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Yesterday in Alabama, Mets 21–year-old Triple-A LHP Jon Niese let up two runs and three hits, while walking four and striking out eight, in five innings, during which he tossed 103 pitches.
…wow, it’s weird, in that niese will be considered among pitchers who could replace John Maine, should maine be shut down…
…yet, oddly, that line from niese last night, looks exactly like a line from maine…
In six starts for Triple-A this season, Niese is 5–1 with a 3.65 ERA.
Niese, who threw 134 innings last season in Single-A, has thrown 161 innings this season between Double–A and Triple-A.
…again, from what i understand, team doctors have told maine he can pitch, meaning the decision is essentially up to him and the team, when factoring in pain and effectiveness…
…frankly, he should probably shut it down – so that he doesn’t end up injuring another part of his arm…if he does, i would expect the Mets to turn temporarily to Brian Stokes, who is ready to make a spot start if needed…after which, and following a round of limited September call-ups, i would think a guy like niese could find himself in the mix…
I’d love to see Niese, don’t get me wrong.
But he’s getting pretty close to his expiration date, too. And you don’t want to risk injury to a promising young arm, if you can avoid it.
Next year is a different matter.
I agree. My question is that if it was known that Maine has had issues and Pedro is a time bomb, why have they not been limiting Niese’s innings? There is no reason for him to already be at 160 when there was a great chance that we would need him in September.
Because they are interested in him developing for the future, not for September.
I completely understand but once let’s say in late July when he was approaching 150 innings I am sure they could have adjusted his work load to accomodate both.
poor planning…what can you say..hindsight is always 20/20 my friend…unfortunatly that seems to be the reoccuring theme with the mets this season
I would try not to use niese as a starter because
A) He is rookie going to have to pitch in really big games
B) the last time the met tried this was with Phil Humber and he did pretty bad aganist the nats in the last week of the season
C) he has already past his innining total from last year and i don’t u really want him to start 4-5 games where every game is really important
use him in relief not as a starter
Maine and Perez looked pretty good in October throwing in big games in 2006
Not sure that either were a rookie?
Using him in relief maybe just as bad, asking him to warm up and pitch on a different rotation. Some pitchers respond well to that and some do not. It may be that he is just done. They may let him have 1 start early in September and then shut him down.
Humber was pitching on like 24 days rest. The Humber situation was so botched by Willie “My Guys” Randolph, that you simply cannot use him as a point of comparison.
Exactly, Humber was thrown out like Kunz was in his last apperance. Let’s put you as a rookie in your least chance of being successful and see how you do.
And using in the bullpen 3 of every 5 games is going to be better how?
They should stay away from him altogether other than to make a show me start the final week in the even they are in the good fortune of playing mop up games before the playoffs.
Maine going down hurts a big advantage the Mets might have had should they make the playoffs, namely moving one of their starters into the pen.
I could be wrong but with Maines current condition wouldnt it be best for him to go out there out of the bullpen and grind through an inning twice or three times a week? he isnt pitching 100 pitches he is pitching more like 30-45 a week
If it were not for the fact that because of the arm he can’t find the SO and when he does it’s a hit. His WHIP is not where you would want for a relief pitcher at all.
What makes the Maine situation worse is that we are going to be limiting Mike Pelfrey’s work over the course of September… He’s been the second best pitcher on this team since June and will need tobe heavily relied pon in September and yet, we cannot pitch him more than once a week…
All this start about starting pitching is nice and all… But shouldn’t the concern be that the bullpen is going to blow the entire regular season for the Mets?
Actually the pen has been ok when only having to pitch 2 innings or so. It’s when the starters go out in the 6th inning after 5.1 innings. That will be a problem if Pelfrey is limited and Maine is out or even if he is still going out there.
again.
*start = Talk
What about some of the other waiver guys. A guy like Vincent Padillia would be a good one. He has a high ERA but a lot of that is because of the HR and could go down in Shea. He would be signed at 12 million for next season and have an option year in 2010. He could help us this season and next season. It should not take much to get him as the Rangers would mostly be dumping salary. Something like 2 PTBNL in Carp and Parnell?
I don’t want to be a dick, but that is a completely awful idea. Not only does Padilla suck, but he’s got a terrible contract which you mentioned. I wouldn’t take him for free.
id take him for free..
This is a tough call. Im certian the mets are going to play this extra careful in light of the whole ryan church thing early. If they do option to shut down maine i believe after the obvious stokes that would make his spot starts, would be figs for a callup. Is knight available…(havent been watching the olympics)? We dont have any lights out options guys we just are going to have to patch this thing together. Of course not ideal going into the playoffs but hey im sure teams have had to make due with less. On a side note, why has manuel not learned not to use heilman with men on base. I dont have the stats but im sure they would back me up.
At this point I would rather see Heilman start the game for Maine and pitch 3 innings for now and see Stokes come in than I had to see him from 6th inning on.
In fact I mentioned this yesterday. Shut Maine down and bring up Reyes. Move Heilman to the rotation. I know it will take a few starts to get him stretched out but it’s worth a shot. I would much rather have Stokes in the pen and Heilman starting.
I hear ya real that would be an interesting move on the part of the mets but this concerns me about that
ERA vs left-.324
ERA vs right-.205
He would get smashed early by any left handed lineup but
ERA w/o Runners-.210
ERA w/ Runners-.310
So for him to start for 3 innings wouldnt be such a bad idea. The thing about the mets is we have a bunch of specialist but none that really stand out with avg number splits….
I’d rather see Heilman get cut
At this point we can’t afford to do that. Besides he has trade value and could net something in the offseason.
That being said if we could find a waiver guy that could slot in the rotation then Heilman could be put into only mop up in September after the callups.
Too bad we didn’t have the young guns the Yankees have. Then we would be in good shape.
dont forget claudio vargas..not that he’s teh answer but he’s a vet, can K guys, and wasn’t really all that bad in his starts. I think he’s the obvious guy to take his spot after stokes.
ALSO, big ups to the guys thinking outside the box and bringing up calling up Al Reyes, and stretching out heilman to start. Might be a disaster, might not. But the obvious needs here are to fix this bullpen and eventually replace maine.
Knwing the mets, they’ll start stokes, then vargas, then figgy, then niese, until the playoffs, if we make it (which i think we shall)
I agree. I’d rather call up a decent vet like vargas to start than mess with Neise this year (who is 21 years old and is close to his innings limit this year). Start Vargas if needed for a few weeks and if he bombs patch with Stokes, Figgy, etc.
No need to worry. El Duque will pull a Pavano and come back from injury.
What about Brandon Knight ?
Should be back from Olympics.
His 1 Met start 5 inn 4 ER was subpar,
but he was great in July for N.O.
other than the first inning, he looked pretty good in his lone Mets start. I did not actually see the olympic games, however, judging by his stat line, it did not look like he pitched so great there.
More Knight info
In 07 he went 12-5 in the Independant league.
In 06 he was a closer (27 saves) in AA
He’s a career minor leaguer, but … could be best option.
Did they release him for olympics?
He is listed on the NOZ roster
Everyone — CALM DOWN.
Look at the schedule: they have 4 off days in the next 17 days. If Pelf pitches on either the 2nd or 3rd, then he can pitch the 9th and the 16th too. Then, on the 21st, if it’s a race, you decide whether to start him then and have him “on turn” for the 26th (and for NLDS Game 1), or skip him. Or, use him the 2nd, 9th, 16th and 24th, setting him up for the playoff game if there is one.
Of the 31 remaining games, including today, Johan starts 7 (Aug 27 & Sept 1, 7*, 12, 17, 22 and 27), Pedro starts 7 (Aug 26 & 31, Sept 6*, 13*, 18, 23 and 28-last game), Perez starts 6 (Aug 30, Sept 5, 10, 15, 20, & 25) and the playoff on short rest if needed.
If Pelf starts 5 games (today + 4 in Sept), then you need 6 starts from Maine, Stokes, Knight and Vargas. Between all of them, they’re needed Aug 29 & Sept 2, 3, 9, 14, 16, 19, 21, 24, 26.
can I get that in a chart or something that makes some sense to look at? ;)
Vargas hasnt pitched since early August when he got hurt, dont count on him. I guess you would be looking at Lugo, Collazo, Figueroa, or Knight as options.
Pelfrey is next starting on Sept 3rd, so that one is covered…
Shouldn’t one of the main concerns for, uh, Maine, be that he might start putting pressure on different parts of his body to lessen the pain of his shoulder, bringing about a completely different injury somewhere else???
I did a little planning for the Mets…
It looks like they can get by this next stretch of games with almost no use of Stokes and Maine, and less use of Pelfrey.
After Sept 18th they have 10 more games with no off days, so its gets dicey at that point as 4 of those games cant be started by Perez, Pedro, Santana, or Pelfrey. Hopefully those games (against the Braves and Marlins) will be against teams already eliminated…
Aug. 25 H Astros Pelfrey ,
Aug. 26 at Phillies Pedro ,
Aug. 27 at Phillies Santana ,
Aug. 28 – off day –
Aug. 29 at Marlins Maine 5dr ,
Aug. 30 at Marlins Perez 5dr ,
Aug. 31 at Marlins Stokes ?,
Sept. 1 at Brewers Pedro 5dr,
Sept. 2 at Brewers Santana 5dr,
Sept. 3 at Brewers Pelfrey 8dr,
Sept. 4 – off day –
Sept. 5 H Phillies Perez 5dr ,
Sept. 6 H Phillies Pedro 4dr,
Sept. 7 H Phillies Santana 4dr,
Sept. 8 – off day –
Sept. 9 H Nationals Pelfrey 5dr or Maine 10dr,
Sept. 10 H Nationals Perez 5dr ,
Sept. 11 – off day –
Sept. 12 H Braves Pedro 5dr,
Sept. 13 H Braves Santana 5dr,
Sept. 14 H Braves ??
Sept. 15 at Nationals Perez 4dr ,
Sept. 16 at Nationals Pelfrey 6dr,
Sept. 17 at Nationals Pedro 4dr,
Sept. 18 at Nationals Santana 4dr,
No need to pitch Maine 8/29
8/29 Perez
8/30 sub
8/31 Pedro
9/1 Santana
9/2 Pelf (7 days rest- misses Fla)
don’t need Maine of 2nd Sub till 9/16
I think Livan Hernandez is still available. If so, it might be worth it to take a shot on him.
on rockies
colorado already claimed him off waivers…
lets not overreact here, we don’t need Livan Hernandez. The mets have options this season to keep their rotation strong. Other than Maine this is a very solid rotation. We can always have stokes or possibly even Niese start instead of him.