Here in the Piedmont we’re at the time of year where it rains every day, which on one hand stinks because rain makes me depressed but on the other hand it washes away the pollen, so it’s not without its uses. It’s just too bad that the rain extends further north and has washed out [...]
It was a nice comeback season for J.D. Martinez in 2023, as he rebounded from a 117 OPS+ at age 34 to a 134 mark last year. With the Dodgers replacing him with Shohei Ohtani, Martinez hit free agency, where he didn’t quite find the market he imagined. He remained unsigned until the end of [...]
After an All-Star season in 2022, Starling Marte was nowhere close to that status in 2023, thanks in large part to double groin surgery he had in November of ’22. Marte tried to play thru the pain and discomfort but was just a shadow of himself, both at the plate and in the field. Oddly, [...]
My opinion last year with Francisco Alvarez was that he should have made the club out of Spring Training, getting most of his ABs early on as a DH and then receiving more time behind the plate as the year progressed. And people laughed. His defense was nowhere close to MLB-ready, they claimed, and the [...]
The Mets closed 2023 by going 23-22, thanks in no small part to the finishes by Jeff McNeil and Brandon Nimmo. While McNeil was a major disappointment the first four months of the season, Nimmo was having a solid year, with a .784 OPS thru the end of July. But the final two months of [...]
In 2021, Adrian Houser was very good, with a 3.22 ERA in a career-high in 142.1 IP. But he really out-pitched his peripherals, as he had a 4.33 FIP that season. In the past two years, Houser has combined for 214 IP and a 4.42 ERA. That’s a 95 ERA+ and if somehow Houser could [...]
One of the goals for David Stearns was to improve the Mets’ defense. And there are few center fielders in the game better than Harrison Bader when it comes to defense. Signing Bader allows the Mets to move Brandon Nimmo to left field. If Starling Marte returns to form, that gives the Mets a strong [...]
In the offseason before 2023, Brett Baty rocketed up prospect lists, finishing as high as No. 17 with Baseball Prospectus’ ranking. This caused some fans to want him to take over as the Mets’ starting third baseman. Then he had a very good Grapefruit League season, which caused even more fans to jump on the [...]
We heard right away once the offseason started that the Mets were interested in Luis Severino. And he was the first major player they signed under David Stearns. None of us were really sure how the offseason was going to play out. But if we put more weight on the Severino deal at the time, [...]
A lot of us thought that the Mets overpaid to get Francisco Lindor, sending out a non-insignificant package of players to acquire him and then extending him to a 10/$341 contract before he hit free agency, in a season where there were multiple top-shelf shortstops available. But Lindor has been tremendous as a Met. In [...]
Of all the major moves David Stearns has made this offseason – say with an AAV of $1.5 million or more – my favorite is the signing of Sean Manaea. While he doesn’t have the long-ago upside of Luis Severino, Manaea also has 81 starts since 2000, compared to 37 for Severino. And that’s with [...]
For the second time in three years, Jeff McNeil turned in a disappointing season in 2023. He posted a .108 ISO last year, compared to a .109 mark in 2001. And McNeil’s BABIP was .288 a season ago, compared to .280 in ’21. Lifetime, McNeil has a .140 ISO and a .321 BABIP, numbers that [...]