit more than three balls on the ground for every one he hit in the air. Pierre was only slightly behind Ichiro’s rate. With their speed, this allows them the opportunity, at least, to leg a ball out. This season, Reyes is putting more or less the same number of balls in the air as he is on the ground, robbing himself of nearly 30 extra chances to beat out a fielder’s arm for a hit…
…maybe the mets need to implement the willie mays hayes rule, imposed on wesley snipes’s character in the film major league, as my friend johnnyg has been demanding for months now…for those unaware, snipes’s character, hayes, had lightening fast speed…when hayes would hit the ball in the air, his manager demanded 100 push-ups right there on the field…
…i’m kidding, of course…
Mets 1B Doug Mientkiewicz recently ranted to WFAN about how the Shea Stadium infield slows the ball down. Imagine if the infield grass was slick enough, Mientkiewicz explained, that Reyes could utilize it to his advantage, the way players long have gained hits by slapping balls down on to Astro-turf, scuffing them by corner-infielders playing in to protect against the bunt. Inversely, the Mets infielders are quick and agile enough to defend against the same being done to them, Mientkiewicz believes…
Ichiro swings, Reyes swings, Pierre swings. None of them walk. Only two of them hit. Reyes simply needs to hit more, that’s all. Don’t over complicate it…
Tagged Stats |…i try to leave the past in the past, but some things are just to perfect not to relay to you all…
According to the Miami Herald, Marlins Manager Jack McKeon announced that he will skip over LHP Al Leiter the next two times through his pitching staff’s rotation…
Leiter is 2-6 with a 6.75 ERA this season, has more walks than strikeouts and has pitched past the fifth inning only twice all season… “Al will go to the bullpen for the time being,’” McKeon tells the Herald. “Maybe with his experience he can help us out of the bullpen. It will give him a chance to go out there and work on some things too.”… …if only he had some local radio talk show hosts to blame this all on…
Anthony McCarron of the Daily News posts a great column on Jose Reyes, noting that the Mets shortstop still lives with his parents in Bayside, a five-minute trip from Shea Stadium…
In the column, McCarron quotes Mets OF Victor Diaz, one of Reyes’s best-friends on the team, as saying, “We always say to each other, ‘We’re the next superstars coming along in New York.’”…
…i love it…
…we can’t lose site of the fact that this is a process…this team wasn’t b built to win overnight…
…can the mets hit the winner’s circle with tom glavine and mike piazza,, of course…but, i expect them to win with david wright, carlos beltran, victor diaz and jose reyes…there’s a big difference, and i’m glad diaz and reyes feel the momentum shift coming…
The Star-Ledger’s Eli Gelman tips us off to the next generation Joe McEwing, St. Lucie Mets IF-OF-C Andy Wilson…
According to Gelman, “Since signing with the Mets as a non-drafted free agent in June 2003, Wilson, 24, has played every position except center field and pitcher.”…
Wilson is batting .296 through 213 at-bats spanning 57 games while walking 24 times compared to 32 strike outs. He’s hit 14 HR, 15 doubles, has 44 RBI with 38 runs scored and is getting on base roughly 36 percent of the time.
…he’s 24 in A-ball, so it’s tough to get excited about anything here…however, cut down on the strike outs, walk more and he could easily find a job in baseball, at some point, given his versatility…
…fun story, at any rate…
Tagged Minors |
