Daily Archives: May 9, 2006
The Mets have promoted RHP Heath Bell from Norfolk, and optioned RHP Bartolome Fortunato back down to Triple-A…
Bell, 28, was 1–3 with a 5.59 ERA and 43 strike outs in 46.2 innings pitched for the Mets last season. This season at Norfolk, Bell was 2–2 in 10 appearances while sporting a 1.35 ERA in 13.1 innings…
…note…initially i had the mets demoting Pedro Feliciano, which is what i was initially told…turns out that was incorrect, as many of you suggested in this post’s comments section…
The Mets remain as the top team in the National League on this week’s Hit List at Baseball Prospectus, though BP wonders if the team is living on “borrowed time” now that the clock has struck Lima Time…
…for those who have no faith in Jose Lima or Jeremi Gonzalez:
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that the Royals intend to put RHP Joe Mays on waivers, since the pitcher has refused to accept an assignment to pitch in Triple-A…
Mays will remain on waivers for ten-days. According to the report, if Mays goes unclaimed, the Royals will release him…
Mays was 0-4 in six games with a 10.27 ERA for the Royals this season, giving up 38 hits and 33 runs in 23.2 innings…
It has been three full seasons since Mays has won more than 10 games, when he went 17–13 with a 3.16 ERA during a career year in 2001. He missed all of 2004 while recovering from Tommy John surgery…
According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Phillies upper-management plans to meet with this week with its manager, Charlie Manuel, to discuss the inevitable promotion of their top pitching prospect, LHP Cole Hamels…
Hamels, 22, the team’s first-round draft pick in 2002, is 2-0 with an 0.39 ERA with 36 strike outs in 23 innings at Triple-A, where opponents have hit just .128 against him…
B-Mets RHP Alay Soler checks in at No. 5 on this week’s Prospect Hot Sheet at Baseball America…
In 35 innings between Single-A and Double-A, Soler, 27, has allowed just three runs…
No other Mets minor leaguers are on the list…
Ken Davidoff is a columnist for Newsday, and a well-respected writer in New York, who recently wrote that the Mets should go after Marlins LHP Dontrelle Willis by trading their top prospect, OF Lastings Milledge…
Ken was kind enough to talk with me more for a few minutes about Willis and Milledge, as well as the team’s plans going forward……
…to listen to this interview, click the play button below…
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Ken Davidoff, regarding whether trading Willis for Milledge will ever happen…
Well, I think at this point it’s dormant because it’s early May and typically there is just not much trade action this early in the season…
I do think this is something the Mets are going to have to wait out until June or July. They have a cushion of a lead in the National League East, and they have their top two starters pitching excellently, but, to me, clearly they need another frontline guy…
Davidoff, on in-house options…
To me, the in-house options are unattractive. I mean, Jose Lima, at this point, I think has proven there is not much left there. I refuse to get excited about Jeremi Gonzalez – I mean, I honestly haven’t discussed him with anyone in the organization, but look what he is: he’s a journeymen pitcher. You know, once a decade you strike gold with a guy like Aaron Small, as the Yankees did last year…
All they can hope at this point is to just keep hitting a lot and hope that the number four and number five guys just hang in there…
Davidoff, on Aaron Heilman…
I would keep him in the bullpen, I think that’s smart. You just don’t tinker with a successful formula, and he’s part of the successful formula. At this point, Billy Wagner is there greatest concern…but their seventh and eighth innings are in really good shape and I would not tinker with that…
Davidoff, on whether the team will trade its young players, like Milledge…
To me, again, it’s fairly clear that they need a very good starting pitcher. Not a stop gap guy, unless Brian Bannister really surges and comes into his own. So, the debate is: do you trade Milledge. And, as I wrote in my column, I think yes, you do trade him for Willis, and perhaps a Barry Zito. I just think the other names are inconsequential…
If history holds, Pedro Martinez is going to hit a cold spot, and might even have to rest of a turn or two…Tom Glavine, maybe he can keep this up, but he is 40-years-old…and it’s just not realistic to think you can get through the World Series with this rotation…
I think there is no doubt Zito will be available for Milledge – nobody else, but for Milledge. Billy Beane will make that trade no matter where the A’s are in the standings. And, Dontrelle, it’s fairly obvious that they’re gonna have to trade him. That team is a complete sinking ship and he just doesn’t fit there. So they may as well capitalize on one of their few remaining assets…
And so, to me, the only player worth discussing is Milledge…
Davidoff, on whether there is a chilling effect from the disaster that was trading Scott Kazmir…
There is absolutely a lasting feeling that we can’t go through that, again. And I’m not sure they will trade Milledge for Zito or for Willis, because of the Kazmir-for-Zambrano trade. They got scorched on it and, to me, the sin wasn’t in trading Kazmir, it was in trading him for Zambrano, but I’m not sure that they feel that way…
If you’ve yet to do so, be sure and vote in this week’s MetsBlog Fan Confidence Rating by using the poll to the left…
…thanks…
In the Daily News, Adam Rubin writes the following…
“Angel Hernandez faces MLB discipline if the Mets’ claims that the plate umpire told Jose Lima he wouldn’t get the same strike zone as John Smoltz are substantiated, a baseball said…
“When Lima asked why he wasn’t getting the same calls as Smoltz on Sunday, the combative Hernandez allegedly replied: “You’re not John Smoltz.””…
…someone really should put a muzzle on those talking baseballs…
…seriously, though, i certainly hope the mets look into this, given how much criticism this umpire has received around the entire league over the years…
At MLB.com, Jesse Sanchez takes a closer look at the youthful demeanor of Jose Reyes, who still lives with his parents and is considered “the unofficial clown prince of the clubhouse.” …
Mets OF Cliff Floyd, on Reyes, as quoted by Sanchez…
“Some guys get to this level and are so locked-in in doing their job that they forget to have fun. You never have to worry about that happening to that clown. Jose has fun everyday like we did in Little League.”…
Sanchez also writes of Reyes’s new dedication towards strength training and conditioning, which have allowed him to put away the memories of having played just 53 games in 2004 and 69 in 2003…
…outstanding column, jesse…i’m such a sucker for these types of profiles, though…
By the way, the Mets are 13–4 when Reyes scores a run, and 8–6 when he doesn’t. They are 11–2 when he gets on base more than once, and 10–8 when he doesn’t…
In the New York Times, Juliet Macur writes about Pedro Martinez, and his love for gardening, which serves as a sanctuary for the future Hall of Famer…
Martinez, on why he gardens…
“If something hurts, it disappears when you are in the garden. It’s about deep thinking, about letting go. Other players need to do the same thing.”…
…martinez, like Carlos Delgado, fascinates me…there is something about pedro’s charming, calm and sweet side to his personal life, that stands in stark contrast to the abundant, aggressive and powerful side of his professional life…it’s like he is Clark Kent and Superman and gardening is his fortress of solitude…
