To start off my gut answer is a “no” in quotation marks (due to my cynical nature sometimes with the Mets) but of course there is a story that will lead to this conclusion.
Thursday night I was watching the Maryland Basketball game with a few of my fraternity brothers (Alpha Phi Omega- Coed Community Service Fraternity, any other APO Mets fans out there?) and it was a slow night, mainly because the campus was already closing for the major snowstorm that was really 18 hours away at that point, but its DC so thats expected.
Anyway one of my brothers is also a Mets fan and we were talking about the state of the Mets and he was very strongly for trading Fernando Martinez because as he sees it, he's a player with no potential. After I explained in detail why he was wrong, I figured this article was necessary to write.
One of the struggling points with Fmart is ability to stay healthy. He has shown at a few levels in the minors that he can hit and that he has a fantastic swing when he is healthy. He is also very young as well, which can be linked to his lack of power and ability so far to hit at the major league level. I would say that up until last week, he was not being considered at all for the Centerfield job at all next season. We have Pagan and GMJ and Fmart still was not ready at all.
However he released a statement last week via an interview saying that he was expecting to get playing time (before the GMJ trade). Since that statement, he has really been turning it on in the winter leagues. During the actual season in the winter league, he was hitting below .200 but since the playoffs, he has been hitting above .330 and this week alone he has 2 homeruns. If he can continue to play strong into Spring he could potentially make things interesting.
Overall though, even if he comes out of spring with 15 homers, he will ultimately start off in the minors. The Mets already have 2 CF on the roster without Beltran, and Fmart really needs to be playing every day to not only get rythem but to also get stronger for future season. However, I am hoping that he really succeeds in Spring, because we will need him down the road.
