Daily Archives: January 15, 2010
Anthony DiComo of MLB.com says the Mets and John Maine avoided arbitration and have agreed to a one-year contract.
DiComo says Maine and the Mets agreed to terms shortly after he filed for arbitration today and according to the Associated Press his deal is worth $3.3 million guaranteed and can earn an additional $225,000 in performance bonuses based on starts.
…hat tip to Mets09ws for the link…
…on a side note, i think its great we are seeing more and more contracts these days get signed where the player can earn more money based on milestones they reach during the season… not that i want to see a guy get hurt or worsen a problem, but i think these incentives may give them a reason to play through a minor injury, whereas if it’s a set dollar value, a player might be less inclined to play through it…
Pedro Feliciano, Jeff Francoeur, Sean Green and Angel Pagan all filed for arbitration today.
Mets GM Omar Minaya told the Daily News there is ‘no problem between the Mets and Carlos Beltran.’
“We have a good relationship,” he said. “I wanted to see how he was doing and he’s coming along very well. We’re excited he’s feeling good and looking forward to him coming back as our center fielder. The relationship between Carlos and the Mets, the organization, ownership, is good.”
To hear more from Minaya, and why John Ricco handled this week’s conference call, and how the team is working with Beltran and Scott Boras, read the Daily News report, here.
Original Post at 5:31 pm:
Earlier today, Minaya told Newsday, contrary to what Carlos Beltran said in his statement last night, he did not give Beltran an OK to have knee surgery.
“Carlos did speak to me before surgery and we had a good conversation,” Minaya is quoted as saying. “It was one of those things as far as he was telling me what the second opinion was and all… I didn’t give an OK.”
….honestly, i don’t care who is right and who is wrong at this point… i just want the repeated, perceived controversies to end, and, what’s more, i want to watch good players take the field and hope they win… i am starting to feel like a court reporter, not a fan who writes a sports blog… i said on Twitter the other day, i feel like i now write a blog that’s like Night Court meets St. Elsewhere… i mean, it’s January, the Jets are eight quarters from a Super Bowl, and the Mets are at the top of the deck with a tit-for-tat, he-said-she-said argument with the most powerful agent in sports, and their best player… it’s mind boggling…
…seriously already, handle your business, get good players and win baseball games… as fans, that’s all we ask… i have lost count of the number of e-mails i am getting from fans who claim to have given up… Twitter is ripe with jokes at the team’s expense… the level of sarcasm towards them, from their own fans by the way, is mind blowing… i can’t imagine the Mets are happy with being viewed this way… so, for those of us who still love this team and want to see them successful and respected, come on, please, just get it together…
In a post to his blog yesterday for ESPN.com, Buster Olney wrote:
“The Mets close to landing a new catcher in Bengie Molina, and they’re in negotiations with Joel Pineiro. If they think signing Orlando Hudson and relegating Luis Castillo to a backup role makes the everyday lineup better, that is something they should do.”
…i was not in favor of signing Adam LaRoche, who is in the process of inking a deal with the D-Backs… but, it’s hard to imagine the Mets not being better with, say, hudson and laroche manning the left-side of the infield… as opposed to Daniel Murphy and castillo… the upgrade between the two sets, plus adding Bengie Molina to the battery, might have had the single biggest impact on the pitching staff of any other path…
…the thing is, hudson is still looking for a multi-year deal… and, though laroche’s deal has just one guaranteed year and $4.5 million with incentives, he has a mutual, $7 million option for 2011, which would’ve most certainly been an issue for the Mets, since they do not want to block Ike Davis…
According to Ed Price of AOL FanHouse, the Mets signed Jolbert Cabrera to minor-league deal and invited him to Spring Training.
Cabrera, 37, last played in the big leagues during 2008, when he hit .252 with 10 extra base hits and 12 RBI in 48 games for the Reds.
He is a career .257 hitter with a .306 OBP, spanning 609 games, during which he has played every position except pitcher and catcher.
According to Ken Rosenthal of FoxSports.com, the Mets have been in contact with free-agent Jerry Hairston Jr., who could fill in for Carlos Beltran, as well as play shortstop.
Hairston, 33, hit .251 with 34 extra base hits and seven stolen bases in 131 games for the Reds and Yankees last season, during which he played every position except pitcher, catcher and first base.
…he is a perfect fit… no doubt… from what i can gather, the Mets intend to give a vote of confidence to Angel Pagan, but also look to bring in a player or two on minor-league deals to compete in Spring Training… hairston makes sense, though he’ll probably require more of a commitment… also, i expect to see Reed Johnson in connection to the Mets at some point, too…
In addition, according to the Arizona Republic, the D-Backs may soon release OF Eric Byrnes, who will earn $11 million next season, now that the team has signed free-agent 1B Adam LaRoche.
…oh, man, please do not put byrnes on the Mets… he might be one of the most overrated players i have ever seen… he’s a shadow of the player he once was, which, even at his best, was a guy who was reckless… i get the feeling people like the idea of byrnes, more than byrnes himself…
By the way, Mets OF Fernando Martinez was 1 for 3 with an RBI during last night’s Winter League post season game for Escogido.
Martinez hit just .191 in 47 at bats this winter, during which he struck out 13 times and had just one extra base hit, as he continues to rehab from last summer’s knee surgery.
… i have to think he will get a serious look from Management this Spring, since Carlos Beltran is likely to miss most of April, recovering from knee surgery…
…martinez looked under-prepared at the plate last summer, but he did play quite well in the field, especially in center field… pagan earned the opportunity last season to be called upon this season to fill in for beltran, no question… however, martinez’s role, in the short-term, is a bit more important right now, considering beltran’s situation…
…in talking with people around baseball this winter, and with people in the Mets organization, nobody questions martinez’s talent… but, nobody is going to trade for him, or start him, or put any more stock in to his abilities, until they see him play a full season without getting injured… he’s young, and growing, and i sense people find these sort of growing pains to be acceptable to a certain extent… i mean, no matter who i talk with about martinez, and no matter what they say, they always compliment his talent and end by saying, ‘But, he’s still just 21 years old.’… however, at some point, excuses are just excuses, and eventually the player has to stay healthy and produce, and now would be as good of a time as any for martinez to prove his worth…
Speaking of Pagan, in a post to Amazin Avenue, James Kannengeiser debunks the idea that Pagan has a bad baseball IQ, concluding, “No player is flawless.”
This morning on WFAN’s Boomer & Carton Show, which airs weekdays at 6 am, host Craig Carton said he talked yesterday to the Mets, as well as with Carlos Beltran’s people, and people in the medical community, and the following, in his words, ‘is exactly what happened,’ it is ‘the truth,’ and these are ‘indisputable facts.’
Carton said Beltran told the Mets in November he was again having an issue with his knee, which he noticed when increasing his off-season workouts.
Dr. Steadman is the premier knee doctor in the country, according to Carton, “He went to the one guy everybody goes to.”
Steadman talked to Dr. Altchek, the Mets team physician, who conferred with Steadman that having Beltran wait and continue to rehab was not the appropriate answer.
According to Carton, Beltran had roughly 25 pieces of loose cartilage in the knee, ‘and it had to be taken out,’ and all sides agreed that having arthroscopic surgery was the best solution.
Carton explained, “When they finally get to Jeff Wilpon and Omar Minaya and the rest of the Mets brass, they wanted a couple of days to confer with Dr. Altchek and Dr. Steadman to decide if they agreed surgery was the only answer to this situation. Apparently, in the course of the Mets talking about it, Dr. Steadman told Beltran, ‘There is no reason for your to wait, you need to get this done.’”
He continues, “Now, Wilpon and Minaya are out in Arizona at the Owners Meetings all week, so Steadman, not Scott Boras, gets in touch with the Mets, because he’s not allowed to operate on Beltran without the Mets blessing. The Mets sent over to Dr. Steadman the workmen’s compensation papers, which allow him for insurance reasons, to actually do the operation. So, the doctor goes, ‘I have an opening at 7:00 am, we’ll get you in first thing.’”
Carton says the Mets claim they didn’t know on Tuesday that Beltran was going in for surgery at 7 am on Wednesday. However, Omar Minaya knew, because, according to Carton, “Beltran called Minaya out of respect and said, ‘Listen, all the doctors are on board here, I’m gonna have this done and why wait, I want to get back as soon as possible,’ and Omar said, ‘I’m with you, good luck, let us know how it goes.’”
In the end, Carton believes, ‘There is now a major problem between Beltran and the Mets.’
The Boomer & Carton Show airs every weekday from 6 am to 10 am on 660 AM WFAN, which you can listen to all day, from your computer, at WFAN.com.
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