213 Miles From Shea

The Mets finally got rid of two players over the last several days that have had the writing on the wall for a while now in Oliver Perez and Luis Castillo. To be fair, the Mets did what any group of people with a lot invested in these players would do. They gave them each a chance to earn their spot on the roster. That's prudent. That's baseball smart. That's acceptable…..or not:

Given this bleak scenario, you sometimes got the feeling this winter that Luis Castillo and Perez were just being kept around for the inevitable sighs of relief that would come with the good riddances. Nobody took seriously these last-gasp auditions, particularly in the case of Perez. – Flip Bondy, New York Daily News

And the New York Post wasn't that much better as they ran article with the headline With Perez gone, Mets Fans Need New Scapegoats. (Full Disclosure: I recognize that this headline for the article is a lot worse than the actual article. The article actually doesn't make Mets fans out to be these desperate creatures that need to blame something, or need to have someone orchestrated into the position of blame, to satisfy our dark human needs).

So what did the Mets really accomplish with regards to Oliver and Luis this Spring?

They first made sure they gave them their course due. To give credit to what Bondy wrote, no one really thought either player was going to break Spring up north with the Mets. At the same time, Bondy is probably too cynical in his statement that the two players were only around to produce positive news for the Mets fan base at the end of Spring. That type of statement falls into the Carl Sagan's “Extraordinary Claims Require Extraordinary Evidence Box”. To claim the Mets were in some form of Front Office conspiracy is a little far fetched (at least in this case). It really is possible that the Mets just wanted to make sure, one final time that they weren't going to eat the cost and regret it more. Also it is very plausible that part of the tone of camp Collins was showing is that everyone, no matter paycheck or media hatred, gets a fair shot at making the team. These claims are more likely than Sandy Alderson led conspiracy.

The Mets in turn this Spring fostered competition and hopefully the best players in the organization. This spring showed that especially for Oliver, the Mets want to head north with the best 25, and these two were not in the top 25 in camp.

Finally, New York papers, Mets fans do not need a scapegoat. With evidence on playing field, the players who don't perform will get ridiculed, but it isn't like we actually need a scapegoat in order to survive. This Mets fan base, although it won't sell papers to acknowledge this fact, is actually filled with logical, rational people, who aren't as brash and trashy as we are portrayed.

The NY Post didn't devote its back page to Castillo, but the Daily News. With the release of Castillo, they decided to post one of the most iconic images of his tenure with the Mets:

You can extrapolate meaning from that image and choosing that image as you wish.

In the beginning of February with Felipe Lopez signing a Minor League deal, the draft order for 2011 was set. This year the first round will consist of 33 picks, and the first compensation round will have 27 picks. One way to think about that is there are so many compensation picks this draft that the supplemental round this year is almost as long as a normal round. The only difference is not everyone is invited to the supplemental round and some teams will be there multiple times (Rays – 6, Blue Jays – 4, Padres – 3, etc.)

The big story will be the Rays in the draft. We all know how the Rays essentially lost their entire team this offseason, however they have a very good minor league system filled with a lot of talent, and they will have 9 picks between the first round of the draft and the supplemental round. If they do their scouting right, they could get big rewards out of this year's draft.

The Mets will have the 13th overall pick this year and then they will get the 44th pick in the supplemental round (followed by pick 71 in the second round. In other words, the Mets will have a normal draft. We don't have an incredible amount of first year picks, and thanks to limited spending/losing, we don't have a lower amount of picks. (The Mets first round pick was actually protected this year, so we would have lost a later pick, but thanks to the amount of Supplemental picks this year, losing a pick would not have been good, but not terrible in an overall sense of things).

You know who I feel bad for though? And by feel bad I mean I feel not bad at all. The Phillies will get the supplemental pick #39 for Jason Werth signing with the Nationals and then pick #66, since the Nationals first round pick is protected.

According to Metsblog, Andy Martino, Adam Rubin, and Brian Costa, the Mets have released Castillo.

This is breaking news, so I don't have a lot of details yet, but if you have been following the Mets this Spring this has been set up the inevitable. If the reports are true, it is the end of the Castillo era, which is one of the most psychologically interesting era's in Mets history. Castillo was a player who did hustle, and at least one good season with the Mets (2009) and yet represented so much that was wrong with the Mets at the same time.

The negative representation wasn't fully Castillo's fault. Yes he struggled, and he did hamper the lineup. But in someways he became the physical embodiment of everything that was and is wrong with the Mets. Castillo came over in the latter half of 2007, right before the collapse. He then later got a massive three year contract, which was a perfect example of the Omar administration trying to win now by over compensating players that had readily available WARP players on the market. He later would become one of Omar's guys, thus giving him an additional stigma. Luis was then the victim of Jerry's horrible lineup construction, especially last season, where he was given the 2nd spot, when in reality, it was time to drop him in the lineup.

At the same time, releasing him is completely necessary. He isn't what he used to be, and the Mets have better options, at least offensively, then Luis Castillo. It is better to lose with younger players still climbing to their ceilings, than it is to lose with an aging former star that is overpaid. Or in other words, to be real, the Mets are going to need luck to be good this year. It is worth the gamble on unknown talent, rather than dwindling, consistent talent.

Luis Castillo faced a lot of criticism, from people including myself. He deserved some, not all. Good luck with whatever life brings next.

Now the Mets have to figure out their 2B issues.

The “Insert” culture of baseball cards these days can easily make cards that are designed to be valuable downright laughable a few seasons later. Case in point with this John Maine card.

Before we break down the card, some of you may be wondering what an Insert, or “Hit” is in modern baseball cards. Baseball Card sets now have smaller sets within them, called Inserts that highlight some sort of theme and are significantly harder to collect than base cards, thus making them more valuable. A “Hit” is when you get a baseball card that has either a piece of memorabilia (bat, jersey) in it or an autograph on it. Sometimes an inset series also are considered hits. Increasing the “Value” of these cards is the serial number on them, showing that only a limited number of these cards have been produced.

So back to this card. It was part of the insert set “Icons” and is also considered a hit due to the autograph on it. What makes this card so funny though, is even back in 2009, would you ever use the word “Icon” to describe John Maine. Now looking back on this card, 2 years later, it is even funnier considering the way the entire Maine situation worked out. That isn't a negative criticism on Upper Deck, its is just an example of how baseball can take unpredictable turns.

The last three Mets games have had one thing in common – They have all been extremely lopsided.

On Friday the Mets won 10-0. Saturday they lost 12-0. Today they one 13-3. So lets boil those three games down to the major story lines:

Friday's game was a great example of the Mets taking advantage of mistakes, something critical the team was missing the last two seasons due to untimely hitting. The Marlins committed 5 errors early, and the Mets were on top of that moving runners aggressively and following up errors with hits. The result was the offense explosion of Mets. Two key Mets players for this season played a huge roll in the 10 runs as Ike Davis and Thole smashed homers (both their second of the Spring).

In the last set of three games we discussed how Thole was heating up. He caught today and Friday and hit a combined 4-6, 3 R, 2 RBI with a HR. With questions starting to rise about Beltran, getting an offense surprise from Thole could be key this season.

Speaking of Beltran, if for some reason he isn't good to go by Opening Day, the playing time will probably fall on Hairston, who has also been awesome of late. Today he went 3-4, scoring 3 runs, hitting 2 homers, 2 RBI and added a walk for good measure. His pop is something to be intrigued by.

With such a wide varieties of scores, there are some pitching notes to make. Dickey stuttered on Saturday. Misch was near perfect for three innings today until allowing 3 ER over 2 outs in the 4th inning. Niese was fantastic on Friday going 4.2 innings, striking out 4 and reminding us all why it is so much fun to watch him pitch.

The season is getting closer, and my optimism is brewing.

By now you have probably have seen this advertisement on the web or actually in a Subway Car/Station. On the surface, I think this advertisement is incredibly funny. The reason I find it so funny is because of its reflection on the culture in New York. Yes the Mets are a joke. Right now they are a joke in so many different ways. They underperform. They make bad baseball moves. They are terrible at money.

This is of course all pre 2011 Mets information.

In the past offseason the Mets made their money problems worse (or, Madoff and the Wilpons made the money problems worse) but they made good baseball moves (Alderson, Collins, and then we'll see how the players are) and have been performing well in Spring. What I like about this advertisement is that its fuel. I hope someone brings a full size image of this advertisement and sticks it up in the Mets clubhouse. If you look at any major Mets website that has posted this image, it has incited Mets fans, and it should light up our players.

That leads to the other reason why I like this sign. It made fans angry. I'm fairly sarcastic person, and when it comes to sports I don't take things seriously at all (which is a major surprise generally for people who get to know me personally), so I wasn't surprised that I was not angry at all about this poster. However reading comments some fans are really angry. Unreasonably angry. What that translates into though is passion. It is nice to remember that we really are part of a passionate fan base that is ready and knocking down the door to come out of the gate with a good team.

So yeah, someone get a copy of that Subway Poster to Collins.

Similar to last time I missed two days, I again missed three games to go over. In the last three games the Mets have gone 2-1. In the one loss (to the Nationals) the Mets actually rallied to score 4 runs in the top of the ninth to bring the score to 6-5, only to then lose the game. So in these meaningless Spring Games, the Mets are showing some fight in their 6-8-1 record.

The big story out of these last three games for me at least has been Josh Thole. On Wednesday he went 3-3 with 2 R, 2 RBI, 2B and his first homer this Spring. Then yesterday against the Marlins he went 2-3, with 2 RBI's and his second double this Spring. So in the last two games he has had 5 hits, 2 doubles, a homer and 4 RBI's. He also managed to raise his Spring Batting average to .391. Thole is showing us that he could provide some interesting numbers in the catching position, an area that has been pretty much written off offensively ever since LoDuca's .318 BA season in 2006. We know that Thole can hit for a “high” average (the possibility of .280 for a catcher is very good) but some surprise pop in terms of doubles and hard hit line drives could be the unexpected boost, or surprise the Mets could need this season if they want to be competitive.

Another minor offense note would be David Wright, who finally got a hit this Spring. For the rest of the offense notes, you should probably check the box scores, but the Mets have been hitting much better these last two days than previously this week. Other players having two hit days in the last three games include Harris, Duda (who also hit his second homer of Spring) and Hu.

The only really bad pitching note would be Mike Pelfrey who showed that he is human yesterday allowing 4 earned runs in 4 innings of work. A really positive pitching note would be Dillon Gee who rebounded from his last appearance allowing no runs in three innings of work. Beato also added in another scoreless inning.

Next up for the Mets is a home game against the Marlins. Let's Go Mets!

The word around the baseball world is that Oliver will now get two more chances to make the team, in bullpen appearances. Let's backtrack though to explain the situation.

When Perez came to camp this year, he was going to be given a shot for the rotation, but it was said constantly by people close to the team that they see him more as a reliever, and they had him work out with the relievers. He then made his first start, which was pretty bad. The word was Perez was on a tight rope. Second start was good. However at that time the rest of the starters were also doing well, so it didn't seem like there was a place in the rotation for him, that he was still fighting for a place in the pen. Then came yesterdays start where in the first inning he was terrible, and in the second inning he was good (see the earlier post from today).

The result from the front office is now Perez will have two more shots to make the bullpen, and he is going to have to be stellar.

….I'm lost.

I thought we were already at this point with Perez where we gave him his chance, and now he was as the end. He has had a lot. Also, I have more patience than most Mets fans, so I have a feeling that if I feel fed up, then there are many more angry Mets fans out there about this situation.

With the way that the bullpen is shaping up, especially with the introduction of Izzy, I really don't see how Perez comes out of camp with the Mets, so can we just let him go already? Or do we need to use more preparation time for other pitchers to prolong the inevitable.

So I missed two days, three games and three losses, but thats Spring Training for you. Going back to Monday, the Mets dropped a game, 2-1, to the Tigers as Terry Collins got to manage against his mentor Leyland (thus why Collins is also wearing number 10). With a score like that, you can tell right off the bat that a problem for the Mets on Monday was the bats, which really fell silent only collecting 5 hits (Pagan, Bay, Evans, Thole and Lutz). With that stat, its understandable that some players had terrible days like Castillo (0-3), Harris (0-4), and Fmart (0-3, first bad day of Spring). Also, as you can imagine with the Tigers only scoring two runs, the pitching was on spot the majority of the day. Izzy had a scoreless inning. Igarashi struck out the side.

Then yesterday, the Mets played a split squad with half the team going with Collins on the road to Houston, and the other half staying back to play the Nationals. The Houston game was more interesting, so I'll save that for last. At home, one of the prospects I'm looking at made his Spring debut in a big way as Cory Vaughn in his first AB blasted a 2 run homer. With Castillo struggling, yesterday was a great day for Murphy who (playing 1B, 2B) went 2-5, scoring 2 R. Finally, Wright again went 0-3, this time with two strikeouts. Pitching wise, Izzy had his first blight of Spring, allowing a solo homer, but that was it. His Spring ERA is still 2.25, and he is starting to move off of the bubble and into the clubhouse for this 2011 Mets team.

The dominating story for the Mets yesterday was in Houston as Oliver Perez had a very Oliver Perez outing. In the first inning he allowed 3 earned runs, and according to people watching the game, he got lucky with two outs as the defense behind him made two spectacular plays. Then in the next inning, he was fine as it went 1-2-3. I'll have more on this later today.