213 Miles From Shea

It’s been a couple of weeks since we picked up our journey through each organization, so let’s pick it back up with the Dodgers. Right now the Dodgers have 5 players that used to be in the Mets organization including Justin Turner, Robert Carson, Randy Fontanez, Brian Burgamy and David Aardsma.

Justin Turner was a utility player for the Mets for a couple of season and quite a joke on Mets Twitter. With the Mets he would perform poorly, then do something amazing, essentially trolling everyone, get more playing time, perform poorly again, then do something amazing and the process would start all over again. He then ended up in LA, and just had a tremendous season as the ultimate troll to the Mets.

Robert Carson was an in-and-out player for the Mets bullpen from 2012-2013. Drafted by the Mets in 2007, he was claimed by the Angels at the end of the 2013 season. He was then released in May of this past season and signed a week later by the Dodgers.

Randy Fontanez was a RHP in the Mets organization drafted in 2011. He pitched in the 2013 World Baseball Classic for Puerto Rico and was selected by the Dodgers in the AAA phase of the 2014 Rule V Draft. He became an example of the depth of pitching in our organization, otherwise he probably would have been protected.

Brian Burgamy was drafted in the 2002 season by the Padres, was signed to the Mets in 2014 and now has signed a contract with the Dodgers. If he doesn’t sound too familiar to Mets fan, that makes sense, he was never a huge piece of the Mets future.

The most recent Met to become a Dodger would be David Aardsma, who just signed with the Dodgers this past week. He has traveled around being drafted by the Giants in 2003, traded to the Cubs in 2005 (for former Met LaTroy Hawkins), then was traded to the White Sox in 2006, traded to the Red Sox in 2008, traded to the Mariners in 2009, signed as a free agent to the Yankees in 2012, signed with the Marlins in 2013, signed with the Mets in 2013, signed with the Indians in 2014 and signed with the Cardinals later that spring.

This series of articles will take us across every organization in baseball and look for former Mets in the majors and minors to see how they are doing, leading up to a “Former Mets Team” to see how the current Mets stack up with pieces we have all over the place. I am still looking for Mets team members on the Pirates, Rangers, White Sox and Tigers. If you any, please let me know!

Vic Black was acquired with Dilson Herrera for a trade that sent John Buck and Byrd to the Pirates. While Herrera is becoming a touted prospect, Black has been quietly becoming a piece of the Mets bullpen. Last year Black put up the following numbers for the Mets:

2014 Stats: 2-3, 41 G, 34.2 IP, 32 K, 19 BB, 1.30 WHIP, 2.60 ERA

Lets take a look different projections for the 2015 season:

PECOTA (BP): 2-1, 45 G, 50.1 IP, 55 K, 24 BB, 1.24 WHIP, 3.29 ERA
PECOTA (MLB.com): 1-1, 24.1 IP, 26 K, 11 BB, 1.23 WHIP, 3.33 ERA
MLB.com: 2-3, 58.0 IP, 56 K, 27 BB, 1.36 WHIP, 3.41 ERA
ZiPS: 57 G, 56.1 IP, 61 K, 33 BB, 3.67 ERA
Steamer: 3-3, 55 G, 55 IP, 56 K, 26 BB, 3.78 ERA
ESPN: 3 W, 48 K, 1.44 WHIP, 3.20 ERA

Average: 2.2-2, 52.3 G, 48.8 IP, 50.3 K, 24.2 BB, 1.32 WHIP, 3.45 ERA

So the computers, with the exception of the PECOTA presented on MLB.com, expect Black to have a mostly full season at the majors and a return to a more human ERA at 3.45, which would still be good out of pen since Black looks to be farther down the line with Mejia/Familia and Parnell when he returns. Although his WHIP isn’t great, that K/BB ratio projects well in each projection. BP also throws in that he has a 28% chance to significantly better than his projection and a 39% to improve from last year.

The Mets this season added two arms to the system while the average MLB team added 15. That being said, I feel better about the bullpen this year than I have in previous years. Let’s take a look at the Opening Day bullpen for the last couple of seasons and compare:

2014 Bullpen: Familia, German, Lannan, Parnell, Rice, Torres, Valverde (+ Farnsworth the almost immediate injury to Parnell, +Mejia in the rotation)

2013 Bullpen: Parnell, Lyon, Hawkins, Atchinson, Edgin, Rice, Burke

2012 Bullpen: Francisco, Rauch, Ramon Ramirez, Byrdak, Parnell, Acosta, Batista

2011 Bullpen: K-Rod, T. Buchholz, Beato, Byrdak, Carrasco, Boyer

And now the projected 2015 Opening Day Bullpen:
Familia, Mejia, Parnell, Edgin, Black, Gee +  Additional Lefty

Doesn’t that look so much better than previous years? Although it would be nice to have an established closer, not the closer by committee we are most likely to have, there are three pitchers in our pen that could legitimately close. Plus, this year could be a breakout year for both Black and Edgin. In addition, Gee as the long man is so much better than our long men in recent history (Lannan, Torres, Acosta, Batista, Carrasco).

This year’s pen doesn’t have the veteran, outside of Gee, but has a lot of upside. With the volatile nature of bullpens, the downside doesn’t seem any worse than the downside of any pen we’ve had in previous years. Plus, in addition to this set of arms, the Mets have the Rule V pick (who may or may not break camp), Leathersich (who also may or may not break camp), and Montero that can join the pen. If the Mets decide to get real crazy, when Syndergaard joins this year, they can shuffle more players in and out of the pen.

In short, it’s hard to predict bullpens, but there is something about this years pen that feels better than previous years. Maybe it’s because we’ve had 6 of 7 pitchers on the team the previous year, so they are all the devil we know, but I’m excited.

(I need to work on snappier titles)

Yesterday I stumbled upon the ESPN power number projections for the Mets players in the 2015 season. I wish their projections would include either PA’s or AB’s as it would add context, but we’ll have to do with what they provide. Anyway if you want the raw data without my analysis, follow the link.

Last year as a team, the Mets hit 125 homers, down from 130 the year before and 139 the year before that. In 2012 the top three homer hitters were Davis (32), Wright (21) and Hairston (20). In 2013 it was Byrd with (21), Wright (18) and Buck/Duda both with (15). Last year it was Duda (30), Granderson (20), d’Arnaud (13). 2015 will be the first season in sometime where the Mets go into the season with all top 3 of their top 3 homer hitters, even though the power has been dropping off.

ESPN Projections:

• Duda – 27
• Granderson – 23
• Cuddyer – 19
• d’Arnaud – 17
• Wright – 16
• Murphy – 10
• Flores – 8

My initial response is Duda, Cuddyer, and Murphy look right. Granderson and d’Arnaud seem a bit high. Wright seems low, I expect him to be around 20. It’s hard to gauge Flores without seeing how much time he gets at short. If he starts 140+ games, expect it to be about 10-12.

If you add up all of the homers for players they list and expect to play in the majors for the Mets, you get 154. Which seems really high.

If you look at just the Mets starters (the above list plus Lagares at 6), you get 126 homers, which would still be above last year. In addition to the starters, Recker is listed at 7, if he gets 40 starts, I think he can put up 7 (not sure if d’Arnaud puts up 17 though in 120), Mayberry at 4 seems right, Captain Kirk at 5 seems high, den Dekker at 3 seems high as well.

Using the ESPN projections as a base, which I’m still deciding how I feel about it, I put the Mets at about 140-145 homers this year. That is dependent on players staying healthy. Power wise, the team reminds me of a better version of the 2012 team as long as Duda has a near repeat performance and Wright returns close to what he was before. In that case Duda provides Davis numbers, Wright provides Wright numbers and both Granderson and Cuddyer can provide Hairston numbers, accounting for the improvement of 139 homers.

A while back I wrote about how the Padres and Mets were on very different trajectories this offseason as the Padres traded all of their talent in order to completely turn around their roster. Since then they have also shelled out some cash to James Shield and rumors are they will make a huge push for Yoan Moncada.

This now means the Padres and the Mets will be different in the following ways:

• Padres traded minor league prospects for major league players
• Padres committed major money to a free agent and to major league stars via trade
• Padres risked minor league talent for the next few years by going after Yoan Moncada (tentative)

Before when looking at the two teams, we needed to look at the next 5 years, which was the time it would take the minor league prospects to mature that were traded from Padres and for the Mets to have to extend and resign their minor league players that they kept. If the Padres get Yoan Moncada we probably need to look at these two teams for the next 7-8 years as case studies as the argument against signing Moncada is it blocks you from two years of amateur signings.

I’m planning over the next couple of weeks figuring out an easy way to track the Padres and the Mets for the next several years as an opportunity to see if Sandy’s wait and see will work in the long run or the Padres win now, and need to spend later works out.