One year after trade, Lucas Duda continues to flourish

Saturday, April 18th marked a significant anniversary for Mets first baseman Lucas Duda.  One year ago on that day, General Manager Sandy Alderson officially made the commitment that Duda was to be the undisputed Mets first baseman by shipping Ike Davis to the Pittsburgh Pirates for Zach Thornton and a Player To Be Named Later, [...]

Measuring Jacob deGrom’s outstanding last 18 games

This may be the 10th article you’ve read about Jacob deGrom in the last 12 hours. But he’s been so good he’s deserved every one of them. He’s one pitch away from having not allowed a run in three starts. Even with that gopher ball, he’s got a 0.94 ERA in 19.1 IP. Raise your [...]

Do you have faith in Wilmer Flores and Juan Lagares?

In the offseason the Mets showed a lot of faith in Wilmer Flores and Juan Lagares. They showed faith in Flores by not acquiring a shortstop to compete with him for the starting job. And they showed faith in Lagares by trading away Matt den Dekker, the best choice to play center field if Lagares [...]

Are the Mets to blame for their Tommy John surgeries?

Part of the fallout of the news of Zack Wheeler's impending Tommy John (TJ) surgery has been the commentary on the way in which the Mets managed his innings and (later reported) ailments last season. There have been plenty of Monday morning doctors, fueled by tidbits of information spun into speculation by the media, suggesting [...]

Henny Penny and the necessity of lefty relievers

Anyone familiar with the children’s tale Henny Penny knows the moral of the story: Beware of those who predict calamity, especially with zero justification. We would be wise to remember the lessons of Henny Penny when it comes to the “calamity” of not having multiple lefty relievers on the team. Few things will have less [...]

Wright vs. Reyes – Did the Mets keep the right star?

At the conclusion of the 2011 season, General Manager Sandy Alderson was faced with what still stands as the biggest decision of his Mets tenure. David Wright and Jose Reyes were both 28 years old and set to become free agents. Alderson only had the budget to resign one of the team’s two homegrown, fan-favorite [...]

Dilson Herrera should be on every Top 100 prospect list

MLB.com recently released its top 100 prospect list for 2015. The good news is that there were five Mets on the list. The news that makes me do a double-take is that Dilson Herrera was not one of them. It’s a major undertaking to do a list around one team; to do one for the [...]

Offensive expectations for Juan Lagares

In Juan Lagares’ first three seasons in the Mets organization – from 2006 to 2008 – he committed 73 errors in 195 games.  He was also a shortstop.  In 2009, the decision was made to move Lagares to the outfield, and now he’s regarded as the best defensive centerfielder in major league baseball. Lagares’ journey [...]

LOOGY history and the Mets’ dismal failure with the approach

There’s a school of thought that goes if you repeat a lie loud enough and often enough – it becomes truth. This is, unfortunately, not exclusive to one walk of life. Where it rears its ugly head in baseball is with the notion that you need to have multiple lefty relievers, with at least one [...]

Travis d’Arnaud’s defense is not an issue…yet

Mets catcher Travis d'Arnaud had a rough go of it in 2014 on both sides of the ball. His early offensive struggles were well documented, as was his demotion and very strong comeback. His great second half went a long way towards putting to bed doubts about his ability to hit at the highest level. [...]