213 Miles From Shea

Hey Readers:

I am currently working right now on two separate projects right now for this site, and my site over at Fan Huddle. As of right now, the first set of articles I am working on is a review year by year of the Mets draft “success” of this decade (which means for the early 2000's, the success is pretty well determined at this point, but later years the success (or lack) has not been seen yet). I have finished 2000-2004 and I am planning to start posting these articles on this site starting on January 4 and going through January 14.

The second set of articles I am working on will be posted on my Fan Huddle site, and will be a Spring Training Preview of possible position battles, and story lines to look for. The series will go by position. Most likely these articles will start to be posted on the 10th, as we wait to see a clearer picture of what the 40 man could look like.

Of course I will continue to post regularly on both sites on other topics, but get excited for these two series (especially the Decade Draft series, I am really happy with it so far).

-Elliot

In this morning's Sports Center on ESPN, the Mets made both of their top 10 lists. ESPN presented, as usual, its top 10 plays of the year and of course, that had to be followed by the NOT top 10 plays of the year. The Mets were honored by being featured in both lists.

For the actual top 10 list, the Mets Daniel Murphy was #9 with his fantastic flip of the glove to the pitcher covering first base after the ball bounced off the edge of the base. Its one of those plays that is hard to describe in words. Below is the video of this amazing play.

The Mets also made the #1 NOT top ten play of the year. It's a night you probably remember. A night a lot of your hope for this season just went away completely. I am talking about of course when the Mets where about to get a great 8-7 win over the Yankees and then Luis Castillo didn't catch an easy two out pop-up, two runs scored and the Mets lost the game 9-8. That play is probably still in your mind if you saw it, so there is no reason to post it here.

In all of the excitement with Bay to the Mets, the possible (and not possible) availability of Carlos Zambrano, and Matt Holiday, there has been very little coverage of five minor signings that have occurred from yesterday to today.

The Phillies have been busy with one major league signing and one minor league signing. On the major league side, the Phillies added another arm to their bullpen in the form of Danys Baez. Baez just finished a contract with the Orioles where he had an up and down time where he pitched poorly and pitched well. He is coming off of a better year than 08, when he didn't play at all, and a poor 07. The contract is said to be for two years. The other players the Mets signed is Tagg Bozied, who was a big prospect several years ago, and then suffered a major injury in 2004 in a celebration. He played for an AAA team last season. He is 30 years old.

The Cubs have signed Marlon Byrd to a three year contract today. Yesterday the catcher's market got slightly smaller as the Rockies negotiated a one year deal with Miguel Olivio, which leaves Torrebela with one less option and leaves more compeption for the Mets catching job that Molina is holding out on.

Another NL East move happened yesterday as Kelly Johnson ended his time with the Braves. The Brave who caused the Mets much grief in the last several seasons has signed a one year contract with the Diamondbacks. I'm pretty glad to see him not in the division anymore.

Jason Bay and the Mets agreed to a 4 year, 66 million dollar deal with a fifth year option yesterday (pending a physical) meaning that the slugger will be patrolling left field. At first, believe it or not, I wasn't excited about this deal, but now I am, because I am excited about some of the promise this provides.

Think about the outfield of the Mets now. We have Bay, Beltran and Francoeur. A combination like that in the lineup is one of the best outfields in the league in terms of hitting (assuming Francoeur plays the full year for the Mets next year with the numbers he put up as a Met, not a Brave). There is the potential here for a lot of homers and really a lot of runs. If the lineup looks like this:

A few days ago, over at Fan Huddle, I made my case for the Mets signing Chapman. This was of course before the signing of Bay, but I stand by my words and still feel that Chapman is a worthy route for the Amazin's to go.

Later I will be posting my new look at the pitching on the Mets a direction to go now that they have committed money over to Bay.

Well, it has been a while since the Mets initial contract offer, and still no Jason Bay. A few days ago Gammons made a statement about how Bay would rather “play in Beirut than in Queens”. This sounds like a classic “he's just not that into you” situation. He doesn't want to play for us (based one what we are offering) and we are, smartly, not going to over buy on Bay. So what does that mean?

Well first for Bay, that means he will have to drop his requests becuase there are close to zero teams out there that can pay him what he wants to play.

For the Mets, it means they are probably making the right decision, as long as they go and plug up some holes. You know when you are hungry, and it is just as easy to eat a salad as it is to eat some Fast Food. You want to eat the Fast Food, and you will enjoy it, but you know later on it will hurt you. Well thats the situation here. We will enjoy having Bay in the lineup, and at first it will be good. However, as the year's go on, he will become a problem, especially if we give him 5 years. It won't be too big of a problem, but still a problem.

So what do we do instead?

We need to sign a pitcher, still look for a Castillo trade, and find a power outfielder that is reamining on the market that we can sign for one year (and only one year) and then spend big money on Free Agents next year, as that class is looking better. We still have a good core of players, we need to fill in the gaps right now.

This isn't about the Mets but its the holidays! That time of year where there people wish for snow, are the in mood to give, families get together and listen to Holiday music….by Rick Dempsey?

For those of you who don't know who Rick Dempsey is, he was the catcher for the Orioles for a while, and the MVP of the 1983 World Series. He was also known for his great antics during rain delays in Baltimore. Now he can be known for his album of holiday songs. I was filling up on gas at my local Royal Farms (in Baltimore) and they were playing Christmas songs. After one song, they advertised Rick's album and said that the previous song was sung by Rick himself. He actually does not sound that bad.

You just don't wake up to find a catcher singing, but whatever. Happy Holidays to everyone out there.

(If you are curious about the musical styling of Rick Dempsey you can preview his album on I-tunes)

Last week I wrote two articles for my other website, the Fan Huddle network, the New York Mets page, that I never linked here. The first of the two articles was about Fernando Nieve. Before his injury last year, he was a good surprise for the Mets in the starting role. Well he has been recovering well and he was doing pretty well in the Winter Leagues. The post written about him can be found here.

The second article was about Jose Reyes' interview with WFAN about he was happy, feeling better, and getting ready for next season. That article can be found here.

Tim Kurkjian over at ESPN has posted his all decade team for the 2000's and one current Met and one former Met was named to the team.

For the current Met, the honors went to Carlos Beltran for his amazing play in Center Field. As Mets fans, many of us take his play for granted as his silent play carries great offensive stats and great fielding. Tim adds in:

“He played the most games in center field of any player in the decade.
He hit 251 home runs, stole 256 bases, drove in 920 runs and won three
Gold Gloves. His performance in the 2004 postseason for the Astros —
eight home runs, tying the record for the most homers in one postseason
— was one of the best in baseball history.”

That postseason performance was basically how he ended up with the Mets, and we all remember that terrible year he had in 2005, where he was booed, but he shock it off and since 2006 he has been a key part of this team. A healthy Beltran is part of the reason why I have so much hope for 2010.

As for the former Met named to the all-Decade team, those honors went to Jeff Kent at second base. He never played for the Mets in this decade, so we can end the conversation about Kent now.

Bill Madden for the NY Daily News wrote a very interesting piece regarding Jason Bay today that brings up a few good points that are worth discussing/sharing. The first main point he brings up is that Bay's original demands probably got him out of a position to play for the Red Sox, and now with Mike Cameron signing a contract, Bay's services are no longer needed.

The Market now has shrunk to just Bay and the Mets and while money is usually what seals a deal, Bay has some concerns about going to the Mets. The first is the dimensions of Citi-Field, which honestly I am sick of hearing. The Mets hit a very low amount of homeruns last season. They were injured and had no power in their lineup, so that was one of the main reasons for the Mets not hitting long ball. Second, there are statistics that show this! The Mets hit more homeruns at home than they did on the road (although that difference is small).

The more concerning aspect of Bay being hesitant to sign the contract is a general feeling that the Mets are projected to finish 3rd in the division. Now of course I am biased, but I think the Mets, if healthy by next season and with another starting pitcher, could very well be projected to at least finsih second in the division next season if they have Bay. It is so difficult to draw conclusions from last season and project them into next season because of the uncanny amount of injuries. The Mets lineup, with Bay, will be one of the best in National League if they are healthy. One more starter (or two more) can make the Mets into a contender.

While Bay to the Mets seems inevitable, I want Bay to be happy being with the Mets, not to feel obligated because they are team with the money. In other words, he needs to have Queen's in his heart.